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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.

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Applications for our MA program may be submitted until March 1, 2025





About

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).


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Bard Graduate Center graduates who received their master’s degrees, May 2019

Bard College Commencement, May 25, 2019


Another academic year has closed and Bard Graduate Center once again celebrates the outstanding achievements of our latest graduates—fifteen master’s degree students who presented their qualifying papers and five doctoral candidates who successfully completed their dissertations. We wish them success as they embark on the next phase of their careers.

PhD dissertation titles and MA qualifying paper titles are listed below each student’s name. Awards are indicated beneath the titles

Doctor of Philosophy

Christine E. Brennan,
Glen Ridge, NJ
The Brummer Gallery and the Market for Medieval Art in Paris and New York,1906–1949

Mei-Ling Israel
, Cobb, CA
Circles, Pins, and Threads: Craft Knowledge Exchange in the Digital Sphere
CINOA Award

Hadley Welch Jensen
, Los Angeles, CA
Shaped by the Camera: Navajo Weavers and the Photography of Making in the American Southwest, 1880–1945

Meredith Picton Nelson
, Rye, NY
Adorning Venus: Roman Gold Body Chains, the Corpus, and their Context
Lee B. Anderson Memorial Foundation Dean’s Prize

Rebecca Sandler Perten
, Teaneck, NJ
Postwar American Jewish Religious Identity, Ritual Objects, and Modern Design: Ludwig Y. Wolpert, the Tobe Pascher Workshop, and the Joint Committee on Ceremonies of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations/Central Conference of American Rabbis

Master of Philosophy

Colin Fanning,
Pueblo, CO
Bringing Theory to Form: Katherine and Michael McCoy, the Cranbrook Academy of Art, and Expanded Discourse of Design, 1971–2005


Master of Arts

Jessica Ashley Boven
, San Francisco, CA
Setting the Modern Table: American Flatware and the Domestication of Stainless Steel

Dylan Leah Brekka, Bristol, RI
Dressing the Strange Artist: Fashion and Fame in Georges Clairin’s Portrait de Sarah Bernhardt

Taryn Clary
, Rye, NY
Buttons to Banners: The Material Culture of Museum Marketing
Mr. and Mrs. Raymond J. Horowitz Foundation for the Arts Award

Tessa Goldsher, Avon, CT
“Grandeur Now Departed”: Race, Nationalism, and the Aesthetic of Nostalgia in the Brooklyn Museum Southern Period Rooms

L. Bates Jaffe, New York, NY
Morbid Consumption: The Commodification of Mummies in Victorian England

Drew Catherine Jepson, Los Angeles, CA
Sensing Sassafras: Materia Medica Exchange in the British Atlantic
Clive Wainwright Award

Sybil Faris Johnson, Sudbury, MA
Very Much American: The Education, Travels, and Legacy of Thomas Gold Appleton, 1812–1884

Leela Outcalt, New York, NY
Elizabeth Robins Pennell’s Cookery Book: A Symphony in the Gender Politics of Nineteenth-Century Dining

Clara May Puton, Toronto, Canada
Lacing a Nation: Renaissance Lace Revivalism and the Scuola Merletti di Burano in Post-Unification and Fascist Italy

Skylar A. Smith, Moore, OK
Familiar Narratives and Clothing Caricatures: The Realities of Tex Avery’s Imaginary Universe

Sophie Anne Swanson, Phoenix, AZ
Plush: Wall-to-Wall Liberation

Christianne Ellen Teague, New Orleans, LA
Voices in Stone: An Exploration of the Use of Pounamu in the Contemporary Jewelry of Aotearoa New Zealand

Colleen E. Terrell, Philadelphia, PA
Rose Slivka and the Crafting of Craft Horizons, 1955–1979

Bailey Elizabeth Tichenor, Unionville, IN
Conspicuous Cataloging: An Investigation of Collections Management in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth-Century Museum

Yusi (Joyce) Zhou
, Beijing, China/Bangkok, Thailand
European Turned Ivories at the Court of the Kangxi Emperor: A Study in Early Modern Cross-Cultural Relations