Theodore Stebbins, Distinguished Fellow and Consultative Curator of American Art at Harvard’s Fogg Museum, will lead off a roster of leading art experts who will speak at the forthcoming Studio Series Talks, to be held at the Lenox Hotel and sponsored by Friends of Fenway Studios.

Stebbins talk, “The MFA, the Boston School, and Me” will highlight the Boston School of Painting, an important movement in American art in the early 1900s and closely tied to the Fenway Studios on Ipswich Street in the Back Bay.

The Studio Series is a new program of events held by Friends of Fenway Studios to help support preservation of the Fenway Studios.  Each of the 2011-2012 Studio Series Talks will be followed by a private reception at the Vose Galleries, Newbury Street, Boston’s premier gallery for fine American art.

Other speakers in the series will be Katherine French, Director of the Danforth Museum in Framingham; Erica Hirshler, Croll Senior Curator of American Paintings at the MFA; and Lindsay Leard-Coolidge, author and lecturer, Northeastern University.  The 2011-2012 program will conclude in June 2012 with a private exhibit preview and gallery talk at the Vose Galleries.

Before joining the Fogg, Stebbins served as the John Moors Cabot Curator of American Paintings at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston for the 22 years and as associate professor of art history and curator of American painting and sculpture at Yale University.

Stebbins’ talk at the Lenox Hotel, Boylston Street, Back Bay, will be on Tuesday, November 1, at 6 pm.  Tickets are $50, or $200 for the full series of five lectures.  Reservations are required.  For further information, go to www.friendsoffenwaystudios.org, or call 617-695-9720.