Frame Image: French. Louis XV Revival-style Frame, 1800s. Overall: 54.6 x 45.1 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario. Gift of an anonymous collector, 1997. Photo © AGO. 97/1026

Victorian Picture Frames in Canada: Stylistic and Institutional Histories with Eric Birkle

Thursday, April 17, 2025 - 7PM (ET) 

This lecture will consider the stylistic development of 19th-century eclectic and Revival-style (i.e. “Victorian”) frames in Canada. It will also examine Victorian frames in Canadian institutional contexts both historic and current, with featured case studies from the Art Gallery of Ontario. 

Not sure you can attend live? We've got you covered! A video recording of this presentation will be made available to all those who reserve/purchase tickets.

Eric Birkle is a PhD candidate in Art History & Visual Culture at York University and the Marie Zimmermann Curatorial Fellow in European Art at the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO). His research considers understudied connections between architectural expression and museological practice in late 19th-century art institutions in Canada and the United States. He is also interested in the structure, function, ornamentation, and style of framing devices. At the AGO, Birkle collaborates with curators and conservators to research and refine the gallery’s historic European frames collection, which spans from the late 16th through the late 19th centuries.