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).

Early in 2021 Bard Graduate Center announced the appointment of Arjun Appadurai—an internationally recognized scholar in contemporary social-cultural anthropology and the cultural dynamics of globalization—as Max Weber Global Professor, effective July 1, 2021. Dean Peter Miller contextualized the development saying, “This is an exciting moment in the history of the institution and opens a glimpse towards a future where our collaborative intellectual venture extends further and the strands of the inquiry launched here 27 years ago grow ever denser and more fruitful.” Dr. Appadurai’s research and teaching at BGC will focus on the intersection of material culture studies, anthropology, social history, and economics. Learn more.

In November, Ivan Gaskell was appointed acting chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Lichtenberg-Kolleg (Advanced Study Institute) of the Georg-August University, Göttingen. On November 14, he gave the response to a paper by Claire Anscomb, “Creative Curating? Displaying Installation Art” at the annual meeting of the American Society for Aesthetics held online. The following month, he was elected a trustee of the American Society for Aesthetics by the membership to serve from 2021 through 2024, his second term as a trustee. He published “Living or Dead,” in Luca Del Baldo, The Visionary Academy of Ocular Mentality: Atlas of the Iconic Turn (Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, 2020), pp. 187-190; “Harvard, History, and a House Museum,” in LaurelX: A Non-Traditional Festschrift in Celebration of Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, ed. Christopher Allison, John Bell, and Sarah Ann Carter (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Archives, 2020); and “Cracking Up with Piet Mondrian,” in Proceedings of the 34th World Congress of Art History, Beijing, 2016 (Beijing: Commercial Press, 2020), Vol. 3, pp. 201-206.

Freyja Hartzell has published “Cleanliness, Clarity—and Craft: Material Politics in German Design, 1919-1939” in The Journal of Modern Craft; “Enemy of Secrets: the Invisible Force of Interwar Glass” in The Journal of Design History; and “Experience, Poverty, Transparency: The Modern Surface of Interwar Glass,” in Surface and Apparition: The Immateriality of the Modern Surface, YeSeung Lee and Benedict Carpenter, eds. (Bloomsbury).

Michele Majer spoke with Leigh Wishner (MA 2004) at Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising in a curatorial conversation on Esther Williams in December. Majer will join PhD candidate Rebecca Matheson for a discussion of the American duster coat at the Decorative Arts Trust on February 19.

Nina Stritzler-Levine contributed an article on Aino and Alvar Aalto to the forthcoming Shared Visions of Aino and Alvar Aalto published by the Setagaya Art Museum in Tokyo. The English language contributions of Stritzler-Levine and fellow contributors are published alongside their Japanese translations.