Public Programs & Events

This is the first program in our summer lunch-time series. Take a break and explore Boston History outside the predominant historical lens. 

Harriet Bell Hayden (1816-1893) was a survivor of slavery and an anti-slavery activist living on Beacon Hill. Her set of nineteenth-century photo albums are clues to her direct involvement in the abolitionist movement and the societal status that yielded. Join Theo Tyson, Polly Thayer Starr Fellow in American Art and Culture at the Boston Athenaeum as she shares her insights and inquiries on the albums. Using fashion and visual culture, Tyson will discuss ways of seeing that offer a glimpse into the lived experiences and connections of Mrs. Hayden’s multicultural and intergenerational Beacon Hill community.

theo tyson is a curator who invites conversations about the sociocultural implications of race, gender, identity, and sexuality through a lens of fashion and culture. She creates spaces of reclamation to share powerful stories of Black womxn and those on the LGBTQI+ spectrum. Her curatorial practice privileges noncanonical ways of seeing, giving audiences poignant new perspectives to view their human connection to the materiality of expression. 

Currently, she is the Polly Thayer Starr Fellow in American Art and Culture at the Boston Athenæum. Her previous posts include Spelman College Museum of Fine Art and SCAD FASH Museum of Fashion + Film.

Tickets are sliding scale; please pay what you are able. If non-members would like to attend for less than $7, please contact bcallahan@nicholshousemuseum.org for accommodation.