(Un)Chained: Visions of Freedom and Unfreedom in Prints and Photographs


October 11 - December 21, 1997
Image: Francesco Goya (Spanish, 1746-1828). Aquellos Polbos (Those specks of dust), 1797-98. Etching and aquatint, 8 1/2 x 5 7/8" (plate). Gift of Professor and Mrs. Alfred Burger, 1983.37.

Inspired by the theme of the 1997 Virginia Film Festival, the exhibition presents works that either embody the West's most longed-for ideal or express its most feared possibility: freedom or its absence. Images of national liberation by photographers like Weegee and Larrabee and printmakers like Kathe Kollwitz remind us of the sometimes dangerous ecstasy that comes with achieved freedom. The dehumanizing doom of imprisonment is witnessed in prints by Piranesi and Goya, as well as in photographs by Eugene Smith and others. Spiritual freedom (or slavery) is revealed in works by D¸rer, Rembrandt, and van Dyck.

Images and Text Copyright, 1997
The Rector and Visitors of the
University of Virginia, Charlottesville		 Bayly Art Museum
University of Virginia
Rugby Road
Charlottesville, Virginia 22903