Annual Lecture Series

From internationally-recognized senior scholars to emerging art historians who are shaping the future of the discipline, our annual lecture series features a compelling range of voices. Speakers present work across historical periods using diverse methodologies, which addresses a variety of themes and research questions.

2023-2024 Department of Art History Lecture Series

Date Name of Lecturer Title

October 19, 2023, 5pm

Pillsbury Hall, Room 412

Adrienne Browne
Associate Professor, University of Chicago

The Donald R. Torbert Lecture in Architectural History—"The Residential is Racial: A Perceptual History of Mass Homeownership"

 

March 29, 2024, 12:15pm

Heller Hall, Room 1210

Stephen Whiteman
Courtauld Institute of Art

"Plausible Fictions and Imperfect Models: Engaging the Past through Digital Art History"

Co-sponsored with the Center for Premodern Studies

April 19. 2024, 4:30pm

Andersen Library, Room 120

Yael Rice
Associate Professor, Amherst College
Catherine B. Asher Lecture in South Asian and Islamic Art History—"Tactile Histories of the Mughal Album"

2022-2023 Department of Art History Lecture Series

Date Name of Lecturer Title

November 17, 2022, 5:30pm

125 Willey Hall

Zeynep Çelik Alexander
Associate Professor, Columbia University
The Donald R. Torbert Lecture in Architectural History—"Imperial Data: An Architectural History"

2021-2022 Department of Art History Lecture Series

Date Name of Lecturer Title

October 21, 2021, 5:00pm

125 Willey Hall, Zoom

Jesús Escobar 
Professor, Northwestern University

 

The Donald R. Torbert Lecture in Architectural History—"Mariana's Madrid: Architecture, Ceremony, and Power"

April 13, 2022, 6:30pm

125 Willey Hall

Maggie Cao
David G Frey Assistant Professor
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill 

 

"Transplanting the Tropics"

2020-2021 Department of Art History Lecture Series

Date Name of Lecturer Title

October 20, 2020, 3:00pm

Zoom
 

Laura Kalba
Associate Professor 
University of Minnesota 

 

Faculty Colloquia Series—"Beautiful Money: Looking at La Semeuse in Fin-de-Siécle France"

2019-2020 Department of Art History Lecture Series

Date Name of Lecturer Title

October 11, 2019, 3:30pm

445 Heller Hall
 

Jane Blocker
Professor 
University of Minnesota

 

Faculty Colloquia Series—"Beacon: Epistemologies of the Art Object"

 

October 30, 2019, 5:30pm
Lindahl Founders Room
Northrup 2nd Floor
Madhuri Desai
Associate Professor of Art History and Asian Studies
Penn State
The Donald R. Torbert Lecture in Architectural History—"The Mughal Temple in Banaras and Beyond"

March 27, 2020, 12:00pm

Zoom

Jennifer Awes-Freeman
Visiting Assistant Professor
University of Minnesota

Faculty Colloquia Series—"Altered Arks/Arks as Altars: Divinity on the Move in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages"

 

2018-2019 Department of Art History Lecture Series

Date Name of Lecturer Title
November 1, 2018, 5:00pm
Lindahl Founders Room
Northrup 2nd Floor
Michael Osman
Associate Professor
University of California, Los Angeles
The Donald R. Torbert Lecture in Architectural History—"Modernism's Visible Hand: Architecture and Regulation in America"
April 8, 2019, 4:00pm
445 Heller Hall
Jenni Sorkin
Associate Professor
University of California, Santa Barbara
"One Thousand Hours: Artistic Labor and the Vase that Established Studio Ceramics"

2017-2018 Department of Art History Lecture Series

Date Name of Lecturer Title
October 24, 2017, 5:30pm
Lindahl Founders Room
Northrup 2nd Floor
Christina Cogdell
Associate Professor of Design and Chair of Design Department
University of California, Davis
The Donald R. Torbert Lecture in Architectural History—"Towards a Living Architecture? Complexity and Biology in Generative Architecture"
November 30, 2017, 4:00pm
710 Social Sciences
Jennifer Awes Freeman
Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Theology
University of St. Thomas
"Breastfeeding Cain: Visualizing Eve's Role in the Fall"
April 6, 2018, 4:00pm
445 Heller Hall
Peng Peng, Visiting Assistant Professor
Emily Capper, Visiting Assistant Professor
Jennifer Awes-Freeman, Visiting Assistant Professor
Jennifer Marshall, Associate Professor, and Colleen Stockmann, Graduate Student
Art History Faculty Symposium
"The Lost Wax Casting in Bronze Age China: Art and Technology"
"Film As Performance Score"
"The Good Shepherd: Image, Meaning, and Power"
"William Howard's Desks"
April 12, 2018
445 Heller Hall
Annika K. Johnson
PhD Candidate, History of Art & Architecture, University of Pittsburg

"Pipestone at the Confluence of Cultures in the Nineteenth Century"

 

2016-2017 Department of Art History Lecture Series

Date Name of Lecturer Title
October 4, 2016, 5:00pm
1210 Heller Hall
Louis P. Nelson
Professor of Architectural History and Associate Dean
University of Virginia's School of Architecture
The Donald R. Torbert Lecture in Architectural History—"Architectures of West African Enslavement"
October 12, 2016, 7:30pm
1210 Heller Hall
Tom Rassieur
Curator of Prints and Drawings
Minneapolis Institute of Art
"Martin Luther: Art and the Reformation"
November 10, 2016, 2:30pm
335 Blegen Hall
Ananya Chatterjee
University of Minnesota
Gabriela Currie 
University of Minnesota
Daniela Sandler 
University of Minnesota
"Say What You See: Visual Culture Across Disciplines"
December 1, 2016, 2:30pm
445 Heller Hall
Margaret Cool Root
University of Michigan
Yael Rice
Amherst College
Emma Flatt
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
"The Visual Culture of the Persianate World"
April 8, 2017, 10:30am
McNamara Alumni Center

19th Century

Colleen Denney
University of Wyoming
Annika Johnson
University of Pittsburg
Gabriel Weisberg
University of Minnesota

Islam

Deborah Hutton
The College of New Jersey
Molly Aitken
City University of New York
Catherine Asher
University of Minnesota

South Asia

Rebecca Brown
Johns Hopkins University
Frederick Asher
University of Minnesota

"Liber Amicorum: A symposium honoring Professors Catherine Asher, Frederick Asher, and Gabriel Weisberg"