Embedded Files
Provenance Research Specialist Daniel Healey presenting "Orphaned Antiquities & Cold Case Files: Investigating Provenance in the New Era of Museum Restitution".
Dr. Debby Sneed presenting "Disability and the Greek Ideal: A Case Study in Marble".
Spring 2026
Spring 2026
AIA Local Lecture: Orphaned Antiquities & Cold Case Files: Investigating Provenance in the New Era of Museum Restitution
Speaker: Daniel Healey, Provenance Research Specialist at the Worcester Art Museum
Time and Date: 6:30-7:30pm Monday, February 9
Location: Rehm Library, College of the Holy Cross (location; parking)
About: Provenance refers to an artwork’s history of ownership, from the time of its creation or archaeological discovery to the present. Provenance researchers track down a wide range of sources—scholarship, auction catalogs, financial records, inventories, correspondence, photographs, markings on artworks themselves, and more—to reconstruct an object’s past and retrace its path to the museum. This work has been compared to that of an investigator, and provenance researchers routinely described as “art detectives.” Over the past decade, these metaphors have become increasingly relevant as law-enforcement agencies across the U.S. have arrested dealers, seized antiquities from the nation’s leading museums, and made hundreds of repatriations to countries around the world—all to great fanfare and press coverage. The collision between the worlds of law enforcement and museums has revolutionized the field of provenance research and redefined the standards of ethical and legal collecting in this country. As a former Antiquities Trafficking Analyst for the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and now the Provenance Research Specialist at the Worcester Art Museum, I will share stories from the frontlines of provenance research—stories of looting, forgery, and repatriation—that explain why museums need “art detectives” now more than ever.
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AIA Local Lecture: Disability and the Greek Ideal: A Case Study in Marble
Speaker: Dr. Debby Sneed, Assistant Professor of Classics at California State University, Long Beach
Time and Date: 6:30-7:30pm Thursday, March 12
Location: Hogan 401, Hogan Campus Center, College of the Holy Cross (location; parking)
About: The study of Greek art is heavily influenced by the notion of the ideal and idealized human body, which has long been assumed to exclude aspects of bodily difference and disability. In this talk, I consider a collection of 6th century BCE sculptures of maidens (korai) that were found on the Athenian Acropolis. As traditionally interpreted, these statues all stood together as representations of the feminine ideal in Greek art, but scholars tend to separate one maiden from her sisters because her body does not fit into modern definitions of beauty. By returning her to her rightful place in this collection, I present a reassessment of Greek sculptural ideals and, with it, of our understandings of Greek art, display, and dedication in late 6th century BCE Athens.
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AIA Local Lecture, Westchester Society: There Is More To Egypt than Tut: Challenges for Egyptology and Egyptologists
Speakers: Thomas Schneider, Dani Candelora (Worcester Society), Uroš Matić, Sue Kelly, Frederik Rogner
Time and Date: 10:00 AM-1:00pm Saturday, May 2
Location: online, hosted by the Rye Free Reading Room; register here
About: The Archaeological Institute of America, Westchester Society, and the New York chapter of the American Research Center in Egypt are pleased to present to present the following free online symposium “There Is More To Egypt than Tut: Challenges for Egyptology and Egyptologists.” The purpose of the symposium is to do exactly what the title expresses. King Tutankhamun is the universal face of Egypt to the world. Egypt is blessed with an abundance of art, architecture, and writing. But there is more to the study of Egypt than material objects. The speakers in this symposium will address issues in chronology based on the First Intermediate Period, the Hyksos based on the Second Intermediate Period, race and Nubia, women, and the relation of Egyptology to other “ologies.”
Dr. Nicholas R. Brown presenting "Tutankhamun’s Funeral: What We Know from KV62".
Pattern-making workshop with artist Zahra Almajidi.
Professor Amy Gansell presenting "The Queens of Nimrud’s Northwest Palace: Beauty, Power, and Presence in the Neo-Assyrian World, c. 865–705 BCE".
Fall 2025
Fall 2025
AIA Archaeology Hour: Beer in Ancient Mesopotamia
Speaker: Professor Tate Paulette, hosted by Professor Jacob Damm (Worcester Society Vice President)
Time and Date: 8-9pm Wednesday, September 17
Location: on Zoom; watch recording here
About: The inhabitants of the land between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers gave us the world’s first cities, first kings, first writing. They also built the world’s first great beer culture. They loved their beer: its colors, textures, tastes, and intoxicating effects. They sipped it through long reed straws and praised it in song and story. They drank beer at home, on the job, and in neighborhood taverns--also at feasts, festivals and religious ceremonies. In this talk, Tate Paulette introduces his new book, In the Land of Ninkasi: A History of Beer in Ancient Mesopotamia. This authoritative but light-hearted account explains exactly what we know about the beers, brewers, and drinkers of ancient Mesopotamia, how we know it, and what puzzles still remain to be solved.
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AIA Local Lecture: Tutankhamun’s Funeral: What We Know from KV62
Speaker: Dr. Nicholas R. Brown, Yale University
Time and Date: 7-8pm Wednesday, October 22
Location: Rehm Library, College of the Holy Cross (location; parking)
About: Dr. Brown’s presentation, titled "Tutankhamun’s Funeral- What We Know from KV62," will explore what the archaeological record reveals about the state funeral in ancient Egypt. Dr. Brown will analyze the unique funeral procession scene depicted in the tomb's Burial Chamber and its connection to a funerary rite known as the “Awakening of Osiris.” This talk will show how these images and artifacts were meant to transform the king into a divine being.
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AIA Sponsored Event: Pattern-Making Workshop
Artist: Zahra Almajidi
Time and Date: 2-5pm Sunday, November 16
Location: Islamic Society of Greater Worcester (location)
Info: On Sunday, November 16, there will be an AIA-sponsored hands-on activity with Detroit-based artist Zahra Almajidi at the Islamic Society of Greater Worcester. Zahra Almajidi is a visual artist who uses traditional metalsmithing techniques and CAD/CAM processes to re-create folk art. This workshop will explore pattern-making. Space for the workshop is limited.
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AIA National Lecture: The Queens of Nimrud’s Northwest Palace: Beauty, Power, and Presence in the Neo-Assyrian World, c. 865–705 BCE
Speaker: Professor Amy Gansell, St. John's University
Time and Date: 4-5pm Tuesday, November 18
Location: Rehm Library, College of the Holy Cross (location; parking)
Abstract: Nearly three thousand years ago, at the ancient site of Nimrud (near modern Mosul, Iraq), a succession of ten Neo-Assyrian kings reigned in collaboration with their queens from the magnificence of the Northwest Palace, the seat of the empire and center of their world. Too often overshadowed by the well documented legacy of Neo-Assyrian kings, this presentation illuminates the queens who reigned with them. Piece by piece, and layer by layer, across about 150 years of evidence, we discover the beauty, power, and presence of Nimrud’s Northwest Palace queens in life, death, and for eternity.
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AIA Related Event: "Like the Stars of Heaven": Jewelry in Ancient Assyria
Speakers: Professor Amy Gansell, artist Zahra Almajidi, and Professor Elizabeth Knott (Worcester Society Director of Outreach)
Time and Date: 6-7:30pm Tuesday, November 18
Location: Worcester Public Library (location)
Info: Professor Amy Gansell and artist Zahra Almajidi will come together with Worcester AIA Director of Outreach Elizabeth Knott to discuss jewelry and adornment in ancient Iraq at the Worcester Public Library. “‘Like the Stars of Heaven’: Jewelry in Ancient Assyria” will take a close look at an ancient artwork from the Worcester Art Museum.
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