Join scholar Meseret Oldjira for a talk exploring the artistic achievements that characterize the ancient and medieval heritage of Ethiopian art while highlighting the Ethiopian artworks on view at the AGO.

The adoption of Christianity as the state religion of the Aksumite kingdom in the 4th century prompted the rise of a rich Christian literary and artistic tradition in Ethiopia. Today, the surviving churches, wall paintings, illuminated manuscripts, and painted icons attest to Ethiopia’s development of a strong local tradition of artistic production as well as its active participation in global artistic exchange in the medieval and early modern periods. 

All ticketholders for the talk in Jackman Hall will have the opportunity to view works included in the exhibition in the Art Gallery of Ontario’s Marvin Gelber Print and Drawing Study Centre before the talk from 5 - 7pm, and from 8 - 9pm following the talk.

Meseret Oldjira is a PhD candidate in the Art and Archaeology department at Princeton University. Her research explores artistic and cultural exchange across the medieval Mediterranean and north-east Africa, focusing on biblical illuminated manuscripts. Her dissertation is a study of the complex relationship between text and imagery in thirteenth- and early fourteenth-century illuminated Gospel manuscripts produced at an island monastery in northern Ethiopia.