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BGC Gallery will resume its exhibition programming this September with the return of Sèvres Extraordinaire: Sculpture from 1740 until Today, originally slated for fall 2024.
Bard Graduate Center is an advanced graduate research institute in New York City dedicated to the cultural histories of the material world. Our MA and PhD degree programs, Gallery exhibitions, research initiatives, scholarly publications and public programs explore new ways of thinking about decorative arts, design history, and material culture.

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28th Annual Iris Foundation Awards
Honoring Irene Roosevelt Aitken, Dr. Julius Bryant, Dr. Meredith Martin, and Katherine Purcell





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BGC Gallery reopens this September with the return of Sèvres Extraordinaire: Sculpture from 1740 until Today, originally slated for fall 2024.

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The Bard Graduate Center Gallery produces multiple exhibitions and publications each year, serving as a vital center of learning and a catalyst for engagement in the interrelated disciplines of decorative arts, design, and material culture. The gallery is celebrated in the museum world for its longstanding legacy of landmark projects dedicated to significant—yet often understudied—figures and movements in the history of decorative arts and design; these exhibitions and publications typically represent the definitive intervention on the artists and objects they investigate. BGC Gallery is also committed to generating and supporting a vast range of diverse presentations, small and large, that challenge traditional approaches to object inquiry; these examinations of material culture explore the human experience as manifest in our creation and use of “things” of all kinds. Whether originating in internal research and expertise, or in collaboration with external subject specialists, these endeavors prioritize rigorous scholarship while seeking to adhere to the field’s highest standards in production and design.



The Sevres Porcelain Manufactory: Alexandre Brongniart and the Triumph of Art and Industry, 1800-1847 was the first in-depth examination of the life and career of the longtime director of the renowned French porcelain maker and the company’s rebirth under his leadership.

Appointed director of the Sevres manufactory in 1800, Brongniart was a gifted scientist, teacher, and administrator. Bridging the philosophies of the Age of Enlightenment and the emerging Industrial Revolution, he brought his scientific side to bear on improving the way in which ceramics were made at Sevres. Brongniart also used his training to forge alliances in the industry and to work within the international marketplace to assure not only Sevres’ survival, but its commercial preeminence.

The exhibition featured 110 drawings and watercolors never before seen in the United States, as well as a number of masterful examples of Sevres porcelain drawn from private and institutional collections. It was on view at Bard Graduate Center from October 17, 1997–February 1, 1998 and was curated by Derek E. Ostergard.
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Credits
Curated by Tamara Preaud. Organized by Bard Graduate Center with Manufacture Nationale de Sèvres.