Bard Graduate Center is an advanced graduate research institute in New York City dedicated to the cultural histories of the material world. Our MA and PhD degree programs, Gallery exhibitions, research initiatives, scholarly publications and public programs explore new ways of thinking about decorative arts, design history, and material culture.
Exhibitions
Sèvres Extraordinaire! Sculpture from 1740 until Today
Online Exhibition
Online Exhibitions
September 23, 2024
September 23, 2024
“Humans Should Be as Well-Dressed as Horses”
Craft, Clients, and Continuity of Phelps Associates, 1940–1969
An Alumni Spotlight Lecture by Rebecca Jumper Matheson (BGC PhD ’22, Fashion Institute of Technology)
January 21, 2026
“We Black Folks Had to Wear Lowells”
Slavery, Negro Cloth, and the…
A lecture by Jonathan Michael Square (Parsons School of Design)
January 28, 2026
The Handshouse Studio Notre-Dame Project
A presentation by Marie Brown (Handshouse Studio), Michael Burrey (North Bennet Street School), Lindsay Cook (Penn State University), and Jackson DuBois (Timber Framers Guild)
February 4, 2026
Event Horizon
Early Modern Warfare and the Monumental Print
A lecture by Carolyn Yerkes (Princeton University)
February 11, 2026
When Alex Met Candy
The Ottoman Version of the…
A Ravi and Seran Trehan Lecture in the Arts of the Islamic World by Edhem Eldem (Columbia University)
February 18, 2026
Object
MA/PhD
Meet the BGC
News
2024 Horowitz Book Prize Winner
Plantation Goods: A Material History of American Slavery
Publications News
October 24, 2025
October 24, 2025
