Souvenirs: Remembering the Pleasures and Perils of the Grand Tour

Examines visual image and objects, ranging from portraits, landscape watercolors and graphic satires, to cork models of antiquities, which served to remind and remake travelers' ideas of Italy and other sites on the eighteenth century Grand Tour of the European continent. We will examine the role of anxiety, laughter, pleasure and danger in a rite of passage that was designed to elevate and educate young men, artists, and increasingly, women and men from the middling orders. Enrollment limited to 20.