Join us for casual in-gallery conversations in our special exhibition, JANE!, facilitated by our Museum Engagement Guides. Enjoy a spotlight tour focusining on a single object, followed by an open conversation. 

Curated by Associate Curator of European Art, Patrick R. Crowley, JANE! celebrates the aesthetic and affective excesses of Jane Stanford, the Gilded Age founder and matriarch of Stanford University. Bringing together precious keepsakes, souvenirs, archaeological detritus, and spooky messages from beyond the grave, the exhibition reveals the campy underside of a familiar biography and perhaps an even more familiar murder mystery.

From her elegant French gowns to a colossal painting of her jewels, from the Egyptian artifacts she acquired for her fledgling museum to a container of her beauty cream excavated from her Palo Alto mansion destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, JANE! presents various idiosyncratic artifacts of Stanford lore—many of them shown for the very first time—and very probably for the last.

We gratefully acknowledge lead support for JANE! provided by Pamela and David Hornik. Sustained support generously provided by The C. Diane Christensen Fund for African Art.

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Public tours are free for all. Please check in at the visitor services desk* in the main museum lobby.

*If you plan to bring a large group with you (10 people or more), please notify us one week in advance via this form so we can inform our Guides. Thank you!

IMAGE: Astley D. M. Cooper (American, 1856–19240.) "Mrs. Stanford’s Jewel Collection," 1898. 50 x 75 in. Oil on canvas. Stanford Family Collections, Cantor Arts Center, Stanford University, JLS.16294