The Carlos celebrates the career of Catherine Howett Smith
le ft Catherine Howett Smith
celebrates her retirement last November. ri g h t Hendrick Goltzius
(Netherlandish, 1558–1617), Detail from The Annunciation from The Life of the Virgin, 1594, Engraving, Museum purchase in honor of Catherine Howett Smith. 2021.10.1
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ast fall, Emory University celebrated the distinguished career of Carlos Museum Associate Director, Catherine Howett Smith. For 36 years, her keen intellect, far-reaching vision, and steadfast work ethic shaped the museum into one of the university’s crown jewels, serving both the Emory and greater Atlanta communities. Much of what is celebrated about the Carlos today bears her fingerprints. She was instrumental in the 35,000 sq. ft. expansion of the museum and ensured that the museum would be a vital part of the intellectual life of the campus and the community. Catherine wrote many of the transformative grants for the Carlos, including those that expanded family programming, increased the use of technology, and created an on-site conservation lab. Catherine developed successful strategic plans, accreditation reviews, funding proposals, and
interdisciplinary initiatives. She also served as interim director for two terms and oversaw the museum’s ambitious programs in conjunction with the summer Olympic games in Atlanta, which included a satellite facility, several major exhibitions, a city-wide outdoor sculpture project, and a significant increase in visitation, publicity, and funding. Her commitment to the Carlos and Emory for more than three decades demonstrates that real and meaningful accomplishment comes from a lifetime commitment to an institution developed with imagination and vision and executed with discipline and determination. To honor Catherine’s three decades of service, the Carlos acquired The Annunciation from The Life of the Virgin by Hendrick Goltzius (Netherlandish, 1558– 1617). Goltzius, a virtuoso and prolific printmaker, created this ambitious, large-format series in the 1590s. He executed five of the
suite’s six engravings in the manner and hand of earlier European masters, such as Albrecht Dürer and Lucas van Leyden, but devised new compositions for each scene. They were so convincing that they were initially thought to be previously unknown works by Dürer and Lucas. The Annunciation is the first print in the series, and it is the most complex. Rather than imitating the style of a single earlier master, Goltzius synthesized the manners of several Italian artists—including Raphael, Titian, Barocci, and Zuccaro—a choice that imbued The Annunciation with a mystery as enigmatic as the Virgin herself, who was considered to be the perfect imitator and reflection of Christ. The Annunciation joins another engraving from Goltzius’s Life of the Virgin series, The Adoration of the Shepherds, executed in the manner of Jacopo da Bassano, in the Carlos Museum’s permanent collection of Works on Paper. Z
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