Cantor Arts Center

A year of high notes for Stanford’s Chocolate Heads

In this third and final installment of the Chocolate Heads series, the students and director of the movement band reflect on practice and performance.

The Chocolate Heads movement band had a banner year, by any measure. They collaborated with jazz great William Parker, workshopped with neuroscientists and synesthetes, staged an underground performance at Cantor Arts Center, dazzled an audience at Bing Concert Hall, partnered with the a cappella group Talisman on an original composition, and finished the year with a spring…

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Saints and Manet at the Cantor starting June 12

Two exhibitions explore themes ranging from miraculous visions to death and destruction during the Paris Commune of 1871.

Faith Embodied: Saints from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment June 12–November 17, 2013 Gallery for Early European Art The 16 prints in this exhibition explore different narrative strategies that artists employed to represent the deeds, miraculous visions, and martyrdoms of the saints. The works also demonstrate how the depiction of saints varied, from simple images…

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Stanford art history graduate students will take a hands-on approach thanks to Mellon Grant

The Cantor Arts Center and the Department of Art and Art History forge a partnership to rethink the relationship between objects and academic study.

For an art lover, there is nothing quite like standing in front of a work of art. There’s the scale of the work, the texture of the paint, and the visceral emotional reaction that can only come through experience. For the museum curator, handling these objects – reading the artist’s scribbles on the back of…

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Pacific Northwest artists restore Stanford totem poles to their original grandeur

Among the outdoor sculptures spread throughout Stanford's campus are two towering giants. After weathering years of sun, moisture and insects, the totem poles are receiving needed restoration.

The first totem pole installed on the Stanford campus rests close to the Oval, tucked into a nearby grove of trees. Art Thompson finished the Nuu-chah-nulth style pole, titled Boo-Qwilla, in 1995. The second pole, The Stanford Legacy by Don Yeomans, sits adjacent to the Law School’s Crown Quad and was completed in 2002. Carved in the traditional…

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Cantor Arts Center Chooses Photography as an Area for Expansion

Stanford, Calif. — Connie Wolf, the John and Jill Freidenrich Director of the Cantor Arts Center, announces the launch of a comprehensive plan for the growth of the Cantor’s photography program. This will position the Cantor as a leader in the collection, exhibition and study of photographs in the Bay Area, which is recognized internationally…

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Richard Misrach lecture on 
Monday, May 13 at 6 pm at Annenberg Auditorium, Cummings Art Building


The artist will sign books after the lecture.

Artist Richard Misrach will be at Annenberg Auditorium on Monday to talk about his photography and the Cantor exhibition Revisiting the South: Richard Misrach’s Cancer Alley. Misrach, one of the most influential photographers of his generation, helped pioneer the renaissance of color photography and large-scale presentation. For 40 years he has documented modern industry’s impact…

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Stanford’s Cantor Arts Center partners with the Google Art Project, an international online art gallery

More than 100 high-resolution images from the Cantor are now available for in-depth research and examination.

Nothing compares to seeing a work of art in person, but there might also be nothing compared to examining a high- resolution image of a work of art that reveals details not visible to the naked eye – at least a naked eye viewing from behind a velvet rope or through protective Plexiglas. The closer-than-you-can-get-in-person…

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Stanford’s Cantor Arts Center draws kids in with new family program

A new Sunday program at Stanford's Cantor Arts Center brings children and families into the museum for tours and art-making.

There’s a new pitter-patter at the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford. Scurrying between the sculptures, popping by the portraits and musing at the masks are groups of children, taking part in a new program that has them drawing and sketching in the shadow of the masters. The Cantor has always welcomed families but the new program, on Sunday…

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Chocolate Heads go UNderground

See and hear the dance movement band at the Cantor Arts Center

Who: Chocolate Heads Movement Band + Guests from MIT and CSU Hayward; Directed by Aleta Hayes What: Movement and band performance Where: Cantor Arts Center Lobby When: Jan. 24, 7:45pm—no late seating What’s a Chocolate Head? Chocolate Heads is a movement-driven band composed of mostly Stanford student dancers, musicians, and visual and spoken-word artists, under…

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The Jameel Prize: Art Inspired by Islamic Tradition

On view for the first time in the United States, “The Jameel Prize: Art Inspired by Islamic Tradition” opens December 12 at Stanford University’s Cantor Arts Center. This special exhibition presents the work of 10 artists selected as finalists for the prestigious Jameel Prize, an international award bestowed by the Victoria and Albert Museum in…

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Christian Marclay’s Video Quartet

Across a bank of four screens, Maria Callas, Jimi Hendrix, Marilyn Monroe and scores of other musicians and actors make some kind of sound, seemingly in response to each other—much like players in a musical ensemble. This is Christian Marclay’s “Video Quartet,” a publicly and critically acclaimed 14-minute DVD projection, on view November 14 through…

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Ceremonial turning of the soil delights the Anderson family and guests

Ground has officially been broken for the building to house the Anderson Collection at Stanford University, designed by Richard Olcott/Ennead Architects.

Earlier this week, at a groundbreaking ceremony on the north side of the Cantor Arts Center, more than 200 invited guests looked on as Hunk, Moo and Putter Anderson put golden shovels in the dirt to commemorate the official start of construction on the building to house the Anderson Collection at Stanford University. Provost John…

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Stanford Arts looking ahead to 2016, the 125th anniversary of the opening of Stanford University

The momentum from Stanford's Arts Initiative continues to move the arts forward with new facilities and distinguished gifts.

In a recent issue of Stanford magazine, Stanford President John Hennessy wrote about the many ways that The Stanford Challenge has been transforming the university through increased financial aid, interdisciplinary graduate fellowships, professorships and new facilities. He wrote that the Stanford Challenge, which concluded in December 2011 after raising $6.2 billion, was the most successful campaign in U.S. higher-education…

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Remarks by Alex Nemerov at Anderson Collection Groundbreaking

Professor Alex Nemerov speaks at the groundbreaking ceremony for the Anderson Collection at Stanford University, which took place on October 9th, 2012. The Anderson Collection is one of the largest and most outstanding private collections of post-World War II American art in the world. The collection has been built over the last 50 years by…

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Remarks by Provost John Etchemendy at Anderson Collection Groundbreaking

Good afternoon and welcome. For those of you I haven’t had a chance to meet, I am John Etchemendy, Stanford provost. It is my honor to welcome everyone to this groundbreaking ceremony for the Anderson Collection at Stanford University. We are delighted that Hunk, Moo and Putter are here to help us mark the occasion.…

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Remarks by Roberta Denning at Anderson Collection Groundbreaking

Throughout the world, a groundbreaking ceremony marks the start of an important construction project.  Our ritual turning of the sod will occur a little later this afternoon. But given the nature of today’s occasion—the beginning of the building that will house the Anderson Collection at Stanford University—any reference to groundbreaking is closer in meaning to…

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