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Discover a world of art!
Come Visit Us!
Admission is always free for everyone at the Johnson Museum. Check out our event calendar for upcoming programs and workshops for families throughout the year.
Look Closer!
Dive deeper into these artworks and learn a lot of cool details
L’homme qui marche II (Walking Man II)
Jaguar effigy jar
When Thoughts Collide
Soldier
What is that object?
Let’s color it to find out!
Drag the colors to paint it to bring the image to life…
Or print it to using pencils and paint!
Pick another item of the collection to color
At Home
Art Projects:
What kind of
artist are you?
Explore some different ways that we can approach art. What inspires you the most? Let’s find out together!
Spin Around
Take a special look at some works in our collection that have been 3D scanned! Try clicking, dragging and scrolling to see all the sides of it.
Soldier
China, 2nd or 1st century BC
This sculpture was placed in an ancient Chinese tomb, or underground grave, in order to protect the person who had died. People believed that a human’s soul lived on in the afterlife and would need materials and support from other people in order to be happy for eternity. Tomb objects like this are known as mingqi and are usually made out of clay. This soldier once held a weapon. Can you find the place where the missing weapon once was? Why do you think the weapon has disappeared?
Soldier. China, Western Han dynasty, 2nd or 1st century BC. Earthenware with unfired pigments, 18 11/16 × 5 7/8 × 5 1/8 inches. Gift of Victor and Marie Cole, 2011.102.003.
Credits
This 3D scan was created by Sabrina Haertig ’22, the Summer 2020 Nancy Horton Bartels ’48 Scholar for Education at the Johnson Museum of Art.
Pick an item FROM the collection to see IT from all sides
Jaguar effigy jar
This vessel was made approximately 800 years ago, in the country we now call Costa Rica, where it would have been used for drinks during special occasions and ceremonies.
Jaguar effigy jar
Guanacaste-Nicoya (Costa Rica), AD 1200–1400
This jar is made in the shape of a jaguar, one of the most powerful predators in the Americas. Jaguars can hunt on land, in the treetops, and in the water, making them a symbol of power and authority. Because jaguars are equally at home in trees and on land, they are seen as mediators between humans and the divine, or the earth and sky worlds. This vessel was made approximately 800 years ago, in the country we now call Costa Rica, where it would have been used for drinking cacao or maize beer during special occasions and ceremonies. As you rotate the vessel, can you notice the slits in the legs and holes in the arms? Each of the jaguar’s limbs is hollow and contains several small clay balls. Imagine tilting the jar to take a sip of cacao and hearing a faint rattling sound!
Jaguar effigy jar. Guanacaste-Nicoya (Costa Rica), AD 1200–1400. Earthenware, 13 3/8 × 10 5/8 × 11 7/16 inches. Gift of Thomas Carroll, PhD 1951, 2006.070.436.
Credits
This 3D scan was created by Sabrina Haertig ’22, the Summer 2020 Nancy Horton Bartels ’48 Scholar for Education at the Johnson Museum of Art.
Soldier
This sculpture was placed in an ancient underground grave in China in order to protect the person who had died. Objects like this are known as mingqi and are usually made out of clay.
Soldier
China, 2nd or 1st century BC
This sculpture was placed in an ancient Chinese tomb, or underground grave, in order to protect the person who had died. People believed that a human’s soul lived on in the afterlife and would need materials and support from other people in order to be happy for eternity. Tomb objects like this are known as mingqi and are usually made out of clay. This soldier once held a weapon. Can you find the place where the missing weapon once was? Why do you think the weapon has disappeared?
Soldier. China, Western Han dynasty, 2nd or 1st century BC. Earthenware with unfired pigments, 18 11/16 × 5 7/8 × 5 1/8 inches. Gift of Victor and Marie Cole, 2011.102.003.
Credits
This 3D scan was created by Sabrina Haertig ’22, the Summer 2020 Nancy Horton Bartels ’48 Scholar for Education at the Johnson Museum of Art.
White-ground lekythos
This tall jug is from ancient Greece, and was used to hold oil, usually made from olives. Why do you think they created such a beautiful container to hold this oil?
White-ground lekythos
Greece, Athens, ca. 450 BC
This tall jug is from ancient Greece, and was used to hold oil, usually made from olives. Why do you think they created such a beautiful container to hold this oil? What can you notice about the illustrations on the sides of the vessel? Can you spot the outline of a similar jug drawn onto the side of this one? Sometimes, vessels like this one were buried with the dead, or large stone versions were used as monuments for people who had died.
White-ground lekythos. Greece, Athens, ca. 450 BC. Fired terra-cotta with white ground and incised decoration, 12 3/4 × 3 3/4 inches. Transferred from University Collections, 77.052.
Credits
This 3D scan was created for the Johnson Museum of Art with Cornell Engineering’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering under the supervision of Hunter Adams, BS ’15, MS ’17, PhD 2020, with Jack Defay ’22, who assisted with scanning the objects and generating 3D renders, and Carol Anne Barsody, MA ’23 / MA student in archeology, who generated and facilitated this collaboration as an extension of her research on technology in museum exhibitions and museum education, and who helped develop the scanning techniques which made it possible.
Lock and latch
This wooden lock was created out of the hard and durable wood of the toro tree by a blacksmith from the Dogon culture in Mali, a country on the west coast of Africa.
Lock and latch
Dogon, 20th century
This wooden lock would have been used to secure the door to a granary, a building used to store millet, a type of grain. The lock was created out of the hard and durable wood of the toro tree by a blacksmith from the Dogon culture in Mali, a country on the west coast of Africa. How do you think this lock would have worked? Can you figure out which parts of the lock are movable? The long horizontal beam coming out of the square center of the lock could be moved from side to side if the proper key was used to unlock it.
Lock and latch. Dogon, 20th century. Wood, 13 1/4 inches high. Gift of William W. Brill, 84.012.013 a,b.
Credits
This 3D scan was created for the Johnson Museum of Art with Cornell Engineering’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering under the supervision of Hunter Adams, BS ’15, MS ’17, PhD 2020, with Jack Defay ’22, who assisted with scanning the objects and generating 3D renders, and Carol Anne Barsody, MA ’23 / MA student in archeology, who generated and facilitated this collaboration as an extension of her research on technology in museum exhibitions and museum education, and who helped develop the scanning techniques which made it possible.
Check Out Our Collection
Can’t visit the Museum? You can still see thousands of images from around the world that are all part of our collection, and even more works of art that you can only see online. Take a trip around the world!