Highlights of the Carnegie Museum of Art’s collection of European paintings include Murillo’s depiction of the Christ child clothed in jewel-encrusted finery (c. 1670–75) and a portrait by Guillaume Guillon-Lethière of Adèle Papin, one of Napoleon’s mistresses, playing the harp (1799). Both works appear in this exhibition about European imperialism in Africa and the Americas that takes non-metropolitan perspectives into account (12 July–25 January 2026). Many artists played an active role in empire-building, while others undermined it, but some works in the exhibition display a complex or ambivalent relationship with empire. Consider the painting Saint Benedict of Palermo (1747), by an artist of the Spanish School: the Christian miracles it depicts arise from colonial religion, but they are performed by the dignified Black Sicilian friar of the title.
Find out more from the Carnegie Museum of Art’s website.
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