Museums & Collections

Discover treasures from Harvard’s museums and special collections, from ancient artifacts to modern art.

A worm-like creature known as the "velvet worm" rears as if looking at the camera

Creepy Crawlies and Sticky Murder Weapons at Harvard

In the shadows of Singapore’s forests, an ancient predator lies in wait—the velvet worm.

by Olivia Farrar

Ornate eighteenth-century dress with wide hooped skirt

Peabody Essex Museum fashion exhibit

Highlighting 250 years of women in fashion

by Nell Porter-Brown

Three people in 1950s New York

Robert Frank at the Addison Gallery, Andover, Massachusetts

“Robert Frank: The Americans,” at the Addison Gallery of American Art

by Nell Porter-Brown

A photograph of art historian Cassandra Albinson next to a photograph of a portrait of the Marquise de Pompadour applying pink rouge to her cheeks

Harvard Portrait: Cassandra Albinson

A curator takes a fresh look at portraits of aristocratic European women.

by Jonathan Shaw

Philanthropist Edwin Binney with Helen Willard, curator of the Harvard Theatre Collection

Edwin Binney, 3rd

Brief life of a philanthropic art collector: 1925-1986

by Madison U. Sowell

An historic photograph from Radcliffe’s Schlesinger Library archives shows the 1936 exhibition on women scientists—in this case, folders of their published scholarship.

Radcliffe’s 1936 exhibit celebrating women in university life

“Women in Science” on display

by Alona Bach

Up Close (Virtually) with the Forbes Pigment Collection

Harvard’s world-famous collection of colors can now be enjoyed from home. 

by Marina N. Bolotnikova

Majestic twentieth-century stone castle perched on Gloucester coastline

Hammond Castle Museum

Gothic surroundings, spiritualism, and science: Hammond Castle Museum’s eclectic appeal

by Nell Porter-Brown

Photograph of Edo era fan depicting Mount Fuji and Mount Tsukuba on alternate sides

An Edo-era dazzler from Harvard Art Museums exhibit

This folding fan enfolds two sacred mountains.

by Lydialyle Gibson

Detail of a handwritten page from suffragist Susan B. Anthony’s journal, used as an example of the kinds of manuscripts volunteers are transcribing for Harvard libraries and archives.

Harvard libraries welcome volunteers’ help with historical manuscripts

Volunteer transcribers help make Harvard library documents accessible.

by Diane E. Booton

Claude Monet's painting of clouds, fields, and poplars

Museum of Fine Arts winter exhibits

Winter exhibits at the Museum of Fine Arts

by Nell Porter-Brown