Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Jerusalem c. 18th century

Curator: Here we have Johann Friedrich Bause's portrait of Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Jerusalem, currently housed in the Harvard Art Museums. Editor: The cool detachment of the sitter really strikes me. It's like a mask of Enlightenment rationality. Curator: Interesting. Jerusalem was a hugely influential theologian and pedagogue during that period. Note the cross he wears. Editor: It speaks to his office and authority, of course, but I'm drawn to the somewhat austere composition. The oval frame almost feels like a symbolic enclosure. Curator: I see it as a calculated attempt to portray Jerusalem as a figure of reason, an almost secular saint for the burgeoning bourgeois public. Editor: Perhaps. Regardless, the portrait invites reflection on the complex relationship between faith and reason during that transformative era. Curator: A fitting summary, I think. A potent image for any study of 18th-century intellectual life.