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Art Talk Live: New Frame(work)s for German Expressionism

A painting of a man in an orange suit, with a cat and a window in the background.
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, German, Self-Portrait with Cat, 1920. Oil on commercially woven cotton fabric. Harvard Art Museums/Busch-Reisinger Museum, Museum purchase, BR50.12.

Gallery Talk

This event was recorded. Please view the talk on our Vimeo channel.

German Expressionists understood frames as integral to their paintings—often designing, carving, and painting the frames themselves. And yet, over the last century, many such frames were removed by art dealers, collectors, and even museums.

In this talk, curator Lynette Roth will tell the story of how a team of colleagues reframed the Busch-Reisinger Museum’s paintings collection in advance of the Harvard Art Museums’ re-opening in 2014. Based on extensive research and recent scholarship on and growing interest in German Expressionist frames, these “new” frames replicate lost originals, thus restoring as close as possible the artists’ original intent.

Led by:
Lynette Roth, Daimler Curator of the Busch-Reisinger Museum and Head, Division of Modern and Contemporary Art

This talk will take place online via Zoom. Free admission, but registration is required. To register, please complete this online form.

Read these instructions on how to join a meeting on Zoom. If you have any questions, please contact am_register@harvard.edu.

Art Talks Live are presented via Zoom every other Tuesday at 12:30pm (ET) and offer an up-close look at works from our collections with our team of curators, conservators, fellows, and graduate students.

The Harvard Art Museums are committed to accessibility for all visitors. For anyone requiring accessibility accommodations for our programs, please contact us at am_register@harvard.edu at least 48 hours in advance.