Institute for the Study of the Ancient World

This lecture will take place in person at ISAW. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. The body was a hugely popular subject of representation in ancient Egypt. But this talk will look at the bodies in Egyptian art that we now don’t see–those of the ancient Egyptian audience.

Published 02/04/2026 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events

This lecture will take place in person at ISAW. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. This talk will explore how and why that was so, offering several hypotheses for why Egyptian figural art became central to the imagining of this complex psychological concept. The talk––paying special attention to Rodin’s self-described “Egyptian colossus,” his 1898 monument to Honoré de Balzac––will also probe Rodin’s highly distinctive approach to this widespread association between Egyptian art and the formal expression of the human potential for unconscious thought.

Published 11/05/2025 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events

This lecture will take place in person at ISAW. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. This lecture explores how Rodin created the same tactile, intimate viewing experience with his sculptures of dancers, including his Nijinsky (1912). Designed to be held in the hand rather than fixed on a base, this sculpture instantiates an encounter with the viewer’s body that is both mobile and sexualized, in deliberate homage to Vaslav Nijinsky’s scandalous 1912 ballet Afternoon of a Faun.

Published 11/05/2025 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events

This lecture will take place in person at ISAW. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. This lecture examines the origins and development of this technique, as well as how Rodin’s process of combining disparate parts opened onto a genre of remarkable assemblage sculptures that incorporate ancient vessels and other found elements.

Published 11/05/2025 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events

This lecture will take place in person at ISAW. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. Ancient Egyptian images of the body are at the same time both highly recognizable and foreign to the modern viewer. From impossible composite figures of human-animal hybrids to seemingly stiff and block-like human forms in sculpture, Egyptian depictions were meant not simply to capture a likeness, but to manifest powers in order to establish the presence of, and relations between, depicted entities.

Published 11/05/2025 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events

This event will take place in person. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. Please join us as Carl Walsh, ISAW Assistant Curator, hosts a conversation with Bénédicte Garnier, Musée Rodin, in the gallery for a behind the scenes look at Rodin’s Egypt. Benedicte and Carl will address the themes of the exhibition, discuss Rodin’s sculpture and his Egyptian antiquities on display, and explore comparative perspectives on the representation of the human.

Published 10/27/2025 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events

This workshop will take place in person at ISAW. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. Please join illustrator and teaching artist Joan Chiverton for an afternoon of sketching in the galleries in conjunction with the exhibition Rethinking Etruria. Develop your drawing skills and discover a new way of seeing the exhibit, as you sketch masterpieces and other objects. Following a brief introduction and tutorial, Ms. Chiverton will circulate the galleries and provide individual coaching, if desired. All skill levels are welcome, from beginner to advanced. Participants should bring their own drawing pad or paper with a board, but we will have paper on hand if necessary. Gallery specific pencils will be provided by ISAW. For conservation reasons pens, pastels, charcoal and paints need to be kept at home.

Published 05/29/2025 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events Events Archive Academic Year 2024-2025

This event will take place in person. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. Please join us as Roberta Casagrande-Kim, ISAW Exhibitions Director, hosts guest curator Vincent Jolivet École Normale Supérieure in a gallery conversation about the recent work and discoveries at the Etruscan necropolis at Norchia. Using the objects on display, Vincent will discuss how his team's excavations have helped us understand more about the Etruscan language and society, and how digital techniques such as drone photography and photogrammetry have allowed us to bring Norchia into the gallery for visitors to experience.

Published 04/08/2025 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events Events Archive Academic Year 2024-2025

Come join us for an evening performance of traditional Andalusian music and song! Immerse yourself in the spirit of intercultural exchange and the cosmopolitan synergy of Al-Andalus, brought to life by the New York Andalus Ensemble.

Published 11/18/2024 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events Events Archive Academic Year 2024-2025

This lecture will take place in person at ISAW. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. This lecture is given in conjunction with ISAW's exhibition Madinat al-Zahra: The Radiant Capital of Islamic Spain. When Abd al-Rahman I established independent Umayyad rule in Cordoba in the mid-eighth century, most of his subjects were Christian. By the time Madinat al-Zahra flourished under his descendants, Abd al-Rahman III and al-Hakam II, the majority of the caliph’s subjects were Muslim.

Published 11/14/2024 — filed under: exhibition-event Located in Events Events Archive Academic Year 2024-2025

Search results