BRUNSWICK

The newest exhibit at Bowdoin College Museum of Art, The Ivory Mirror, focuses on a theme deeply embedded in early Renaissance culture — mortality.

The exhibit brings together works of memento mori — which translates to “remember you are to die” — a genre of artistic and literary imagery that emerged in the Renaissance during the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, during periods of high mortality. It features painting and prints from Albercht Durer and Hans Holbein, as well as ivory carvings from Chicart Bailly, plus carved pendants and texts.

Carved rosary prayer beads will also be on display, many of which survived centuries in Wunderkammers — rooms of art for display in homes of the intellectual elite and nobility.

Associate Art History Professor Stephen Perkinson said in a tour of the gallery, the objects in the exhibit are dazzling, and created to draw in a viewer. Many of the carved figures are made of ivory, and although the subject matter is gruesome, the beauty of the piece creates a push-pull effect of alarm and captivation.

Perkinson said the works depict how to live life well whether one is born high and low, sending the message that all are equal in death. The contrast between piety and luxury and the intersection of morality and self-hood is displayed by the works, with poetic ways of evoking the sense that life is fleeting, regardless of accomplishments and status, he said.

The art also seems to instruct the viewer to how to balance prosperity and the more serious aspects of life, such as how to create a personal identity and how to be aware of vanity. Some of the pieces touch on misogyny surrounding ideas of temptation and women.

“While we recognize the

Renaissance as an age of exceptional human progress and artistic achievement, macabre images proliferates in precisely this period: unsettling depictions of death personified, of decaying bodies, of young lovers struck down in their prime. This provocative imagery runs riot in the remarkable array of artworks featured,” said Perkinson.

The exhibit is shown in conjunction with a series of programs throughout the summer and fall, including film screenings, gallery talks, and programs with scholars and health care experts to provide perspectives on death and choices, according to Suzanne Bergeron, communications director for the museum.

The exhibit is open through

Nov. 24 and features 70 works from Bowdoin’s own collection and pieces on loan from New York and Europe.

Perkinson said the exhibit is an exciting and rare opportunity, with works that the Metropolitan Museum of Art does not have.

“It’s a wonderful chance for people to see things not in ordinary daily life,” Perkinson said.

jlaaka@timesrecord.com