Planning a trip to the Cleveland Museum of Art? Make sure you don’t miss the “Imagination in the Age of Reason” exhibition, on display through March 2.
The exhibition has a close tie to Case Western Reserve University, as it was developed by Jillian Kruse, a fifth-year PhD candidate in art history.
Designed around a painting by Jean-Étienne Liotard, the exhibition takes a close look at the Enlightenment period in the late 17th and 18th centuries through European prints and paintings.
Britany Salsbury (CWR ’05), curator of prints and drawings, approached Kruse to design the exhibition after they worked together during Kruse’s third-year internship at the museum, a hallmark of CWRU’s joint PhD program with the Cleveland Museum of Art.
While many know the Enlightenment Period for its emphasis on reason, Kruse’s exhibition explores the ways in which artists during this time used imagination to “expose hidden truths, conjure strange worlds or concoct illusions.”
Kruse previously curated an exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art (“We the People: American Prints from Between the World Wars”; 2017–19) and created a small exhibition of photographs by the members of Drexel University’s Writers Room at the Free Library of Philadelphia.
The exhibition at the Cleveland Museum of Art is a full-circle moment for Kruse, who was drawn to CWRU because of its close ties to the museum.
“It’s really rare for graduate students to be the primary curator of an exhibition at a museum of this caliber,” Kruse said. “I feel incredibly proud and honored to have been trusted to call attention to some of the amazing works and stories that can be found in the collection at the CMA. It’s something that I’m not sure I would have had the opportunity to do elsewhere and it has certainly been a highlight of my graduate career.”
Before you stop by the museum, learn more about the student who curated it.
Answers have been lightly edited for clarity and length.
1. What drew you to CWRU?
I came to CWRU because of the unique opportunities offered by the doctoral program in art history. The program is jointly administered by CWRU and the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) and gives students unparalleled opportunities to work with the staff and collections at the CMA. Most classes are taught in the galleries or art study room, curators sometimes co-teach classes, and doctoral students undertake a year-long curatorial internship at the museum. As an aspiring print curator, this special relationship with the museum was what attracted me to CWRU and it has enabled me to continue building my curatorial expertise and practice while also completing a doctoral degree.
2. What inspired you to study art history?
My path to art history was somewhat circuitous and I often refer to myself jokingly as an “accidental art historian.” I studied history and French in undergrad rather than art history and it was only during my master’s in public history and cultural heritage at Trinity College, Dublin, that I began to take an interest in art history.
As part of that program, each student completed an internship at a cultural institution in Dublin. When visiting the National Gallery of Ireland (NGI), the curator of prints and drawings there, Anne Hodge, was so passionate and enthusiastic about her work that I decided I wanted to work with her. Through my internship at NGI, Anne introduced me to art history and to prints specifically. It was really at that point that I fell in love with prints, the discipline of art history, and museum work.
3. What are your future goals in art history?
Upon completing my degree, I plan to continue my museum career and find a permanent position as a curator of prints and drawings. I believe in the power of art history to make our lives better both through the beauty of art and through critically engaging with the art and ideas of the past. I hope to make this a key part of my work as I move forward as a curator and scholar.
4. What type of art do you study?
I work on a broad range of prints and drawings, but my doctoral research focuses on late 19th-century French prints made by impressionist artists such as Edgar Degas (1834–1917), Mary Cassatt (1844–1926),and Camille Pissarro (1830–1903). My dissertation specifically explores the experimental and collaborative printmaking practice of Pissarro and seeks to understand the relationship between the artist’s collaborative mode of making and his motifs depicting communal rural labor in dialogue with his anarchist politics.
5. What would you like members of the community to keep in mind while viewing it?
I would like members of the community to keep in mind that the Enlightenment itself as a period and idea are still contested to this day. This exhibition is one way of trying to think through and question received narratives of the period. I would also encourage visitors to look closely and think about the ways that their own close looking and imagination might reveal new truths for them.
6. Have you had any internships or research experiences in art history?
I’ve held internships or other curatorial positions at the National Gallery of Ireland, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth College, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. In those roles, I’ve researched prints and drawings from a wide range of time periods and cultures. I’ve also been incredibly fortunate to be able to assist and contribute to a number of exhibitions including the CMA’s “Degas and the Laundress: Women, Work, and Impressionism” exhibition as well as with the upcoming “Picasso and Paper” show on view beginning Dec. 8 and “Karamu Artists Inc: Printmaking, Race, and Community,” opening March 28.
For my doctoral work, I’ve been able to conduct research in museums and archives in the United Kingdom, France and Switzerland thanks to awards and grants from the Baker-Nord Center for the Humanities, the Eva L. Pancoast Memorial Fellowship and the Harmon Chadbourn Research Fellowship from the Society for French Historical Studies.
7. Is there anything else you want to share?
An exhibition is never the work of only one person and there are a number of other people affiliated with CWRU who contributed in various ways. Britany Salsbury (a CWRU undergraduate alumna) supervised and mentored me through the process. Andrea Wolk Rager (associate professor of art history) encouraged and enriched the work every step of the way.
Exhibition texts were reviewed and commented upon by lead interpreter at the CMA Stephanie Foster (a CWRU art history MA alumna). First-year MA student Madalyn Fox worked on the family guide for the show. Morgan McCommon, a CWRU art history MA alumna, was the exhibition project manager. Cameron McConnell, yet another CWRU art history MA alumna, has been working on programming for the exhibition.
Sydney Slacas, a joint CWRU art history MA-JD alumna, organized a lecture I gave to the Painting and Drawing Society. Justin Willson, the former Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in Art History Leadership at CWRU/CMA, and I discussed ideas related to the exhibition and were jointly awarded a flash grant from the Baker-Nord Center for the Humanities.
John Kelly, who was the editor for the show, is also a CWRU art history MA alumnus.
Finally, some of the objects and ideas of the show were inspired by a class taught at CWRU by Professor Catherine Scallen, who recently retired from the Department of Art History.