What matters to you.
Sign Out
Play Live Radio
0:00
0:00
NEXT UP:
 
Top

Forum Network

Free online lectures: Explore a world of ideas

Funding provided by:
boston-athenaeum-logo-9x9.jpg

Boston Athenaeum

The Boston Athenaeum , one of the oldest and most distinguished independent libraries in the United States, was founded in 1807 by members of the Anthology Society, a group of fourteen Boston gentlemen who had joined together in 1805 to edit The Monthly Anthology and Boston Review. Their purpose was to form "an establishment similar to that of the Athenaeum and Lyceum of Liverpool in Great Britain; combining the advantages of a public library [and] containing the great works of learning and science in all languages." The library and Art Gallery, established in 1827, were soon flourishing, and grew rapidly, both by purchase of books and art and by frequent gifts. For nearly half a century the Athenaeum was the unchallenged center of intellectual life in Boston, and by 1851 had become one of the five largest libraries in the United States. Today its collections comprise over half a million volumes, with particular strengths in Boston history, New England state and local history, biography, English and American literature, and the fine and decorative arts. The Athenaeum supports a dynamic art gallery, and sponsors a lively variety of events such as lectures and concerts. It also serves as a stimulating center for discussions among scholars, bibliophiles, and a variety of community interest groups.break

http://www.bostonathenaeum.org

  • Literacy and Picturacy

    Thu, Jan 8, 2004
    When literacy is the universal standard of cultural achievement in both nations and individuals, the ability to read a picture is so little recognized that we do not even have a name for it. On the contrary, the opposition between pictures and words commonly separates literate from illiterate, the educated elite from the barbarous idolators of the image. With examples ranging from the prehistoric cave paintings of Lascaux to the disturbing contemporary photographs of Sally Mann, James Heffernan seeks to complicate the cultural polarity by showing that pictures demand to be read quite as much as printed pages do, that we cannot "recognize" their meaning until and unless we learn to interpret their signs, which largely depend on the cultural conventions within which they are framed. But learning to read pictures also means listening to the questions they raise and the challenges they pose to authority of the word.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum

  • William Clark and the Shaping of the West

    Fri, Apr 23, 2004
    Landon Jones discusses the life of William Clark, and describes the dark and bloody ground of America's early West, describing how the West was won and what we gained and lost by winning it. Between 1803 and 1806, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark co-captained a fabled expedition across the vast, largely unexplored reaches of the North American continent. Lewis ended his life three years after returning to civilization, but Clark, as the highest-ranking federal official in the West, spent three decades overseeing the consequences of the historic journey, namely, Indian removal and the destruction of Native America.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum

  • Maps and History: Constructing Images of the Past

    Sat, Apr 26, 2003
    Jeremy Black, professor of history at the University of Exeter, argues that historical atlases offer an understanding of the past that is invaluable, not only because they convey a previous age's sense of space and distance, but also because they reveal what historians and educators of those periods thought important to include or omit. Black explores the role, development, and nature of these important reference tools, from ancient to modern times.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum

  • Inside a Stem Cell Laboratory

    Thu, Jan 6, 2005
    Ann Parson, author of the recently published *The Proteus Effect: Stem Cells and Their Promise for Medicine*, shares some basic information about stem cells and what the future holds for medicines based on them. She is joined by four postdoctoral fellows who work in one of Boston's and the country's leading stem cell research laboratories, that of George Daley, a Harvard Medical School and Boston Children's Hospital hematologist and oncologist. Each scientist describes the research project he or she is tackling and how, if successful, their work could lead to significant improvements in current medical practices. With the stem cells of humans finally isolated, researchers are entering a new era of harnessing cells to treat a variety of disorders.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum

  • Sea of Glory: The US Exploring Expedition (1838-1842)

    Thu, Jan 13, 2005
    Nathaniel Philbrick explains for the first time why the US Exploring Expedition vanished from the national memory. Using new sources, including a secret journal, Philbrick reconstructs the darker saga that official reports, which focused on the "Ex Ex"' accomplishments, never told. The US Exploring Expedition of 1838-1842 was one of the most ambitious undertakings of the 19th century and one of the largest voyages of discovery the Western world had ever seen: six magnificent sailing vessels and a crew of hundreds that included botanists, geologists, mapmakers, and biologists, all under the command of the young, brash lieutenant Charles Wilkes. Their goal was to cover the Pacific Ocean, top to bottom, and to plant the American flag around the world. They discovered a new southern continent, which Wilkes would name Antarctica. This was an enterprise that should have been as celebrated and revered as the expeditions of Lewis and Clark.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum

  • French and Indian War: Struggle for North America

    Thu, Jan 20, 2005
    William Fowler captures the sweeping panorama of the French and Indian War, and the huge cast of characters who fought it. Field commanders on both sides contended with the harsh realities of disease, brutal weather, and scant supplies, frequently having to build the roads they marched on. For many, the French and Indian War is just the backdrop for *The Last of the Mohicans*, a mere prelude to the American Revolution. Fowler's engrossing narrative reveals it as a turning point in modern history. On May 28, 1754, a group of militia and Indians led by 22-year-old major George Washington surprised a camp of sleeping French soldiers near present-day Pittsburgh. The brief but deadly exchange of fire that ensued lit the match that, in Horace Walpole's memorable phrase, would "set the world on fire." The resulting French and Indian War in North America escalated into a conflict fought across Europe, Africa, and the East and West Indies. Before it ended, nearly one million men had died.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum

  • Longfellow: A Rediscovered Life

    Tue, Feb 8, 2005
    Charles C. Calhoun shows how the young poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow blended the Federalist politics and Unitarianism of his parents' generation with the German romanticism he discovered on his travels. The result was distinctive American poetry, traditional in form, but nationalistic in sentiment. Longfellow's Paul Revere, Priscilla Alden, Miles Standish, and the Village Blacksmith became American icons. And in his masterpiece, *Evangeline*, Longfellow invented the foundational myth of Acadian and Cajun ethnic identity. Calhoun's *Longfellow: A Rediscovered Life* is a Victorian family saga. As a young man from the provinces, Longfellow gained international celebrity and great wealth; yet his life was afflicted by chronic melancholy, by the tragic deaths of two beloved wives, by a spendthrift son, and by a self-destructive brother. A procession of vivid characters walks through the pages of Calhoun's book, from the poet's Revolutionary War grandfather, Peleg Wadsworth, to his friends and acquaintances, including Hawthorne, Emerson, Charles Sumner, Dickens, Carlyle, Fanny Butler, Queen Victoria, and Oscar Wilde.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum

  • One Hundred Years of Egyptian Art at the MFA

    Thu, Mar 10, 2005
    Few people realize that the first home of the Museum of Fine Arts was the Boston Athenaeum, and that the Athenaeum's galleries once housed several thousand Egyptian objects. Today, the Department of Egyptian Art at the MFA Boston has grown to include some 70,000 objects and is one of the finest collections of its kind in the world. Recently celebrating its 100th anniversary, it is also the oldest such department in the United States. This lecture examines how Boston became interested in ancient Egypt, when the first objects arrived on Boston shores, and how the collection developed to its present size and quality. Using archival photographs, Dr Freed focuses on behind-the-scenes stories of the early years and the Department's pioneering archaeological excavations in Egypt. Dr Rita E. Freed has been working in the MFA Boston's Ancient Egyptian Department for 15 years; she was recently named to the John F. Cogan Jr. and Mary L. Cornille Chair of the Department of Art of the Ancient World. She is also adjunct professor of art at Wellesley College. Dr Freed has curated a number of internationally acclaimed exhibitions on the subject of ancient Egyptian and Nubian Art, including *Rameses the Great*, which toured the country in the late 1980s, and *Pharaohs of the Sun: Akhenaten, Nefertiti, Tutankhamen* in 1999, which traveled to Chicago, Los Angeles, and Leiden, Netherlands. Dr Freed has participated in archaeological excavations in Egypt, Cyprus, and Israel.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum

  • The White House: A Pop-Up Book

    Tue, Mar 22, 2005
    Starting with the design by Irish-born architect James Hoban in 1792, the White House history spans more than 200 years. In *The White House: A Pop-Up Book*, Chuck Fischer brings to life not only the architecture, furnishings, and fine art of America's First Home, but also the history of Washington, DC, the National Mall, and America's First Families. A movable diorama of the Mall gives a 3-D view of America's national monuments; a pop-up of the White House provides a look at the mansion's exterior; a standing "carousel" reveals interiors of the Red Room, Cross Hall, Blue Room, Green Room, and Lincoln Bedroom; a removable map of Washington, DC details the city's layout; and a gallery of the presidents combined with a fan that opens to portray the first ladies illustrates America's leading families over the centuries. In addition, numerous pull-outs and pop-ups surprise the reader with interesting details, such as holiday traditions at the White House and the antics of more than one White House child (roller skating across polished floors or bombarding a cabinet meeting with a toy cannon!). Chuck Fischer is one of the most talented and sought-after artists in America today and is the author and illustrator of the acclaimed *Great American Houses and Gardens: A Pop-Up Book* and *Wallcoverings: Applying the Language of Color and Pattern*, both published by Universe. His wallcovering and fabric designs are in the permanent collection of the Cooper-Hewitt Museum, and he has recently been a visiting artist at the American Academy in Rome.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum

  • Hudson River School of American Landscape Painting

    Thu, Apr 14, 2005
    David Dearinger, a curator at the Boston Athenaeum, lectures on history and technique of the the Hudson River School style of landscape painting. The Hudson River School resulted from the earliest attempts by American artists to find a truly "American" theme and style. It was born in the 1820s in the paintings of Thomas Cole and thrived through the 1850s in the work of Asher Durand, John Kensett, Sanford Gifford, Fitzhugh Lane, and Frederic Edwin Church. Dr Dearinger traces the birth and development of the style using key examples of paintings by these and other artists, gives an overview of the movement's historiography, discusses contemporary critical responses to it, and comments on the waning and eventual demise of the style in the 1870s. **David Dearinger** is Susan Morse Hilles Curator of Paintings and Sculpture at the Boston Athenaeum. An art historian and curator, he received his PhD from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, with a specialty in nineteenth-century American art. He taught art history in New York at Brooklyn College, Hunter College and, for many years, at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Before coming to Boston, he was chief curator at the National Academy of Design in New York. He has published and lectured widely on the history of American painting and sculpture.
    Forum Network
    Partner:
    Boston Athenaeum
Load More