Art & Culture
Monthly Archive: December Art
#ThrowbackThursday: Overshot Coverlets
In September, 1971, the ROM opened the landmark exhibition Keep Me Warm One Night, a kaleidoscopic display of over 500 pieces of Canadian handweaving. It was the culmination of decades of pioneering research and collecting by the ROM curatorial powerhouse duo ‘Burnham and Burnham’, aka Dorothy K. Burnham and Harold B. Burnham.
#ThrowbackThursday: A Very Hot Evening
In September, 1971, the ROM opened the landmark exhibition Keep Me Warm One Night, a kaleidoscopic display of over 500 pieces of Canadian handweaving. It was the culmination of decades of pioneering research and collecting by the ROM curatorial powerhouse duo ‘Burnham and Burnham’, aka Dorothy K. Burnham and Harold B. Burnham.
#ThrowbackThursday: Working Like Mad
In September, 1971, the ROM opened the landmark exhibition Keep Me Warm One Night, a kaleidoscopic display of over 500 pieces of Canadian handweaving. It was the culmination of decades of pioneering research and collecting by the ROM curatorial powerhouse duo ‘Burnham and Burnham’, aka Dorothy K. Burnham and Harold B. Burnham.
#ThrowbackThursday: Keep Me Warm One Night
Exactly forty-five years ago, in September, 1971, the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) opened the landmark exhibition Keep me Warm One Night, a kaleidoscopic display of over 500 pieces of Canadian handweaving. It was the culmination of decades of pioneering research and collecting by the ROM curatorial powerhouse duo ‘Burnham and Burnham’, aka Dorothy K. Burnham and Harold B. Burnham.
Exhibit A: Dior Dress
“In a machine age, dressmaking is one of the last refuges of the human, the personal, the inimitable.”
— Christian Dior
Commissioned by the ROM, Passage #5 was designed by John Galliano for Christian Dior Haute Couture. This dramatic coat-dress was inspired by fashion illustrator René Gruau’s drawings from the 1940s and 1950s and is a 21st-century reworking of Dior’s 1947 New Look collection (his first).
A Story of Ghana: Exploring the Asafo Flags at the ROM
Since the beginning of the month, the Royal Ontario Museum has been host to a stunning display of historic Ghanaian imagery, in the form of the flags used by the Asafo fighting groups to send messages to friends and enemies alike. These flags document many of the events and histories that were of value to the Fante states and are expressive, powerful, and of great importance to understanding the history of the region as we know it today. As a collection, they make up a fascinating display of aesthetic storytelling that reveals much, and gives each viewer a sense of what was important to each community under each flag at various points throughout each one's history, right up to the present day.
Go with the Flow: Technology & Early Glass
Glass is probably the most fluid of solids. Looking at blown glass, such as that in the ROM's Chihuly exhibition, is like watching movement made still. If you look carefully at the handles of the perfectly preserved handles of this Roman glass vase from Syria (above), it looks as though it is still a fluid, still dynamically moving along its flow. In a way, that is because it is. Glass essentially has the atomic structure of a fluid, but it has been so rapidly cooled that it is essentially stuck in that condition.
ROM Celebrates National Aboriginal Day!
On June 21st, the ROM Learning Department began National Aboriginal Day celebrations with a cleansing ceremony using Sweet Grass to start the day off in a good, positive way led by Justin Chiblow, Kiowa Wind Memorial Indigenous Youth Intern.
Behind the Blitz: Become the Biodiversity
Blog by Stacey Lee Kerr, Biodiversity Storyteller / Creative Producer for the ROM's Centre for Biodiversity
At this year's Ontario BioBlitz, things are set to get a little wild... we've invited everyone to dress up as their favourite Ontario Species for our NatureFest Costume Contest. But what does it take to win a fabulous prize? Inside, in the final installment of our Behind the Blitz blog series, we've got some tips for how to come out on top, and "become the biodiversity"!
New to ROM: Frances Ferdinands
Combining aesthetic beauty and history, this work cleverly and poetically combine references from historical Sri Lankan decorative art alongside meanings that resonate with issues of inequality, injustice, and the exploitation of natural resources during Sri Lanka’s colonial past. Written by Deepali Dewan.
