Elissa Auther, visiting associate professor and Windgate Research and Collections Curator at the Museum of Arts and Design, mounted the exhibition Surface/Depth: The Decorative After Miriam Schapiro, on view at MAD through September 9. Highlighting Shapiro’s pivotal role in opening up the art world to historically marginalized forms of craft, decoration, and abstract patterning associated with femininity and women’s work, the exhibition underscores her legacy with selected works by contemporary artists Sanford Biggers, Josh Blackwell, Edie Fake, Jeffrey Gibson, Judy Ledgerwood, Jodie Mack, Sara Rahbar, Ruth Root, and Jasmin Sian. On April 23, Auther led an in-depth tour of the exhibition for Bard Graduate Center students in a seminar on postwar U.S. Craft and Design taught by Catherine Whalen. In addition, Ellen J. Holdorf, director of Collections Management, hosted a rare behind-the-scenes study session with studio craft objects from the museum’s rich holdings.

Ivan Gaskell presented a paper entitled “History, Harvard, and a House Museum,” at the symposium, Objects and the Formation of (Disciplinary) Knowledge in Universities and Beyond during his annual residence as a permanent fellow at the Lichtenberg-Kolleg (Advanced Study Institute in the Humanities and Social Sciences) of the Georg-August University, Göttingen, Germany. He also took part in two international workshops at the university: Sensible Objekte (“Objects of Sensitivity”) and Sammeln Erforschen (“Objects and Disciplines”). In July, he visited to the University of Groningen in the Netherlands to participate in a panel discussion, and to adjudicate the final projects in the summer school, The Knowledge of the Curator II: Curating Art and Science.