Click Here to Read: Enlightenment-Era Teaching Cabinet: The small chamber was at the heart of intellectual life in New England from 1766 to 1820, and then it all but disappeared by Mary Louise Schumacher on the HyperAllergic website on August 31, 2017.
Installation view of the loosely reconstructed Philosophy Chamber, with large portraits by John Singleton Copley and bird specimens prepared by Charles Willson Peale. The red wallpaper is inspired by a fragment of the original wallpaper donated to the chamber by John Hancock, c. 1772. On view in the The Philosophy Chamber: Art and Science in Harvard’s Teaching Cabinet, 1766–1820 at the Harvard Art Museums (photo by Katya Kallsen, © President and Fellows of Harvard College)