The new Robert H. and Blythe Bickel Edwards Center of Art and Dance marks the beginning of a second century of fine arts in Bowdoin’s curriculum. The College first included formal courses in art and music during the 1912-1913 academic year.
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- Prof. Frederic Tillotson practicing with the Meddiebempsters, 1945.
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- Prof. Thomas Cornell with art students in the attic studio of Adams Hall, 1965
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- View of the Rotunda of the Walker Art Museum showing plaster “casts of the antique,” before 1937.
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- From Michael Kutch’s “Waterlines” ( 2009).
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- “Book of Hours” of Marie de Medicis, ca. 1530.
Sight & Sound, a new exhibition in the Bowdoin College Library, celebrates this “turn-of-the-century” by taking a look back at how art and music have enriched the learning and cultural life of the College from its beginnings.
The exhibition features examples from the Library’s rare book collection that have supported fine arts learning, including medieval illuminated manuscripts, songsters, musical settings for Longfellow’s poems, book illustration and contemporary artists’ books.
Teaching art and music at Bowdoin over the past century is also documented through the display of items from the Bowdoin College Archives.
These materials remind us of how well the fine arts have thrived at Bowdoin and suggest a promising and exciting future for the performing and visual arts in the years to come.
