Bard Graduate Center is a research institute for advanced, interdisciplinary study of diverse material worlds. We support the innovative scholarship of our faculty and students as well as resident fellows, guest curators and artists, and visiting speakers.

Photo by Fresco Arts Team.

Our Public Humanities + Research department focuses on making scholarly work widely available and accessible through the coordination of the fellowship program and public programming that combines academic research with exhibition-related events. Across the institution—from the classroom to the gallery, from publications to this website—we utilize digital media to facilitate and share original research. This section outlines current programming and provides a repository for past scholarly content.

Steven Nelson spoke at the Seminar on Museum Conversations on Wednesday, September 15, at 12:15 pm. His talk is entitled “From the Academy to the Museum: Thoughts on Scholarship in Different Contexts.”

Nelson writes: “The Center for Advanced Study, founded in 1979, fosters scholarship into the arts, architecture, and visual cultures without regard to geography or chronology. Throughout its history, researchers from academia, museums, and beyond have pursued their projects to different ends. Understanding the Center as existing at the intersection of the academy and the museum, this discussion considers the similarities and differences of scholarship in these two venues.”

Steven Nelson is Dean of the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC. Nelson has published widely on the arts, architecture, and urbanism of Africa and its diasporas and on queer studies. Nelson is professor emeritus at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he served as director of the African Studies Center and advised the university on its diversity and inclusion strategic planning. Before assuming the role of dean, he was the Center’s Andrew W. Mellon Professor. Most recently, he has joined the Kress Foundation Board of Trustees and has been named as a member of the Society of Architectural Historian’s 2021 class of fellows. Nelson earned a BA in studio art from Yale University and an AM and a PhD in art history from Harvard University.