"Classical Art in the Modern Day": Margaret O'Hare '17 Presents Hallam Hurt Findings

O’Hare spent two weeks in Florence, Italy last summer reviewing and researching Renaissance art and studying at three of the main ateliers in the country. Her essential question, "Is there a correlation between the rapidly changing culture of the twenty-first century and the resurgence of representational art?", led her to the Florence Academy of Art, the Angel Academy of Art, and Charles H. Cecil Studios, where master painters pass along the techniques used in representational art through apprenticeship style cohorts of no more than 100 students at a time.

Accompanied by Chatham Hall art teacher Susan Morley, O’Hare had the opportunity to experience the life of an apprentice studying at an atelier, while also spending time at the Pitti Palace, the Galleria dell'Accademia, the Bargello, and the Uffizi to form a better understanding of the Borgia’s influence on art of their time. Her experiences in Italy led O’Hare to the conclusion that classical styles of painting are being guarded and preserved today, in part, as a response to the ease and pervasiveness of digital art. The techniques of classical painting provide insight into capturing form that cannot be achieved through the non-tactile experience of creating digital art, and, thus, hold an invaluable place in creating art in the twenty-first century. O’Hare cited her Hallam Hurt experience as a factor in pursuing a degree in fine arts from St. John’s College next year.

The Hallam Hurt '63 Student and Faculty Foreign Travel Award, made possible by the generosity of former trustee and parent Frances Hurt, is given each year to a Chatham Hall student and her faculty sponsor for foreign study and research. Past recipients have used the Hallam Hurt '63 Student and Faculty Foreign Travel Award to study the organic beef industry in Argentina, music history in the great opera houses of Italy, Russian literary classics in St. Petersburg and Moscow, to gain insight into why Sweden is considered one of the happiest countries in the world, and many other topics that provide once-in-a-lifetime educational experiences.