Harvard University

Through Sunday, June 25 – Still Lives: Plants of the Arnold Arboretum, Close Up and Far Away

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Photographer Vaughn Sills brings her exquisite still lives of Arnold Arboretum plants—whether in flower or fruit, burnished fall foliage or shimmery bud—to this exhibition. Each stem is a wonder of composition and color—prominent, yet sublimely connected to a background of a distant and ethereal landscape. The images are Still Lives, from inside Sills’ studio, and include the outside—her images of nature and wide expanses of land and water. Combined, these seemingly disparate elements convey the importance of two ways of looking, close up and far away.

Sills was able to obtain live plant material for this project with staff permission and accompaniment: each stem was carefully collected with Arnold Arboretum Visitor Engagement staff. With a few specimens at a time, Sills returned to her studio and posed branches for portraits against her previously photographed vistas—landscapes from Prince Edward Island, her place of origin. As an immigrant herself, the international collections of the Arnold spoke eloquently to her. It’s a place where plants from different countries can live in an environment that brings spiritual enjoyment to visitors, as part of the Boston Park System. At the same time, the Arboretum is also a place of conservation, education, and research as part of Harvard University. Again, the dual objective of pleasure and science, like Close up and Far Away, or inside and outside. This exhibition brings together the artist and her art—the aesthetic of the medium of photography—with the Arnold Arboretum’s collections as subject, and the broader and distant landscape and nature as complements.

Vaughn Sills website: http://www.vaughnsills.com/

All rights of the images reside with the artist. To view the images, visit https://arboretum.harvard.edu/art_shows/still-lives-plants-of-the-arnold-arboretum-close-up-and-far-away/ Below: Rudoulf Flowering Crabapple, 2022, photograph copyright Vaughn Sills

Wednesday, May 24, 6:30 pm – 8:00 pm Eastern – The Costs of Luxury: Mahogany and Tall Case Clocks in Early America, Live and Online

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On May 24 at 6:30 pm, explore the human and environmental impact behind the rich mahogany exteriors of early American tall case clocks with Jennifer Anderson. Early clockmakers and cabinetmakers utilized some of the finest materials available to craft the tall case clocks featured in wealthy homes of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Historian Dr. Jennifer Anderson will examine the human and environmental costs of one such material, mahogany. Beneath the rich and silky exterior of this exotic wood lies a larger story of consumer demand, exploitation, and environmental impact.

Your in-person ticket includes access to visit Striking Beauty: New Jersey Tall Case Clocks, 1730 – 1830, from 5:00 to 6:00 p.m.

This event is hybrid – held both live and online. Doors open for the in-person event at 6:00 p.m. in the Stockton Education Center at the Morven Museum & Garden, 55 Stockton Street in Princeton, New Jersey. The virtual waiting room opens on Zoom at 6:00 p.m. Q&A for both live and virtual attendees will follow the talk.

A Zoom webinar link will be shared with virtual ticket holders upon registration. A recording of the event will be provided following the program.

Jennifer Anderson, Associate Professor of History at Stonybrook University, holds a PhD in Atlantic and Early American History from New York University. She is the author of Mahogany: The Costs of Luxury in Early America (Harvard Univ. Press, 2012) about the social and environmental history of the tropical timber trade in the 18th century. She has received many awards and fellowships, including the 2016 Murrin Prize and the Society of American Historians’ Nevins Prize. She headed the research team for the Emmy-nominated documentary, “Traces of the Trade,” about the New England slave trade and in 2013 curated an exhibition about Sylvester Manor, a 17th century plantation in New York. Her new research focuses on reinterpreting the complex human and environmental history of Long Island within the broader Atlantic context. Strongly committed to public history, she serves as a historical consultant at numerous historic sites and museums.

Thursday, March 23, 6:30 pm – 8:00 pm Eastern – Plant Exploration, Then and Now, Live and Online

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The Arnold Arboretum has been collecting plants from around the world for 150 years, but plant exploration today looks very different than it did in the 1800s. From changes in collecting practices to an evolving relationship between the Arboretum and its international partners, a lot has changed in the last century. Join Head of the Library and Archives Lisa Pearson and Keeper of the Living Collections Michael Dosmann on March 23 at 6:30 pm in the Weld Hill Research Building, 1300 Center Street in Boston, to learn what these trips were like in the days of yore, and what they are like now.  To register for the in person program, click here.

Parking is available on-site at the Weld Hill Research Building. Find directions here. 

This event will also be livestreamed to YouTube. To sign up for the virtual livestream instead, click here.

Tuesday, January 24, 7:00 pm – 8:00 pm – Tree Equity in Boston: What It Is and How to Grow It, Live and Livestreamed

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The City of Boston recently released a new Urban Forest Plan that aims to grow the city’s urban forest equitably. In this hybrid talk on January 24 co-sponsored by the Brighton Garden Club and the Friends of Faneuil Library, David Meshoulam, Executive Director of Speak for the Trees, Boston, will introduce the idea of tree equity and discuss its critical importance in a rapidly changing climate. The organization has been examining how the distribution of trees has been shaped by race, politics, and history, and works to grow the city’s forest as a tool to build resilient communities.

The live presentation will be held in the New Balance Room, Presentation School Foundation Community Center, 640 Washington Street in Boston. This is a free event.

This event will also be livestreamed to YouTube. To sign up for livestream, click HERE

Monday, January 23 – Friday, March 31 – Grand Paris Express: Reconfiguring the City through Radical Infrastructure

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The Harvard University Graduate School of Design (GSD) is pleased to announce that the 14th Veronica Rudge Green Prize in Urban Design has been awarded to the Grand Paris Express, a large-scale transit project currently being built in and around the Paris metropolitan area. Through carefully articulated design interventions, the Grand Paris Express illustrates the potential for the planning and execution of mobility infrastructure to transform a city and its region. Société du Grand Paris, a national agency responsible for designing, creating, and implementing the Grand Paris Express, will receive the $50,000 USD prize and recognition for the continued stewardship behind the project.

With 68 new stations and 200 kilometers of additional tracks, as well as extensions of existing metro lines, the Grand Paris Express is currently the largest urban design project in Europe. Its four new lines will circle around the capital and provide connections with Paris’s three airports, developing neighborhoods, business districts, and research clusters. It will service more than 100 municipalities, 165,000 companies, and the daily transport of 2,000,000 commuters. Construction work began mid-June 2016 and is due to last until 2030.

Grand Paris Express: Reconfiguring the City through Radical Infrastructure, an exhibition coinciding with the prize, will be on display at the Druker Design Gallery from January 23 – March 31. Curated by Joan Busquets, Martin Bucksbaum Professor in Practice of Urban Planning and Design, the exhibition showcases models, renderings, documentary photographs, and video footage of this vast and ambitious urban design project. A public lecture and reception for the exhibition is scheduled for Thursday, March 2 at 6:30 pm at Piper Auditorium. For more information, visit https://urbandesignprize.gsd.harvard.edu/grand-paris-express/

Thursday, January 26, 7:00 pm – 8:00 pm – Wicked Plants Book Talk, Online

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In her New York Times bestseller Wicked Plants: The Weed That Killed Lincoln’s Mother and Other Botanical Atrocities, Amy Stewart takes on Mother Nature’s most appalling creations. It’s an A to Z of plants that kill, maim, intoxicate, and otherwise offend. Drawing on history, medicine, science, and legend, Stewart presents tales of bloodcurdling botany that will entertain, alarm, and enlighten even the most intrepid gardeners and nature lovers.

This is an Arnold Arboretum free virtual-only event. You will receive a Zoom link upon registering. Register at https://arboretum.harvard.edu/events/event-signup/?id=61526

Tuesday, December 13, 10:00 am – 12:0 pm – Growing Woody Plants from Hardwood Cuttings

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Join Arnold Arboretum Manager of Plant Production Tiffany Enzenbacher on Saturday, December 2, from 9 – 12:30 in the Dana Greenhouse Classroom, 1050 Centre Street in Jamaica Plain, to learn how to propagate woody plants from fall cuttings. Students will collect and stick cuttings of several taxa (Ilex and Pieris to name a few), and will take their propagules home. After rooting, small plants may be ready to transplant as early as next year. Post-class nurturing will be required. Fee for all materials is included in the cost of the class. Students should bring their own pruners to class and dress for the weather. Register at my.arboretum.harvard.edu or call 617-384-5277.

Wednesday, November 2, 2:00 pm – 2:30 pm – Plant Inventory on Hemlock Hill

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Join Kyle Port, Manager of Plant Records, on November 2 at 2 pm to learn how plant inventory work is being tackled on Hemlock Hill at the Arnold Arboretum. Participants will travel less than a quarter mile over gravel, woodchips, and pavement. Meet at the bottom of Hemlock Hill Summit Road near Tsuga canadensis 1230-98*A. See map at website https://arboretum.harvard.edu/events/event-signup/?id=59014 for on-site location.

Arnold Arboretum Landscape Talk – Plant Inventory on Hemlock Hill


Wednesday, October 19, 9:30 am – 11:30 pm – Drawing Butterflies and Moths in Colored Pencil, Online

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On Wednesday, October 19 from 9:30 – 11:30, explore the beauty of butterflies and moths. This two-hour online workshop will introduce observational drawing techniques with pencil and then dive into colored pencil techniques used to create a rich, vibrant image. All skill levels are welcome.   Fees: $30 HMNH members/$35 nonmembers. Advanced registration is required at https://reservations.hmsc.harvard.edu/Info.aspx?EventID=11