History of Design and Curatorial Studies

Perspectives in World Art and Design

In the fall of 2010, ADHT launched two pilot sections of PWAD1.  Employing the lecture/recitation model for a total of 150 students, two sections led by Professors Rosemary O’Neill and Laura Bonilla-Merchav aimed to connect the class content with museum specialists and scholars in areas from pre-history to the fourteenth century.  In addition to lead faculty, students were given specialized lectures by speakers including:  Jeung Sung Kim from the Onassis Center, on the exhibition “Heroes: Mortals and Myths in Ancient Greece”; Yasuko Tsuchikane, St. Elizabeth College, presented on early Japanese Art; Dr. Patricia Tpongracz, Director of Curatorial Programs at Museum of Biblical Art instructed the class on Early Christian and Jewish Art; Dr. Leslie Tait, Curator, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Cloisters addressed Medieval Art ; and Dr. Ethan Robey, Associate Director of the MA program in Decorative Arts gave a presentation on Gothic Art.  Additionally, part-time faculty Leon Waller drew on his extensive experience to address African Art and Jaime Arredondo lectured on pre-Columbian Art in Mexico.  As part of the course, students visited collections in the Metropolitan Museum of Art focusing on Roman Art and Southeast Asian Art as well as a private lecture on the Brooklyn Museum’s Egyptian collection.

For spring 2011, Professors O’Neill and Anastasia Aukeman have again scheduled lectures and museum experiences for 180 students in PWAD2 covering the fourteenth century to the present.  Outside speakers invited to lecture for this semester include:  Dr. Henry Luttikhuizen, Professor of Art at Calvin College, Michigan and Board member of the Historians of Netherlandish Art; Adriana Proser, John H. Foster Curator of Traditional Art at the Asia Society; and Dr. Laura Auricchio, Assistant Professor at Parsons.  In addition, the Museum of Biblical Art will offer students tours of their upcoming exhibition, “Passion in Venice:  Crivelli to Tintoretto and Veronese”; and the Brooklyn Museum will welcome our students for a lecture and tour of the 19^th and early 20^th century galleries devoted to the fine arts, furniture, decorative arts, and works indigenous to the southwestern U.S.

To date, students have been invited by The Cloisters, The Brooklyn Museum, and the Museum of Biblical Art to apply for internships in their education and curatorial departments.  Professor O’Neill has also been invited to join the Brooklyn Museum’s Professors’ Group for academics in the New York City region actively using the museum’s collection in their college classes.