Italian art at Stanford

Tour • Cantor Arts Center, Stanford University

The history of Stanford University is connected to Italy in surprising ways. During this tour we will see example of Medieval and Renaissance art at the Cantor Museum that the Stanfords so loved and then we will stroll to the Memorial Church at the heart of the university to see the direct influence of that ancient art on the design of the campus.

A race to the sky: skyscrapers of San Francisco

Tour • San Francisco Downtown

How did the title of the tallest building of SF pass down from building to building during the past 130 years? And how did skyscrapers manage to combine their record-setting heights with beautiful architecture?

Art and literature at the Legion of Honor

Tour • Legion of Honor, San Francisco

In this tour we will take a look at five ancient objects in the museum’s collections and explore their connections to five famous and historically significant books. We will trace how literary plots, artistic forms and historical events have entered into dialogue with each other through the centuries. We will journey from the greatest literary works of the Greco-Roman world, through the European Middle Ages, and end with the appearance of new genres in British literature of the 18th century.

"The Secret of Kells" — a story from Medieval Ireland

Online lecture

The Secret of Kells is a unique Irish animated film that not only tells the story of the creation of the Book of Kells, the greatest treasures of medieval Ireland, but also engages with important philosophical questions of fear, creativity, and love for the whole world.