Art History

Back to Blog September 1, 2022

Art History grad students research and present papers in the summer of 2022

Author: Jane DeRose Evans

Lauren Wilson (PhD student) travelled to Crete in June on a grant to the INSTAP-SCEC study center to conduct preliminary research on the ceramic materials from the rescue excavation of Kastelli. The site is southeast of Knossos and produced Minoan pottery that will be the focus of her dissertation. She returned in August to attend a course on prehistoric through Roman pottery analysis taught by professors from the British School in Athens. Lauren also presented a paper, “Defining the End of the MM IIB in the Mirabello Region: the Alatzomouri Pefka Deposit” at the workshop, ‘Protopalatial Pottery: Relative Chronology and Regional Differences in Middle Bronze Age Crete’ hosted by INSTAP-SCEC in honor of its 25th anniversary.

Jessica Sara Sternbach (PhD candidate) conducted research vital to her dissertation in archives in Amsterdam and the Hague, funded in part by the Marcia Hall Art History Summer Travel Award. While there, she had the good fortune of meeting with a descendant of the Six family, whose ancestors were painted by Rembrandt, to discuss their family history and their art collection. She was able to travel in part due to funds from the Marcia Hall Art History Summer Travel Grant.

Erin Riley-Lopez (PhD candidate) prepared for her upcoming Center for the Humanities At Temple Fellowship (Spring 2023) by conducting research on the exhibition, “Trigger: Gender as a Tool and Weapon”, which will form a chapter of her dissertation and be presented at CHAT next semester.

Michael Ernst (PhD student) used an ARISC Graduate Fellowship and a Temple First Summer Research Initiative to travel to Azerbaijan this summer to investigate gas station prayer-houses. He used his time to visit and document new structures, such as the mosque being constructed in Nakhchivan City, which is placed next to the Mausoleum of Noah, the reputed burial site of the Biblical patriarch.

Marian Berthoud (PhD candidate) finished her Rome Fellowship by exploring sites in Sicily that will be included in her dissertation. She received the Kress Fellowship to attend Middlebury Language School for the study of Portuguese.

Preston Gould (MA student) researched Qualifying Paper topic while traveling in Italy on the Marcia Hall Art History Summer Travel Award. He focused his viewing primarily on Tuscan painters of the early 16th century in order to understand how the radical work of the painters in Siena and Florence pushed forward the Italian artistic canon.

Elizabeth Kathryn Dunteman (PhD candidate) returned to Venice to resume her Save Venice Anniversary Fellowship at Save Venice in order to complete her archival research at the Archivio di Stato di Venezia; work with other scholars at the Rosand Library & Study Center; and assist with research concerning Save Venice conservation projects and the Women Artists of Venice project.

Lily F. Scott (PhD candidate) used travel funds from the Barra Fellowship in American Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art to travel to Washington, DC and Maryland to conduct dissertation research at the Archives of American Art, the Smithsonian American Art and Portrait Gallery Library, the Smithsonian Institution Archives, and the University of Maryland Special Collections and University Archives.

Megan Reddicks Pignaturo (PhD candidate) traveled to Florence to view the ongoing restoration of the Brancacci Chapel frescoes, climbing up onto the scaffolding to view both of the upper registers. This research will be included in her dissertation.

David Carnish (PhD student) pursued his interests in the ideas of originality and repetition in the Renaissance and by counterfeiters of art.