‘Celtic Art Across the Ages’: Harvard Art Museums Debuts their New Interactive Gallery

“Celtic Art Across the Ages,” Harvard Art Museums’ new exhibition, strives to educate on the material culture of the vast Celtic world and challenge modern perceptions of the traditions and art of the Celtic peoples.

Located on the third floor of the Harvard Art Museums in the Special Exhibitions Gallery, the exhibit features pieces from 800 B.C.E. to modern day, with provenance from countries including Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and Germany. The gallery is uniquely composed of a variety of media, ranging from metalwork and textiles to a harp and an Irish-language film from the 1900s.

The exhibit is the culmination of five years of planning and curation, spearheaded by Susanne Ebbinghaus, George M. A. Hanfmann Curator of Ancient Art and Head of the Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art.

“It takes a while from initial idea to develop things like the research around the main themes [and] which objects to use” said Penny Coombe, Kelekian Curatorial Fellow in Ancient Art.

This is the first major exhibition to be dedicated to Celtic art in the United States, and as such, experienced enthusiastic contributions from countless museums around the world.

“[Various international museums] were also just excited when they heard this is the first time — let’s show U.S. audiences what was being made in Central Europe, Western Europe, and Britain and Ireland, from antiquity to early medieval times,” said Ebbinghaus.

Ebbinghaus was originally inspired to curate this gallery due to her interest in the interactions between the Greeks and Romans as well as their neighbors. These cross-cultural encounters were largely driven by trade and conquest and directly influenced much of the art and material culture of the Celtic people on display in the exhibit.

“This tomb context [from the Kleinaspergle burial mound in Asperg, Germany] with its multi fold connections, really got me interested,” said Ebbinghaus.

Grounded by a reading room, visitors of the exhibit can work their way through the archaeology, art, encounters with the Greco-Roman world, and reception themed rooms. Each themed gallery is situated in a room with either beige, mint, or crimson walls — a departure from the stark white found across the rest of the museum.

“It’s full of color, and you’ll notice that the design is really sympathetic and really elevates all the objects as well,” said Coombe.

In another divergence from the majority of the Harvard Art Museum’s exhibits, the gallery includes numerous interactive elements. Some of the rooms incorporate a map or timeline to further contextualize the pieces for visitors, while other rooms have audio and visual companions. QR codes which direct you to the Bloomberg Connects app can be found throughout the object placards.

The reading room has a multitude of uses, including housing the gallery books as well as stencils and paper for visitors to recreate the Celtic designs. More saliently, the room serves as a space to highlight the living Celtic culture through weekend performances.

“A really important part is having this room as a performance space where we can have music and dance and poetry meetings, just to recognize there’s a bit of an intangible cultural heritage as well, so people can participate in different ways,” said Coombe.

An Opening Conversation with the curatorial team and Harvard faculty kicked off the gallery opening, and the continuing schedule of public programming can be found on the Harvard Art Museum’s website.

“It’s an art that seems to have been actually really curious about the power of things to change, and what you can get out of those practices, of maybe looking at those objects — turning and changing and seeing different things. We don’t know anything about their culture, the kind of value they put in this, but I think it’s a great window, privvy into what they were interested in,” said Laure Marest, Damarete Associate Curator of Ancient Coins.

This exhibition is truly special and requires the visitor to really interact with the exhibition through its various elements to truly understand the history of Celtic art.

“[I hope visitors approach this by] just immersing themselves in different ways of viewing through the objects in the exhibition and advising everyone who comes to look very closely to make use of the magnifying glasses and other tools because so many of the objects are so small, but they really reward close looking because they’re so intricate,” said Ebbinghaus.

“Celtic Art Across the Ages” encapsulates the many facets of Celtic art over nearly 3,000 years thanks to the dedicated work of many curatorial teams. The gallery is open to visitors from March 6 through Aug. 2 in the Special Exhibitions Gallery.