Art Gazing in Hartford

Our eyes and minds were tested by a day of art gazing. This time we visited the Wadsworth Athenaeum in Hartford, Connecticut. For hours, artwork after artwork flashed before our eyes in an engaging march to gaze upon the treasures of a museum before the time ran out.

After a beautiful Celebration of the Eucharist and a tour of the Hartford St. Joseph’s Cathedral we made a short visit to the Connecticut History Museum then walked to the Wadsworth Athenaeum.  This museum carries a rather robust collection of Art. Erin Monroe, Associate Curator of American Painting and Sculpture, gave us a special welcome and introduction.

One of the brothers made the following reflection about why we do such things as visit museums: “The goal for us as humanities students seems to be to capture the elements of style, to guess the whos and wheres and whats of a painting and to decipher the intention behind each production."  He continued saying, "However, this is not enough. As seminarians and religious, we try to let the artwork speak to us and reveal the very soul of the artist and the quiddity of the culture it was produced in so as to be equipped to better lead our world to truth and beauty.”

Red-eyed and weary from trying to decipher some of the contemporary art puzzles, we returned home with a little more insight into our culture.


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