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M&G 2023 Makers Market–Apply Now!

 

M&G’s 7th Annual Makers Market takes place during Homecoming events on the campus of Bob Jones University. This all-day, indoor fair is hosted in and around the Welcome Center on the Saturday, October 7, 2023 from 10AM-5PM. And, it is open to the public to enjoy!

Because the Market is part of the university’s Homecoming, all the art, foods, creations, and designs are made by BJU grads, current and former faculty/staff, and current and former students. The Makers come from around the country and feature a variety of items including handmade cards, artisan chocolates, functional pottery, illustrations, watercolor paintings, scented candles, jewelry, clever fiber art, woodworking, calligraphy, gourmet popcorn and more!

If you’re interested in being a Maker, please follow the process outlined below:

Application Process: 

Artists (and craftsmen, artisans, illustrators, designers, jewelers, bakers, etc.) can submit their application and images online beginning at 8AM Monday, May 29 (Memorial Day) through Midnight Sunday, June 11.

  • Remember: since this is during Homecoming on the campus of Bob Jones University, applicants are limited to current/former faculty and staff, BJU graduates, and current/former BJU students.
  • There is an application fee of $25.
  • Market applications are only received during the 2-week time period stated! Please apply before midnight on Sunday, June 11.
  • Before applying, please reference these resources: FAQs and Before You Apply.
  • These are the submission categories: 2D Fine Art, 3D Fine Art, To Wear, Paper Goods, Fiber Art, and Everything Else.
  • If you know someone that fits the criteria to participate, please share this webpage with them.
  • Current BJU Students apply HERE.
  • All Other Makers apply HERE.

Maker Selection Process

Following the closure of the application portal on June 11, a jury of BJU grads will review all submissions anonymously and choose which artists will participate in the Market in the following categories: 2D Fine Art, 3D Fine Art, To Wear, Paper Goods, Fiber Art, and Everything Else.

  • Once the jury makes its choices based on quality, price point, and variety, M&G will contact the chosen Makers to accept their admission and pay their booth fee to participate.

Public Announcement of 2023 Makers

M&G will announce the participating Makers on our Facebook and Instagram accounts, on our website, and via email in August. Saturday, October 7, 2023 will be M&G’s 7th annual Makers Market.

 

If you would like to receive M&G updates, click here.

Picture Books of the Past: Mattia Preti

Enjoy this series of segments highlighting Picture Books of the Past: Reading Old Master Paintings, a loan exhibition of 60+ works from the M&G collection. The exhibit has traveled to The Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C. and the Orlando Museum of Art in Florida.

It is fascinating to see the similarities in technique between Old Master painters and contemporary visual storytellers. This work by Mattia Preti  provides a good illustration.

St. Michael the Archangel Overcoming Satan

St. Michael the Archangel Overcoming Satan

Giovanni Andrea Sirani

Below the image, click play to listen.

 

M&G Annual Makers Market

During BJU’s Homecoming events every October, M&G hosts a curated market of handmade art, crafts, foods, and designs created by BJU grads, current and former faculty/staff, and current and former students. The Makers come from around the country and feature a variety of items including handmade cards, specialty cupcakes, functional pottery, illustrations, watercolor paintings, jewelry, fiber art, woodworking, calligraphy, gourmet popcorn and more!

This all-day event is hosted on both floors of the Welcome Center on the Saturday of Homecoming, and it is open to the public to enjoy!

If you’re interested in becoming a Maker, please consider the following process and timeline:

Application: Artists (and craftsmen, artisans, illustrators, designers, jewelers, bakers, etc.) can submit their application and images online beginning 8AM on Monday, May 29 (Memorial Day) through Midnight on Sunday, June 11, 2023.

  • Remember, since this is for BJU Homecoming, applicants are limited to current/former faculty and staff, BJU graduates, and current/former BJU students.
  • There is an application fee of $25.
  • Market application information will be updated each spring, and applications are only received during the 2-week time period stated. If interested in applying, visit here.
  • M&G will make an email announcement about the opening of the application process in advance and on the day of the opening. There will be reminders throughout the two weeks to encourage Makers to apply.  If you would like to receive this announcement please click here.

Selection: Following the closure of the application process, a jury of BJU grads will review all submissions and choose which artists will participate in the Market in the following categories: 2D Fine Art, 3D Fine Art, To Wear, Paper Goods, Fiber Art, and Everything Else.

  • Once the jury makes its choices based on quality, price point, and variety, M&G will contact the chosen Makers to accept their admission and pay their booth fee to participate.

Announcement: M&G will announce the participating Makers on Facebook, Instagram, our website, and via email at some point late summer. Saturday, October 7, 2023 will be M&G’s 7th annual Makers Market.

If you would like to receive M&G updates, click here.

Object of the Month: May 2023

Cassone

Walnut and pastiglia

Italian, 15th century

The antique furnishings in the Museum & Gallery collection elevate each visitor’s experience of the artwork on the walls, but the pieces also provide a historical context of the eras and cultures from which the artworks sprang. Indeed, the furnishings are also artworks in themselves.

This is certainly true of the many cassoni (plural of the Italian term for “chests”) in the collection. Like other furnishings in Renaissance homes, the quality of workmanship and materials employed in decorating each cassone convey a great deal about the fashion of their times, the technologies available to craftsmen, and the wealth and social status of their owners.

Unfortunately, much has gone against their survival to our day. Cassoni were used for storage of personal items, opened and closed numerous times over the years. That wear, along with the environment in a home, infestations of termites, dry rot, changes in taste and reversals of family fortunes all conspire against the preservation of these furnishings.

These rich, showy Italian types of chests became widespread in Northern and Central Italy, particularly Tuscany (with a number of the best artists hailing from the cities of Siena and Florence). Weddings served as the occasions for which cassoni were made, and they were in fashion from the 14th-16th centuries, a period spanning the very late-Middle Ages to the beginning and middle of the Renaissance. The oldest surviving cassoni feature primitive panel designs, while later works demonstrate lavish carving, gilding, polychrome, and more complex narrative scenes.

Much like moving trucks, boxes, and barrels accompanying the establishment of new homes, cassoni had a very specific use. Practically speaking, the chests were designed to contain the bride’s dowry and jewels, her family’s contribution to the marriage, and became one of the couple’s most important household furnishings—often at the foot of the bed. They quite literally became a vehicle displaying the status, wealth and sophistication of the intermarrying families, carried in a procession (the domum ductio) from the bride’s parent’s home to her groom’s abode.

Decoratively speaking, cassoni often feature heraldic imagery relating to the families’ crests, and the pictorial panels often contained biblical, mythological, or allegorical imagery which ranged from learned and literary to humorous and light-hearted. Cassoni themselves were so common in the early- and middle-Renaissance that they’re included in Old Master paintings (most familiar may be scenes of the Annunciation in which Mary is seated on or kneeling near a cassone situated at the foot of her curtained bed) and even picture-within-picture vignettes on cassoni panels themselves.

This particular M&G cassone entered the collection in 1957, and its features suggest a date very early after 1400, likely from Tuscany. Unlike many cassoni today, which have the panels removed and presented as separate works of art in their own right, our chest is in good original condition and is structurally sound, despite surviving 600 years of use and change. The lid is still attached with its original hinges and has a simple locking mechanism. While the lid opens and closes easily, the tight fit and years of use have worn off some of the gesso along the top edge.

Composed of thick walnut planks and framing, the chest has a large front center panel decorated with gilt and polychrome over trellis-embossed gesso. Heraldic lions (possibly leopards or even hunting dogs) face each other across the front, and the two vertical end panels blossom with delicate arabesques and outline colored shields, which likely contained familial coats of arms.

Carved, fluted pilasters frame the two pictorial end panels and are topped with vague Corinthian capitals. The primitive-style narrative at the right end is now entirely obscured, but the imagery at the opposite end remains. The subject matter is indistinct and may be biblical or mythological. Most likely, perhaps, it is the myth of Diana (Artemis) and Actaeon, from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, in which the bathing goddess is startled by a young hunter. In her anger, Diana turns Actaeon into a stag who is then hunted and killed by his own hounds. This identification seems to make sense of the simplistic representation of forest, pool, a stag’s head (lower right) and a hound in the left background. As an allegory or fable for a young couple, it may emphasize modesty, self control, and consequences for the lack of either or both.

This cassone provides insight into the artistry, fashion, and domestic life of those living in the early years of the Italian Renaissance and is a valuable part of the M&G collection.

 

Dr. Stephen B. Jones, M&G volunteer

 

 

Additional Resources:

The Oxford History of Western Art.  Kemp, Martin, ed.  Oxford University Press, 2000.

Pooley, Eugene.  “Scenes from a Marriage.”

https://blog.dorotheum.com/en/classic-week-florentine-school/

https://www.medieval.eu/bridal-chests-or-cassoni-from-medieval-italy/

 

 

Published 2023

Picture Books of the Past: Bartolommeo Neroni

Enjoy this series of segments highlighting Picture Books of the Past: Reading Old Master Paintings, a loan exhibition of 60+ works from the M&G collection. The exhibit has traveled to The Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C. and the Orlando Museum of Art in Florida.

In contrast to the large altarpieces commissioned by churches, the Tondo’s circular format was well suited for private homes.

Holy Kinship

Holy Kinship

Vincent Sellaer, called Geldersman

Below the image, click play to listen.

Ponder Anew: M&G Tour RSVP

M&G Tours for Thursday, June 29, 2023 at 1:30PM OR at 4PM

To learn more about this special loan exhibition and hours, visit here.

Name(Required)
Choose your RSVP option below:
(Please include total number of guests and their names)

Easter Card: He is Risen

The Entry into Jerusalem

The Entry into Jerusalem

Signed, “the hand of Theophrastos”

Below the image, click play to listen.