Delaware Art History at 50

September 2016 marks the 50th anniversary of the Department of Art History at the University of Delaware, and also the 50th anniversary of its graduate program. From its inception the Department sought to have a graduate, indeed a doctoral, program of the highest quality, while also providing excellent courses and programs for the University's undergraduates. We plan to celebrate our anniversary with a festive conference at Clayton Hall and the Trabant University Center on the University of Delaware campus, Friday and Saturday, September 30 to October 1, 2016. Please hold these dates, and please consider coming to the event! We would love to have as many as possible attend our celebration. There will be no fee for those wishing to attend, but please do visit our registration website. We will need to know whether you plan to attend, and how many you expect to be in your party. There will be a banquet at Clayton Hall on Friday evening, and lunch on Saturday, and for those portions of the event a fee must be paid. A block of hotel rooms has been reserved at the Courtyard Marriott hotel on campus, and also at the Embassy Suites near the UD stadium complex, at a special rate for the first to make reservations, until the rooms are gone.

The program will focus on our past and our future. Professor Wayne Craven, with William Innes Homer the co-founder of the Department, will open the festivities, and Professor Damie Stillman will speak after lunch on Saturday. There will be a brief talk followed by a panel discussion for each of the four sessions, featuring a range of our alumni from various eras in the history of the Department, including current students, and with a current member of the faculty serving as moderator. It should be a great opportunity to see old friends and colleagues and to make new ones, and to get some taste of the many things now happening in and around the Department. We will be embarking on a periodic self-study later in the fall, to be followed by a full "academic program review" with outside visitors in the spring, and we very much look forward to having the benefit of the perspectives and advice of our many friends and former students.

Friday, September 30, 2016

Clayton Hall, North Campus (on Rte. 896, just north of Courtyard Marriott)

5:00 Opening Reception

6:15 Welcome by Lawrence Nees, Chair, Department of Art History

6:20 Welcome by Domenico Grasso, Provost, University of Delaware

6:25 Welcome by George Watson, Dean, College of Arts and Sciences 

6:30 Opening Lecture by Professor Wayne Craven

7:00 Banquet

Saturday, October 1, 2016

Trabant University Center Theatre (corner of Main St. and College Ave.)

9:00-10:15 First Session: Museums

Speaker: Franklin Kelly

Panelists: Jack Becker, Anna O. Marley, Lorena Bradford, Galina Olmsted, Heather Campbell Coyle, Lynley Anne Herbert

Moderator: David M. Stone

10:15-10:45 Break

10:45-12:00 Second Session: European Art

Speaker: Arthur J. DiFuria

Panelists: Nicole Elizabeth Cook, Elisabeth Berry Drago, Michele L. Frederick, Adrian R. Duran, Pepper Stetler

Moderator: H. Perry Chapman

12:00-1:30 Lunch in Old College foyer and the Visual Resources Center

1:30-2:00 Lecture by Professor Damie Stillman

2:00-3:15 Third Session: Contemporary Art and World Art

Speaker: Joan Marter

Panelists: Jason Hill, Jessica L. Horton, Louis P. Nelson, Carol A. Nigro, Theodore Triandos

Moderator: Sandy Isenstadt

3:15-3:45 Break

3:45-5:00 Fourth Session: American Art

Speaker: Susan Rather

Panelists: Roberta K. Tarbell, Kathleen Curran, Melody Barnett Deusner, Alan C. Braddock, Spencer Wigmore, Nikki A. Greene

Moderator: Wendy Bellion

5:00 Concluding Remarks and Discussion

PDF version of the Saturday program

Read the UDaily articles on Delaware Art History at 50 from September 21, 2016, and October 5, 2016

View photos from the 50th Anniversary event

Images on the "Delaware Art History at 50" banner (L-R): Paul Gauguin, Self-Portrait (detail), 1889, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (Photograph courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington); Gabonese (Kota), Reliquary Figure (Mbulu-Ngulu), 19th century, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut (Photograph provided by the Yale University Art Gallery); Rembrandt, Self-Portrait in a Cap, Open-Mouthed (detail), 1630, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (Photograph courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington); Herzog & de Meuron, National Stadium ("The Bird's Nest"), 2004-2008, Beijing, China (Photograph by Lawrence Nees); Dorothea Lange, Migrant Mother (detail), 1936, photograph, Library of Congress, Washington, DC (Photograph courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Black-and-White Negatives, LC-DIG-fsa-8b29516).