Cocktails With The Curator: Sarah Farkas

Sarah Farkas, the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art's Kress Interpretive Fellow, will lead a guided close-look and discussion ofThe Adoration of the Magi(ca. 1480-90) by Jacopo del Sellaio in the Moss Gallery. What at first appears straightforward—a panel painting depicting the visit of the three Magi, or Wise Men, to the newly born Christ Child—is a complexly constructed work with many enduring mysteries. Why is the architecture behind the Holy Family crumbling into ruin? Why are these biblical figures surrounded by attendants in Renaissance-era fashions? Preceded by delicious cocktails in our cafe, Sarah's talk will cover the artistic and social context of the work's creation in late fifteenth-century Florence, a time marked by wealth, artistic splendor, and political intrigue.Sarah Farkas is the current Kress Interpretive Fellow at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art where she works on projects related to the historical European art collections. She completed her B.A. at Oberlin College in Art History and German Studies in 2012 and her M.A. in Art History at the University of Texas at Austin in 2019. Sarah is currently working on her Ph.D. at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a focus on women in the sixteenth century and the art of the English and German Reformations. She has held previous curatorial positions at the Allen Memorial Art Museum in Oberlin, OH and the Ackland Art Museum in Chapel Hill, NC.