Campus & Community

A walking elegy, tiny gallery, and gentle Brutalism

Photo illustration by Liz Zonarich/Harvard Staff

July 9, 2025

2 min read

Photography professor recommends 3 local spots to find beauty, solace

Part of the
Favorite Things
series

Recommendations from Harvard faculty

Robin Kelsey is the Shirley Carter Burden Professor of Photography, History of Photography and American Art.

Favorite place to walk

Mount Auburn Cemetery

You can commune with the dead, with migrating birds, and with ancient trees. Each time I visit, I treasure the chance to say hello to departed friends, from vital contemporaries who left us too soon (e.g., our faculty colleague Svetlana Boym) to those long-gone but thrilling us still (e.g., Winslow Homer). When I need to restore myself, there is no better place in Cambridge than this path-winding refuge with its massive, straight-boled oaks.

Favorite art gallery

Anthony Greaney

What better place to find contemporary art than up creaking stairs in a dilapidated warehouse by the Market Basket in Somerville? The space is tiny, the light soft and exquisite, and the curation distinguished by its perspicacity and care.

Favorite building on campus

The Carpenter Center

To call this building “Brutalist” may abide by textbook definitions but feels utterly inapt to me. I find the Carpenter Center inviting (who can resist that ramp?) and aspirational. The sight lines, the terrace, the cool concrete shadows on a hot summer day. Beautiful!

— As told to Sy Boles/Harvard Staff Writer