Art History | Penn Today

A digital image of Ursula Rucker standing at the base of the Philadelphia Art Museum steps with three people walking behind her.

Monument Lab app expands space and time at Art Museum steps

OverTime, a new augmented reality app that weds public art and history in a personal visual format gives users access to interactive, self-guided tours of public spaces, and invites users to add stories of their own.

Julie Nelson Davis smiles for portrait outside her office

Julie Nelson Davis named a 2021 Guggenheim Fellow

Considered a foremost authority on Japanese prints and illustrated books, the history of art professor teaches a wide range of courses on East Asian art and material culture.

professor standing in front of a painting in a museum gallery

Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw puts the nation’s first ladies on display

As curator of the first comprehensive exhibition on first ladies at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw weaves her scholarship into the stories of the women who supported U.S. presidents while in the White House.

The unbridled brilliance of Julian Abele

The 1902 graduate of the architecture program is finally starting to receive credit for his vast and iconic portfolio, which includes the central branch of the Free Library, Penn’s President’s House, Harvard’s flagship library, and more than 30 spaces and places on Duke’s campus.

Grid of underwater images with data indicating depth and time period.

Mantha Zarmakoupi brings history to the surface

The Morris Russell and Josephine Chidsey Williams Assistant Professor in Roman Architecture conducts underwater surveys to map ancient travel and political intrigue.

Reflections on public spaces in the age of COVID, protest

Ken Lum and Paul Farber of the Weitzman School of Design remark on how the public might perceive public spaces and art differently in the time of COVID-19 and protests.

The New York Times

John Singer Sargent’s secret muse

Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw of the School of Arts and Sciences spoke about the practice of updating information about well-known artworks in museum wall labels and catalogs. “Curators and art historians have been interested in trying to reveal more—in part because there’s more interest in having a robust understanding of the past,” she said.

A friendship born through marginalization

At the turn of the 20th century, Julian Abele and Louis Magaziner—a Black man and an immigrant Jew—were standouts in Penn’s School of Fine Arts about to launch distinguished careers in architecture. They were also beginning what would be a lifelong friendship. A Magaziner descendant and Abele admirer investigates what brought them together.

students gathered around a table looking at armor

A day in shining armor

Grad students get a close-up view of artwork and materials from museum collections—including a 500-year-old painting and two sets of armor from the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

A conversation with Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw

In the latest episode of “Office Hours,” a Penn Today podcast, Professor of History of Art Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw explains the curation process behind the Barnes Foundation’s “30 Americans” exhibit.

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