A Night at the Sackler Museum

Ben Stiller wasn’t on campus, but that didn’t stop the Harvard Art Museum Undergraduate Connection from hosting “Night at the Sackler Museum,” an event intended to bring students behind the scenes of the museum from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Thursday night. Flyby sent a correspondent who had never been to the Sackler to check the event out.

The night included tours of the museum’s exhibits, a performance by the (Harvard-Radcliffe Veritones, one of the College’s co-ed a capella groups, and cake served by Thomas Lentz, the Cabot Director of the Harvard Art Museums. The cake was accompanied by fortune cookies.

On the “Deciphering Symbols and Creating Meaning from Art” tour, a group of visitors trekked to the fourth floor of the museum and saw artist Gustave Moreau’s “Young Man and Death” and the modern art section, which included “I’m with Stupid” by Rachel Harrison. Harrison’s piece poses the meta-question, “Who gets to decide what belongs in a museum?” according to Yvette Ramirez ’12, who led the tour.

One of the students who attended the event said she saw a link between the museum and her coursework. Kristina F. Latino ’13, a prospective HAA concentrator, said, “I came to see a lot of the works that I am reading about in class.”

Kristen J. DePre ’13, who is also considering concentrating in History of Art and Architecture, said, “It’s nice to see lots of people from the outside coming into the museum. Even with the construction [at the Fogg Museum] there is still a collection here and students are more than welcome.”

Photo by Matthew E. Warshauer/The Harvard Crimson.