Welcome from the Chief Campus Curator

With a vista that includes 11 million square feet of physical space and nearly 300 co-curricular buildings, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences campus is perhaps the most voluminous “text” one will explore during their time at Harvard. Its rich institutional history, architectural distinction, active social and intellectual life, and setting within a bustling city underscore the charm and iconicity of our school’s ecosystem.

To be sure, the FAS campus is more than a “cabinet of curiosity”—it is a dynamic academic enterprise and a depot for engagement with a global and diverse community of students, faculty, staff, researchers, alumnae, and visitors. For these reasons and more,  our campus  must reflect a commitment to inclusive excellence and to an overarching residential and visitor experience that inspires a sense of hospitality, discovery, and belonging.

The clarion call for Harvard’s FAS to rethink its visual culture and signage is, in part, an invitation to explore what is visible, what is unseen, and what is not yet legible within our shared spaces. As the inaugural chief campus curator, I am eager to lead and collaborate with our community and University partners as we work to reimagine the visual culture and vernacular spirit of the FAS.

Together, we will prioritize and enable didactic, innovative, practical, and community-driven strategies that aim to:

• Enliven the academic and visitor experience through dynamic curation and creative interventions in co-curricular, shared, digital, and public-facing FAS spaces
• Employ human-centered and universal design approaches that enhance orientation, wayfinding systems, accessibility, and intuitive navigation of the campus’ historic built environment
• Commission creative projects and leverage cross-institutional collections – art, material culture, ephemera, artifacts, and objects – to present a more multi disciplinary, diverse, and aspirational visual culture
• Deepen connections to Harvard’s vast history through inclusive storytelling, expanded tour programs, and historical interpretative signage that build upon and bring into sharper focus the campus’ extant memorial ecology

I hope you will join me and the FAS Visual Culture & Signage Advisory Committee as we embark upon this ambitious and mission-driven initiative. In the meantime, I invite you to explore the Report of the FAS Task Force on Visual Culture & Signage to learn more about our mission, guiding principles, and the recommendations that anchor our remit and scope of work.

Respectfully,

Brenda Tindal
Executive Director of the Office for Academic Culture and Community and Chief Campus Curator