The Department of Art History and Art offers opportunities to study art history, to participate in a broad range of studio offerings and to engage in pre-professional museum training. The Bachelor of Arts degree is granted in art history and in pre-architecture. In addition, the department offers graduate programs leading to the degrees of Master of Arts in art history, in art history and museum studies; and the Doctor of Philosophy in art history.
All art programs are considerably enhanced by close cooperation with and access to the facilities of cultural institutions located in University Circle, in particular The Cleveland Museum of Art, The Cleveland Institute of Art and the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland.
The Cleveland Museum of Art/CWRU Art History Program has been in existence since 1967. The museum’s curators serve as adjunct faculty, and graduate research projects under their direction often result in exhibitions and publications. The museum Studies course and internships provide experience in curatorial practices, connoisseurship, conservation, design, and museum education, and the program has a history of producing leaders in the museum field. Graduate students are exposed to both traditional and newer theoretically based art historical approaches in classes taught by faculty renowned for their expertise in a diversity of fields.
News
From Prints to Power 2025
SAVE THE DATE! Dr. Benay will examine relief prints created in the 1940s by Black artists whose contributions have been largely overlooked. By repositioning their work, Benay will illustrate how these artists helped foster an enduring Black art and collecting scene in Cleveland.
Professor Popkin Organizes Symposium in Greece
Professor Maggie Popkin and doctoral student Clara Pinchbeck (pictured here with Professor Tina Howe of the CWRU Religious Studies Department and Dr. Bonna Wescoat, Director of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens), recently presented paper at the symposium, "Three-Dimensional Experiences of Ancient Environments in Athens." The symposium...
Rebekkah Hart receives the Getty Internship
Congratulations to Rebekkah Hart, third-year PhD student in medieval art, who has been selected as the 2025-2026 Getty Graduate Intern in the Sculpture & Decorative Arts curatorial department! She will be working with an astounding collection devoted to European sculpture and decorative arts dating between around 1200 and 1900....
Cecily Hughes receives the Haugen Memorial Scholarship
Congratulations to Cecily Hughes, third-year PhD student in medieval art, on receiving the Einar and Eva Lund Haugen Memorial Scholarship! Administered by The Society for the Advancement of Scandinavian Study (SASS). The Haugen scholarship provides generous support for doctoral research in and about the Nordic regions. Cecily will use the award funding to travel to Norway and Sweden this summer and do research for her dissertation.
GAMS Book Club this Thursday!
Come on, come all! Grad medievalists look forward to seeing you at the book club on Thursday!
Reed O’Mara named the 2025-27 Kress Institutional Fellow in Munich
Congratulations to the Department of Art History and Art Ph.D. candidate and Mellon Fellow Reed O’Mara, who has been selected as the 2025-2027 Kress Institutional Fellow at the Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte in Munich, Germany. As a Fellow, Reed will conduct research on her dissertation, “Materializing Sacred Language: Picturing and Performing Hebrew in Late Medieval Art.” This extremely competitive fellowship will offer Reed the opportunity to visit museums, libraries, archives, and sites throughout Germany and Austria pertinent to her dissertation, which is being advised by Professor Elina Gertsman. Reed is the second PhD student in the Department to receive this prestigious fellowship; Sam Truman, a PhD candidate in medieval art, is currently completing her 2023-2025 Kress Fellowship at The Courtauld Institute of Art and Warburg Institute in London, UK.
Jillian Kruse awarded Chester Dale Fellowship at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Congratulations to Jillian Kruse who was awarded the 2025-2026 Chester Dale Fellowship at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where she will be hosted by the Department of Drawings and Prints under the leadership of Dr. Nadine M. Orenstein, Drue Heinz Curator in Charge in the Department of Drawings and Prints. The highly competitive 12-month residential predoctoral fellowship will support her dissertation “Printing Utopia: Experimentation, Collaboration, and Anarchy in the Prints of Camille Pissarro.” The fellowship offers unparalleled access to the Met’s collection and resources as well as opportunities to actively participate in the museum’s larger scholarly community. Jillian will also assist with museum projects relevant to my research under the supervision of Dr. Ashley Dunn, Associate Curator of Drawings and Prints in charge of nineteenth-century French works on paper.
Madalyn Fox named the fifth annual Keithley Fellow in Community-Engaged Art History
Congratulations to Madalyn Fox, a first-year MA candidate in Art History and Museum Studies, who has been named the fifth annual Keithley Fellow in Community-Engaged Art History! Maddy will work with the director of Arts & Culture at Cleveland Public Library on a number of initiatives including the launch of PRISM: Seeing Beyond Mass Incarceration, a multi-disciplinary exhibition across several CPL branches seeking to change the narrative related to mass incarceration in the United States.
