Art History Students Curate Museum Exhibition

A new exhibition called Pattern Makers, designed and curated by Pitt art history students, runs through May 9 at the Westmoreland Museum of American Art. The show tracks the presence and meaning of patterns across some of the museum’s collection that has rarely been on public view.

The students in Assistant Professor Alex Taylor’s Curatorial Development class mined the collection virtually—poring over spreadsheets and databases to examine thousands of pieces of art available to them. The result was an exhibition of 67 pieces of art from the museum’s permanent collection, presented in 12 clusters. It includes fine art as well as furniture, quilts and artisan-made objects. 

“I hope the students’ chief takeaway was just how many rich and complex connections one can draw across disparate works in a museum’s collection and how understanding its objects in new combinations can provide almost inexhaustible narratives,” said Taylor.

Two upcoming virtual conversations about the exhibition are scheduled:

• April 7, 7-8 p.m. In Conversation: Patterns in Quilts
• April 14, 7-8 p.m. In Conversation: The Process of Curating a Museum Exhibition Virtually
   

Students who took part in the project include Annie Abernathy, Isaiah Bertagnolli, Alan London, Katie Loney, Janina Lopez, Emily Mazzola, Morgan Powell, Olivia Rutledge and Vuk Vukovic.

Pictured at left: Francis Celentano, Alpha Red and Orange Alternates, 1969.

Collection: Westmoreland Museum of American Art.