The course will spend six weeks looking closely at the Mystery Sonatas by Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber. One of the sessions will include a live performance with Andrus Madsen and Susanna Ogata. The Mystery Sonatas by Heinrich Biber are a set of 15 sonatas and an unaccompanied solo violin written by Passacaglia and dedicated to the Prince Bishop in Salzburg, Max Gandalph von Kuenberg. Each sonata in the set is a musical meditation upon the fifteen mysteries meant to be pondered during the practice of rosary devotion. During…

In this seminar series, local scientists, researchers, and medical and industry professionals will share their passions and lead interactive discussions. Participants will hear a unique combination of interesting historical anecdotes and fun modern stories of the discoveries and innovations that are influencing the future of science and medicine today. In addition to bringing fresh perspective to popular issues, this seminar aims to highlight a variety of fascinating niche topics which you may have never heard of or thought about before, but which have real impact on all our…

This course features a dynamic lecture series showcasing pioneering scientific and health promotion programs led by women faculty at leading research institutions across Boston. Each week will feature two lectures followed by interactive Q&A sessions, giving course participants the opportunity to engage directly with prominent women scholars. A wide variety of topics will be covered, including, but not limited to, emerging biotechnology and AI, pioneering healthcare and emergency response strategies, breakthroughs in engineering, advances in computer science, and other cutting-edge developments across the sciences and the medical field.…

Vermeer (1632-1675) is among the most major painters of the Dutch Baroque era, culturally and intellectually opening that world to us. He painted only about 40 pictures, and eight of these are in New York at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Frick. Perhaps his best known painting is the “Girl with the Pearl Earring,” which inspired a novel and a movie. Vermeer worked slowly and carefully, using high quality pigments and possibly a camera obscura, a box with a pinhole allowing one to see a reflected…

Zora Neale Hurston (1891-1960) wore many (stylish) hats during her lifetime. Sometimes all at once. She was a novelist, anthropologist, folklorist, essayist, and playwright. Hurston was one of the stars of the Harlem Renaissance, a period of Black creativity that began after World War I and ended with the onset of the Great Depression. Written in seven weeks and considered a classic of the Harlem Renaissance, Their Eyes Were Watching God is Hurston’s best known novel. In it, she tells a beautiful coming of age story of Janie…