Clark Art Presents Symposium on Guillaume Lethiere

Print Story | Email Story

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Clark Art Institute presents a one-day symposium on Friday, Sept. 27 in celebration of Guillaume Lethière.

The exhibition, organized in partnership with the Musée du Louvre, is the first to investigate Lethière's extraordinary career. This free event takes place from 9:30 am–6:30 pm in the Manton Research Center auditorium.

The symposium invites scholars and the public to examine Lethière’s body of work together, and to contextualize the presence and reception of Caribbean artists in France in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The event is moderated by Olivier Meslay, Hardymon Director at the Clark; Esther Bell, deputy director and Robert and Martha Berman Lipp Chief Curator at the Clark; and Sophie Kerwin, doctoral student in art history at the Bard Graduate Center, New York, New York.

Speakers and presentations include:

Frédéric Régent (maître de conférences and directeur de recherche, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris) on “Guillaume Lethière: The Exceptional Trajectory of a Free Person of Color”

C. C. McKee (assistant professor of the history of art, Bryn Mawr College, Pennsylvania) on “Lethière’s Allegorical Confines: Indemnity, Colonialism, and African Diasporic Fantasies”

Meredith Martin (professor of art history at New York University and the Institute of Fine Arts, New York, New York) on “Colonial Networks: Remapping the ‘Paris’ Art World in the French Antilles”

Remi Poindexter (Ph.D. candidate, The Graduate Center, CUNY, New York, New York and University Fellow in Art History at the University of North Carolina, Asheville, North Carolina) on “Picturesque Plantations: Jenny Prinssay’s Construction of a French Caribbean Idyll”

Francesca Alberti (Director of the Department of Art History at the Académie de France in Rome–Villa Medici and professor of Art History at the Université de Tours and the Centre d’Études Supérieures de la Renaissance, Tours, France) on “Guillaume Lethière’s Roman Years”

Richard-Viktor Sainsily-Cayol (multimedia visual artist and urban scenographer, Guadeloupe) on “From Neoclassicism to Preromanticism: Lethière, the Missing Link?”

Free and open to the public. For the full program schedule, visit clark.edu/events. Accessible seats available; for information, call 413 458 0524.


Tags: Clark Art,   

If you would like to contribute information on this article, contact us at info@iberkshires.com.

Williamstown Fire District Expects Slightly Lower Tax Rate

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — A rise in operating expenses for the Williamstown Fire Department will be offset by lower debt service payments on the new fire station, resulting in a slightly smaller tax bill from the district, officials noted last week.
 
One week after the Prudential Committee, which oversees the district, reviewed the fiscal articles it will send to May's annual district meeting, the fire chief explained that while operational funding is up by by nearly $125,000 from the current fiscal year to FY27, a drop in principal and interest payments will make up the difference.
 
Currently, the tax rate for the district — a separate taxing entity apart from town government — is projected to be $1.15 per $1,000 of valuation in the fiscal year that begins on July 1. The current rate is $1.24.
 
In FY26, district taxpayers paid $1.9 million toward principal and interest for the Main Street fire station. The draft warrant for the May 26 annual district meeting calls for $1.7 million to be raised for that capital expense, a drop of just more than $198,000.
 
"The impact of the new debt and, indeed, the entire budget is offset by certain revenue items, particularly the $5.5 million in gifts from Williams College and the Clark [Art Institute]," Chief Jeffrey Dias wrote in an email discussing the proposed budget.
 
The $500,000 pledge from the Clark and the $5 million donated by Williams College are being utilized at the start of the payback period for the bonds that fund the station's construction — when those payments are higher.
 
Melissa Cragg, chair of the Fire District's Finance Committee, explained that the use of those gifts early in the process will not necessarily mean a sticker shock down the road.
 
View Full Story

More Williamstown Stories