Cornell Center for Historical Keyboards Salon with Patricia Garcia Gil: A Salon on Music and Science Inspired by Madame Lavoisier. “Nothing is Lost”: The Reign of Terror may have claimed Antoine Lavoisier’s life, but his revolutionary contributions to science have endured. His legacy was preserved by his closest collaborator, Marie-Anne Paulze (Madame Lavoisier), who, in a male-dominated field, created a space for herself and hosted salons that blended science with the latest musical trends. “Nothing is Created”: Inspired by these gatherings, a selection from Madame Lavoisier’s music library—now housed in Cornell’s Rare and Manuscript Collections—will be presented alongside cutting-edge research on spectroscopy, revealing how chemicals leave marks in light and advancing our understanding of celestial bodies like Jupiter’s moon Europa. “Everything is Transformed”: Much like the work of the Lavoisiers, where boundaries fluidly dissolve between disciplines, the fusion of art and science aims to offer a transformative opportunity to reflect on life beyond Earth, as well as to contemplate collaboration as a means for ideas to evolve continually.
