Visual Arts

Explore exhibitions, artists, and visual works that enrich Harvard’s cultural and academic life.

A vibrant composition of flowers, a bird, and butterflies with a distant manor under a moody sky.

Rachel Ruysch’s Lush (Still) Life

Now on display at the Museum of Fine Arts, a Dutch painter’s art proved a treasure trove for scientists.

by Lydialyle Gibson

Peonies and Butterflies (c. 1757)

Japanese nature painting exhibit is National Gallery's seventh most popular ever

Suite of Japanese nature paintings draws more visitors than 1976 King Tut exhibit

The 1931 Picasso painting <i>Nude, Green Leaves and Bust</i> being auctioned at Christie’s in 2010. The sale price of $106 million set a world record.

Brooke Lampley heads modern and impressionist art at Christie's

Brooke Lampley '02 heads modern and impressionist art at Christie's.

by Craig Lambert

A replica of what may be the earliest known version of the American flag to include stars

Rare 1776 U.S. flag displayed; Motif No. 1 celebrated in new book

A star-spangled Colonial find and a book honoring Motif No. 1

Reverend Raitei Arima, chief priest of Shokokuji Monastery in Kyoto, performs a blessing ceremony over a 30-scroll set of paintings from the 1700s, considered a cultural treasure of Japan, on March 26 at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. The museum is displaying the paintings, by Ito Jakuchu, to mark the centennial of Japan's gift of 3,000 cherry trees to the nation's capital.

Colorful Realm Japanese painting exhibit opens at National Gallery

Yukio Lippit curates Colorful Realm exhibit at National Gallery

by Spencer Lee Lenfield

Yukio Lippit video on 18th-century Japanese painter Itō Jakuchū

In a video interview, Yukio Lippit explains the beauty of Japanese paintings displayed in the Cherry Blossom Festival centennial exhibit.

Anthony Amore explains art theft

A video interview with Anthony Amore, director of security at the museum where the largest heist in history took place

<i>Nandina and Rooster</i> (c. 1761–1765)

Cherry Blossom Festival centennial marked with exhibit of Japanese paintings

Masterworks of Japanese painting on display for the Cherry Blossom Festival's centennial

by Spencer Lee Lenfield

<i>Untitled</i> (Night View of Trees and Streetlamp, Burgkühnauer Allee, Dessau), 1928

Lyonel Feininger's photography displayed at Harvard

Displaying a fascinating body of work

Anthony Amore at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, with empty frames that held venerable paintings before the 1990 theft

Art Security Expert Anthony Amore on the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Heist

A new book shatters myths about art theft.

by David Menconi

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's stolen paintings: images and facts

A slide show with facts about the works stolen from the Gardner museum in 1990.