Rediscover the newly renovated Asian gallery
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he museum’s Asian gallery reopened at the end of August after a four-month renovation made possible by the generous financial support of the Christian Humann Foundation and the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation. The renovation significantly increased the museum’s capacity to display works of art to better serve the university and the Atlanta community. By removing and reconfiguring walls and building nw pedestals with smaller footprints, the gallery gained significant floorspace,
allowing three-dimensional works like the Shiva linga to be displayed in the round. A major component of the renovation was the installation of a series of archival drawers with protective UV plex covers to house the museum’s growing collection of Indian paintings. Housing the paintings in viewing drawers makes them more accessible and protects them from the damaging effects of prolonged exposure to light. These paintings have been examined and researched by many Emory classes over the past years,
including courses on the Avatars of Vishnu and the Ramayana. During the summer of 2021, museum staff worked with three Emory faculty members, assistant professor Ellen Gough, associate professor Sara McClintock, and professor Joyce Flueckiger to carefully consider the organization of works of art in the new space as well as develop new interpretive materials. Aditya Chaturvedi, a PhD candidate in the Graduate Division of Religion, served as a research assistant on the project. Z
Visit the Avatars of Vishnu exhibition online You You can now take a 360-degree virtual tour of the spring exhibition Avatars of Vishnu thanks to a collaboration with Emory's Center for Digital Scholarship (ECDS). ECDS staff filmed the studentcurated exhibition with a highly specialized Matterport® camera to digitally capture exhibition spaces. The team at ECDS, including Digital Project Specialist Adam Newman and Senior Video Producer Steve Bransford, worked with Carlos Museum staff to capture the physical 12 | FA L L 2 0 2 1
space as a whole and each individual work of art and label. Capturing the exhibition via this specialized camera preserved the research of the Emory students (20 undergraduate and two graduate students) who curated the exhibition and will give future students an opportunity to experience the exhibition. For more about the exhibition and to view the virtual tour, visit carlos. emory.edu/explore-avatars-vishnuexhibition-online. Z
