Bard Graduate Center is devoted to the study of decorative arts, design history, and material culture through research, advanced degrees, exhibitions, publications, and events.

Bard Graduate Center advances the study of decorative arts, design history, and material culture through its object-centered approach to teaching, research, exhibitions, publications, and events.

At BGC, we study the human past and present through their material expressions. We focus on objects and other material forms—from those valued for their aesthetic elements to the ordinary things used in everyday life.

Our accomplished interdisciplinary faculty inspires and prepares students in our MA and PhD programs for successful careers in academia, museums, and the private sector. We bring equal intellectual rigor to our acclaimed exhibitions, award-winning catalogues and scholarly publications, and innovative public programs, and we view all of these integrated elements as vital to our curriculum.

BGC’s campus comprises a state-of-the-art academic programs building at 38 West 86th Street, a gallery at 18 West 86th Street, and a residence hall at 410 West 58th Street. A new collection study center will open at 8 West 86th Street in 2026.

Founded by Dr. Susan Weber in 1993, Bard Graduate Center has become the preeminent institute for academic research and exhibition of decorative arts, design history, and material culture. BGC is an accredited unit of Bard College and a member of the Association of Research Institutes in Art History (ARIAH).

Elissa Auther is the curator of two exhibitions at the Museum of Arts and Design: Eye for Design, on view through September 18 and Francoise Grossen Selects from the Collection, opening October 18. Two independently curated shows are now touring. Senga Nengudi: Improvisational Gestures is on view at the Henry Art Gallery, University of Washington, through October 9, and Marilyn Minter: Pretty/Dirty will open November 4 at the Brooklyn Museum.

Ivan Gaskell gave two lectures in June: “Joining the Club,” at the Ethnological Institute, and “Concord Migrations: Thoreau’s Human Movements,” at the Lichtenberg-Kolleg. These were presented during the third of his annual summer terms as a senior fellow at the Lichtenberg-Kolleg (Advanced Study Institute) of the Georg-August University, Göttingen. Gaskell’s senior fellowship at the Lichtenberg-Kolleg of two months each year has been extended from a five-year term to a permanent appointment. In July, he participated in the Groningen-Göttingen summer school, The Knowledge of the Curator. His keynote lecture at the Groningen Museum was entitled “‘A firm hand on the Lobster’: Other People’s Things, and How to Get Hold of Them.” His review of the exhibition and catalogue entitled Asia in Amsterdam:The Culture of Luxury in the Golden Age (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, and Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts) appeared in Historians of Netherlandish Art Review of Books, in June. He also published exhibition reviews of Krieg: eine archäologische Spurensuche (Landesmuseum für Vorgeschichte, Halle-an-der-Saale) and Found, curated by Cornelia Parker (The Foundling Museum, London) in West 86th online.

Paul Stirton’s essay, “Commanditaires et luttes de classes dans la Florence du XIVe siècle,” on the Hungarian art historian Frederick Antal, appeared in the June issue of Histoires sociales de l’art: Une anthologie critique, published by the Institut national d’histoire de l’art in Paris. In October, he will give a talk on the subject at the INHA.