The JCSM and its collections are available to you in many ways. Book a docent-led tour, bring students over on your own to use the galleries for instruction, or even send students over by themselves for a special assignment. You can request pieces from the permanent collection to use in research and presentation, as well as have a curator lead all or part of your class.
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To book a tour, or to let us know to expect you and your students, contact Debbie Frojo at jcsmtours@ auburn.edu, or call 844-3486. Please contact us at least two weeks in advance.
As I looked through the
artworks and researched them, it became clear that people’s longing to express their dignity, or that of others, through art was consistent across countries, eras, and cultures.
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— Honors Introduction to Art History student
If you would like to incorporate a museum project into your class, contact Scott Bishop, Curator of Academic and Public Programs, at bishogs@auburn.edu, or call 844-7014. SAVE THE DATE
M o nd a y, M a y 6 / 8 a .m .
S EEI N G ACR O S S TH E C U RR IC ULUM
A workshop for Auburn University faculty, including teaching assistants Co-sponsored by JCSM and Auburn’s Office of University Writing
Contacts:
Scott Bishop Curator of Academic and Public Programs bishogs@auburn.edu 844-7014 Christopher Basgier Associate Director of University Writing chris.basgier@auburn.edu 844-7493
MUSEUM HOURS Monday: Closed Tuesday–Saturday: 10 a.m.–4:30 p.m. Extended Hours: Thursday until 8 p.m. Sunday: 1–4 p.m.
VISIT. JOIN. SUPPORT.
901 SOUTH COLLEGE STREET AUBURN, AL ABAMA
@JCSMAUBURN JCSM.AUBURN.EDU
T DIGNITY AND DIVERSITY:
Portraits from the Permanent Collection A practicum exhibition curated by the students of Honors Introduction to Art History
he modern concept of dignity—the notion of an individual’s inherent human worth—defines one idea at the heart of the artistic genre of portraiture and at the center of this exhibition. By translating a person’s likeness, character, role, or status into a work of art, the artist recognizes and communicates a subject’s value, simply through the fact of the portrait itself. The portraits in this gallery tell us that the individuals before us should be seen and remembered. But we also recognize changes in the definition of dignity over time and across cultures. In Europe before the nineteenth century, for example, the term “dignity” communicated a narrower idea of rank, power, and social status. Similarly, the concept of portraiture is also an ever-changing and diverse category that has manifested itself over the centuries through a variety of subjects, media, and styles.
The student-curators of this exhibition quickly recognized a shared sense of dignity in the more than one hundred diverse and varied portraits held in the museum’s permanent collection. As one student wrote: “As I looked through the artworks and researched them, it became clear that people’s longing to express their dignity, or that of others, through art was consistent across countries, eras, and cultures.” While the long and complex history of portraiture highlights the differences, individualities, and particulars that make each of us unique, it also offers the opportunity to recognize the common humanity we all share. Each student in the class selected one work from the permanent collection to present. Their collective choices demonstrate a variety of portrait formats, from full-length to bust-length and frontal to profile poses, in a range of styles, from the expressive and stylized to the strictly naturalistic. Seen through the variety of modes within painting, photography, and printmaking, the subjects and sitters of the works introduce themselves as anonymous, everyday individuals as well as the elite, famous, and powerful. The selections also present a surprising roster of national and internationally known artists, including two artists from the state of Alabama: Kathryn Tucker Windham and Anne Goldthwaite.