Daily Archives: October 3, 2022

Saturday, October 8 – Monday, October 10, 9:30 am – 4:00 pm – Agricultural Fair Weekend at Old Sturbridge Village

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Fall was the time for 19th-century Agricultural Societies to hold a Cattle Show. Many shows also included an Exhibition of Domestic Manufacture. Throughout the weekend, the staff at Old Sturbridge Village is recreating such a display.  Please stop by to see an exhibition of vegetables, fruit, butter, cheese, and items of home manufacture such as handwoven cotton and woolen fabrics, knitted stockings and shawls, and fancy work.  Village manufactured items such as shoes, tin, pottery, brooms, baskets, straw braid, and books will also be on display.

Also this weekend, learn about saving your seeds for next year’s garden and preserving vegetables to last all year. Watch us use our dried flowers to make everlasting bouquets and weave baskets that are used for harvesting crops. For a complete schedule of events and directions visit https://www.osv.org/event/agriculture-fair-weekend/

Thursday, October 13, 5:00 am – The 19th Century Garden – Painting the Victorian Garden, Online

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The fifth in a series of six online lectures from The Gardens Trust brings David Marsh back on October 13 to discuss Painting the Victorian Garden.

The Victorian Age saw gardens emerge as a major artistic subject in their own right, perhaps hand in hand with the spread of interest in garden-making. A small number of artists even specialized in recording by their own choice not just the gardens of the rich on commission but much more ordinary gardens. This lecture will look at a range of painters and paintings who after decades of neglect are beginning to be recognized as significant figures in both art and garden history. We shall, in the words of Roy Strong, go ‘sauntering past immemorial yew hedges to linger over a herbaceous border before ascending ancient stone steps leading through a weathered iron gate to who knows where’. But we’ll also look inside the conservatory and at the reality behind the chocolate box cottage garden.

After a career as a head teacher in Inner London, Dr David Marsh took very early retirement (the best thing he ever did) and returned to education on his own account. He was awarded a PhD in 2005 and now lectures about garden history anywhere that will listen to him. Recently appointed an honorary Senior Research Fellow by the University of Buckingham, he is a trustee of the Gardens Trust and chairs their Education Committee. He oversees their on-line program and writes a weekly garden history blog which you can find at https://thegardenstrust.blog. £5 each or all 6 for £30. Register on Eventbrite HERE.

Friday, October 14 – Monday, February 13 – Intricate Beauties: The Lichen Explorations of Natalie Andrew

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Ceramics provide a vehicle for Natalie Andrew’s exploration into the sublime aesthetics inherent in lichen. An artist and a biologist, Andrew was permitted by the Arnold Arboretum’s curation department to observe the ‘spontaneous flora’ of lichens occurring in the landscape. The resulting works highlight the texture, depth, and form of lichen against the surface of ceramic.

Natalie Andrew is both a professional biologist and a visual artist whose explorations converge around mosses, slime molds, and other denizens of the forest floor. Integral to her practice is the crossing of the boundaries that separate art and science, allowing them to feed off of each other.


Natalie is currently a Resident Artist at the Harvard Ceramics Program, MA, is the 2018 Artist in Residence at the Bernheim Arboretum and Research Forest, KY, and has had residencies at Wellesley College, MA and the McColl Center for Art, NC. She lectures and gives workshops on art and science, and has exhibited in various galleries in Massachusetts and New Hampshire.

As a scientist, Natalie has most recently worked at the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self Organization in Germany, researching flows and contraction behavior in protoplasmic slime molds. Her previous positions include postdocs at Harvard University and Harvard Medical School, and she has published in Nature Cell Biology, PNAS, PLoS Computational Biology and others.

Natalie has received a Ph.D. in Biology, a Masters degree in Cognitive Science, and a Bachelors Degree in Physics with Electronics, all from the University of Birmingham, UK.

This Arnold Arboretum art show will run from Friday, October 14 through February 13. For more information visit www.arboretum.harvard.edu