The Paston Treasure: Microcosm of the Known World

The seventeenth-century painting The Paston Treasure (ca. 1663) is an enigmatic masterpiece. It will make its North American debut at the Yale Center for British Art. Gathering some of the depicted objects around the painting for the first time in nearly three centuries, the exhibition will trace the genesis and demise of the Paston family collection of treasures from the fifteenth to the early eighteenth centuries. It will explore the making and movement of precious objects, such as mounted nautilus shells between continental Europe and provincial England; and it will reconstruct the networks of artists, craftsmen, and natural philosophers surrounding the Paston family, who established what was perhaps the most extensive cabinets of curiosities ever to exist in England. Furthermore, technical analysis will reveal what lies beneath the physical surface of the painting, helping to understand how it was made and shedding light on who made it and why. The display will include 140 objects from more than fifty international institutions and private lenders.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website.