Women in the art history field
Elderly Lady (circa 1740), painting by Rosalba Carriera
Women were professionally active in the academic discipline of art history in the nineteenth century and participated in the important shift early in the century that began involving an "Emphatically Corporeal Visual Subject ", with Vernon Lee as a notable example.[ 1] It is argued that in the twentieth century women art historians (and curators), by choosing to study women artists, "dramatically" "increased their visibility".[ 2] It has been written that women artists pre-1974 were historically one of two groups; women art historians and authors who self-consciously address high school audiences through the publication of textbooks.[ 3] The relative "newness" of this field of study for women,[ 3] paired with the possibility of interdisciplinary focus, emphasizes the importance of visibility of all global women in the art history field .
Education and employment
In the United States professional, academic employment for women art historians was, by the early 1970s, not commensurate with the number of female PhDs in art history. Between 1960 and 1969, 30.1% of PhDs were awarded to women but those numbers increased significantly during that period: between 1960 and 1965 it was 27%, but between 1966 and 1967 it had gone up to 43.5%. But in 1970–1971, women art historians in art departments in the US made up 23.1% of instructors, 21.6% of assistant professors, 17.5% of associate professors, and only 11.1% of full professors. Comparison with the numbers for the same years for women in the languages, from a study done by the Modern Language Association , showed that "women in C.A.A. [College Art Association] professions face[d] rather more severe discrimination than women in M.L.A. fields". Similar tendencies were reported for salary and employment in studio teaching ("preliminary statistics...indicate that women artists receive a disproportionately small share of full-time studio jobs") and in museums ("particularly significant was a tendency to hire women with BAs to be secretaries and men with BAs for trainee programs which rapidly advanced them to more challenging positions").[ 4]
The history of women in the profession also suggests that art education itself has benefited from the increased presence of professional women art historians, since women students sometimes found it necessary to "redo" an education in which only a male point of view had been provided given. Paula Harper , "one of the first art historians to bring a feminist perspective to the study of painting and sculpture",[ 5] and Moira Roth shared the same experience of a "one-sided training", of feeling left out.[ 6] Discrimination against "women in college and university art departments and art museums" was, in the early 1970s, the immediate cause for the foundation of the Women's Caucus for Art (see below).[ 4]
In a statistical study of US employment among art faculties published in 1977, Sandra Packard notes that "in art departments women have been decreasing in number since the 1930s", and that the number of women in art faculties at institutes of higher education "decreas[ed] from 22% in 1963 to a low of 19.5% in 1974", and cites statistics suggesting that "although women are concentrated at the lower ranks in art faculties, they have more Ph.D. degrees than their male colleagues."[ 7]
Representation
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The Women's Caucus for Art (WCA), a caucus for woman art historians, artists, and curators was founded at the 1972 meeting of the College Art Association (CAA), but re-established itself as an independent organization in 1974 after the CAA told them they could not use the CAA name anymore. According to Judith Brodsky, the CAA was, at the time, very much a male-dominated organization; she notes, though, in a 1977 article, that the Caucus is given space and time at the annual CAA conference and in the CAA's journal, Art Journal .[ 8] A Lifetime Achievement Award was installed in 1979. The organization's objectives include "providing women with leadership opportunities and professional development" and "expanding networking and exhibition opportunities for women", and to that purpose publishes a newsletter, organizes sessions at conferences, and runs databases for "art and activism". In 2012 the WCA celebrated its 40th anniversary, and published a pamphlet for the annual awards ceremony that also includes a number of historical essays and reflections from the past presidents.[ 9]
The Committee on Women in the Arts (CWA) operates under the auspices of the College Art Association and advocates for feminist scholarship. Each year the committee awards a "Distinguished Feminist Award".[ 10]
In 2019, journalist Mona Chalabi completed a study on United States museums and diversity, finding that in 18 major museums the art collections are represented by 85% white and 87% male artists.[ 11] Many United States museums (such as the National Portrait Gallery ) have pledged in recent years to increase diversity in their art collections and in hires.[ 12] [ 13] As a result, a new generation of women art historians, many of which are also women of color, have joined leading institutions.
Women art historians and feminist art theory
Feminist scholars have argued that the role of women art historians is connected to the study of women (as artists and as subjects) by art historians.[ 14] In 1974, Lise Vogel noted that there were few feminist art historians, and that women art historians in general seemed unwilling to ask "the more radical critiques" a feminist scholar should engage in.[ 15] In a 1998 essay, Corine Schleif argued that women and feminist scholars need to challenge the "Great Master" canon, and that they need to focus less on "style as evidence of authorship", seen as a traditionally masculine way of viewing the history of art, but rather on style as "one of many sites on the production of meaning". The topic of women scholars in art history is thus intricately connected with what scholars have called feminist art theory ;[ 14] Kerry Freedman, for example, claims that "women art historians often interpret art that is about and by women differently than their male colleagues".[ 16] However, Carol Armstrong and Catherine de Zegher , in Women artists at the millennium (2006), argue that by the 1980s many "women art history scholars" had begun to think of feminism as irrelevant to the discipline.[ 17]
Notable women art historians
Name
Nationality
Birth date
Specialization
Profession
Phyllis Ackerman
American
1893–1977
Persian art, Chinese art, textiles, tapestries
Co-founder of Asia Institute , author, interior design
Leeza Ahmady
Afghani-American
b. 1972
Central Asian art , diaspora art
Independent curator and director of Asia Contemporary Art Week
Maryan Ainsworth
American
14th, 15th and 16th century Northern European painting, particularly in Early Netherlandish painting
Kress-Beinecke Professor at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts (CASVA) at the National Gallery in Washington DC.[ 18] She is also a curator of European paintings at the Metropolitan Museum of Art , New York.
Svetlana Alpers [ 19]
American
b. 1936
Dutch Golden Age Painting
Art historian
Mouza Sulaiman Mohamed Al-Wardi
Oman
Silversmithing from Oman
Director of the Collections Department at the National Museum (Oman) .
Amalia Amaki
American
b. 1949
American art
Artist, Professor of Modern and Contemporary Art at the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa from 2007 to 2012.[ 20]
Clementina Anstruther-Thomson
Scottish
1857–1921
Experimental aesthetics during the Victorian era
Author, art theorist, art critic
Paola Antonelli
Italian
b. 1963
Modern Art , design
Curator
Irina Antonova
Soviet, Russian
1922–2020
Impressionist art, modern art
Director of the Pushkin Museum in Moscow from 1961 to 2013.
Mildred Archer
English
1911–2005
18th- and 19th-century art in British India
Caroline Arscott
English
Victorian art, 19th century art
Art historian
Muqadamma Ashrafi
Tajikistani
1936–2013
Medieval arts and painting of Central Asia
Author, researcher
Dore Ashton
American
1928–2017
Modern Art, contemporary Art
Writer, professor, art critic
Pamela Askew
American
1925–1997
Domenico Fetti and Caravaggio
Professor
Nurhan Atasoy
Turkish
b. 1934
Ottoman art and architecture
Art historian
Erna Auerbach
German
1897–1975
Tudor period in England, feminist art
Author
Myrtilla Avery
American
1869–1959
Medieval art
Professor, a Monuments men , former chair of Department of Art at Wellesley College and director of the Farnsworth Art Museum from 1930 to 1937.
Sussan Babaie
Iranian
b. 1954
Persian art , Islamic art of the early modern period
Professor at The Courtauld Institute of Art , art historian, writer
Julie Oeming Badiee
American
1947 – 2001
Islamic art, Baháʼí
Professor and department chair at Western Maryland College (now McDaniel College)[ 21]
Barbara Baert
Belgian
b. 1967
Medieval iconology
Art historian
Mieke Bal
Dutch
b. 1946
Modern Art , Contemporary Art
Cultural theorist, video artist
Anna Banti
Italian
1895–1985
Italian Baroque, female artists
Writer, art historian, art critic, translator
Luisa Banti
Italian
1894–1978
Etruscan art
Archaeologist, art historian, writer
Jeannine Baticle
French
1920–2014
Spanish art
Former Honorary Deputy Director and Chief Curator of the Department of Paintings of the Louvre museum.
Ruth Barnes
English
b. 1956
Material culture, South and Southeast Asian Textiles
Art historian, curator
Leila Cook Barber
American
1903–1984
Renaissance art and Medieval art
Art historian, professor of art history at Vassar College.
Wendy Beckett (aka 'Sister Wendy')
English
1930–2018
Catholic art
Art historian, Catholic nun
Ellen Beer
Swiss
1926–2004
Medieval art
Art historian, professor
Lottlisa Behling
German
1909–1989
Medieval art
Art historian, professor
Mary Berenson [ 22] [ 23]
American
1864–1945
Italian Renaissance
Art historian, lecturer
Laurence Bertrand Dorléac
French
b. 1957
Modern and contemporary
Art historian, professor, curator
Rosemary Betterton
English
b. 1951
Feminism and contemporary art
Art historian, professor, author
Margarete Bieber [ 24]
German
1879–1978
Theatre, sculpture, and clothing of ancient Rome and Greece
Art historian, professor
Erika Billeter
German, Swiss
1927–2011
Latino art, contemporary art
Curator, writer, museum director at the Cantonal Museum of Fine Arts .
Gertrud Bing
German
1892–1964
Classical tradition
Director of the Warburg Institute [ 25]
Shirley Neilsen Blum [ 26]
American
b. 1932
Northern Renaissance art , early Netherlandish art, and modern art.
Art historian, author, gallerist, co-founder of Ferus Gallery , and professor emeritus at the State University of New York, Purchase (1970–1989).
Phyllis Pray Bober [ 27]
American
1920–2002
Renaissance art , classical antiquity , culinary history
Author, professor emerita at Bryn Mawr College .[ 28]
Jean Sutherland Boggs [ 29]
Canadian
b. 1922
Nineteenth-century French art , Degas
Curator, art historian, and first female director of the National Gallery of Canada
Alice Boner
Swiss
1889–1981
Indian symbols in art history
Art historian focused on symbols in Indian art, also an artist
Evelina Borea
Italian
b. 1931
Italian art history
Author, curator
Norma Broude
American
b. 1941
Impressionism and feminist art history
Art historian, Author and emerita professor at American University
Frances Borzello
English
Feminist art history including; social history of art, female portraiture, and female nudes.
Author, scholar, feminist art critic
Adelyn Dohme Breeskin
American
1896–1986
Mary Cassatt
Curator, museum director, and art historian at Baltimore Museum of Art
Anita Brookner
English
b. 1936
Jean-Baptiste Greuze , Jacques-Louis David
Author, Slade professor of fine art at Cambridge University ,[ 30] her early work focused on art history and later work was fiction novels
Lillian Browse
English
1906–2005
Augustus John , Edgar Degas , James Dickson Innes
Art dealer, art historian
Coosje van Bruggen
Dutch, American
1942–2009
Dutch avant-garde art
Artist, art historian[ 31]
Palma Bucarelli
Italian
1910–1998
avant-garde art
Director of the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna (GNAM) from 1942 to 1975, art critic
Anneliese Bulling
German, American
1900–2004
Sinologist, Chinese art and architecture
Art lecturer, art historian
Andrianna Campbell
American
Nineteenth and twentieth-century American art, Norman Lewis , Abstract Expressionism
Art historian, curator
Taína Caragol
American
Latino Art
Curator for Latino Art and History at the National Portrait Gallery , author
Teresa Gisbert Carbonell
Bolivian
b. 1926
Andean art history
Art historian
Mary Ann Caws
American
b. 1933
Modern Art , contemporary art
Author, literary critic, art historian
Whitney Chadwick
American
b. 1943
Feminist art critic , contemporary art, modernism, Surrealism, gender and sexuality
Author, Professor Emerita at San Francisco State University
Cathleen Chaffee
American
contemporary art
Chief curator at Albright–Knox Art Gallery .
Sheng-Ching Chang
Taiwanese
b. 1963
Chinese art history and cultural interactions
Professor at Fu Jen Catholic University , journalist, writer
Betty Churcher
Australian
1931–2015
Art historian, first female director of the National Gallery of Australia[ 32]
Lourdes Cirlot
Spanish
b. 1949
Spanish and Catalan avant-garde art, 20-century art
Alessandra Comini
American
b. 1934
American women artists, Egon Schiele's portraiture
Academic lecturer, writer, a founder of the Women's Caucus for Art
Mildred Constantine
American
1913–2008
Poster Art, graphic design
Art historian and curator at Museum of Modern Art in the 1950s and 1960s
Lynne Cooke
Australian
b. 1952
Modern art , contemporary art
Curator
Julie Crooks
Canadian
Curator, head of the department of Arts of Global Africa and the Diaspora at the Art Gallery of Ontario
Anne Crookshank
Irish
1927–2016
Irish painting
Professor emeritus at Trinity College Dublin .
Rosemary Crumlin
Australian
b. 1932
Indigenous Australian art, religious art
Author, Sister of Mercy
Alissandra Cummins
Barbadian
b. 1958
Caribbean art
Director of the Barbados Museum & Historical Society ; lecturer in Museum and Heritage Studies at the University of the West Indies .
Parisa Damandan
Iranian
b. 1967
20th century Iranian photography
Author, historian
Mirella Levi D'Ancona
American, Italian
1919–2002
Symbolism and iconography in art from the Late Middle Ages period to the Renaissance
Professor emeritus at Hunter College, author, art historian.
Barbara Dawson
Irish
b. 1957
Modern art
Director of the Hugh Lane Gallery , author, curator
Félicie d'Ayzac
French
1801–1881
Chartres Cathedral
Author, poet, archaeology, one of the first female art historians in France.
Cécile Debray
French
b. 1966
modern painting, contemporary painting
Director of the Musée de l'Orangerie
Élisabeth Décultot
French
b. 1968
Germanist , German Enlightenment
Literary scholar
Vidya Dehejia
Indian
Indian and South Asian art
Professor of Indian and South Asian Art at Columbia University .
Rocio de la Villa
Spanish
b. 1959
Spanish feminist art, contemporary art
Curator, university professor, president of Spanish Society of Aesthetics and Theory of the Arts ,[ 33] a co-founders of Asociación de Mujeres en las Artes Visuales (MAV)
Sirarpie Der Nersessian
Armenian
1896–1989
Armenian art, Byzantine art
Professor at Wellesley College , Harvard University , Dumbarton Oaks .
Laurence des Cars
French
b. 1966
Pre-Raphaelites , English painting
Director of the Louvre Museum ; former director of Musée d'Orsay , and Musée de l'Orangerie .
Yvonne Deslandres
French
1923–1986
Costume, adornment
Catherine de Zegher
Belgium
b. 1955
Contemporary art
Curator and art historian
Jasleen Dhamija
Indian
b. 1933
Indian textile history, Indian craft history
Professor at University of Minnesota and National Institute of Fashion Technology .
Elisabeth Dhanens
Belgian
1915–2014
Early Netherlandish painting
Heritage official
Anne d'Harnoncourt
American
1943–2008
Marcel Duchamp
Curator and director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art
Kamala Dongerkery
Indian
1909–1992
Indian embroidery, Indian jewelry, Indian toys
Social worker , art historian, author, cultural historian
Saryu Doshi
Indian
Indian miniature paintings , Jain art
Founding director of the National Gallery of Modern Art .
Layla S. Diba
Iranian, American
18th/19th-century and contemporary Persian art and the Qajar period
Iranian-American independent scholar and curator.
Leah Dickerman
American
Modern art , Contemporary art
Curator, art historian
Emilia Dilke
English
1840–1904
18th-century French art
Author, art historian, feminist and trade unionist.[ 34]
Elizabeta Dimitrova
Macedonian
b. 1962
Byzantinist, medievalists
Lydia Durnovo
Soviet, Russian
1885 –1963
Russian painting, Armenian miniatures , Armenian frescoes
Staff of the National Gallery of Armenia
Sharada Dwivedi
Indian
1942–2012
Indian art and architecture history
Author of Indian and Mumbaiart and architecture history books
Shahin Ebrahimzadeh-Pezeshki
Iranian
b. 1958
Persian traditional costume history, Iranian tribal costume history, tribal textile history, Persian embroidery history and craft
Author, curator, department head in a university
Ngarino Ellis
Māori
Māori art history
Associate Professor at University of Auckland, has been the only Māori art historian employed at a New Zealand university. Author.
Irene Emery
American
1900–1981
Textile anthropologist
Author, curator of the Textile Museum
Joan Evans
English
1893–1977
French and English mediaeval art
Art historian
Massumeh Farhad
American
Islamic, Iranian, Turkish art history
Chief Curator and Curator of Islamic Art at the Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery at the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Asian Art .
Constance Jocelyn Ffoulkes
British
1858–1950
Italian
Scholar, she participated in the adoption of a modernization of European methods of research.
Judith V. Field
British
b. 1943
Geometrical art, mathematical art
Scholar, mathematician, research fellow in the Department of History of Art of Birkbeck, University of London
Margaret Henderson Floyd
American
1932–1997
Boston architecture including Henry Hobson Richardson , and Longfellow, Alden and Harlow .
Professor of Architectural History at Tufts University .
Marian Lopez Fernandez-Cao
Spanish
b. 1964
Spanish feminist art, contemporary art, and the works of Sonia Delaunay
University professor and researcher, former president of Asociación de Mujeres en las Artes Visuales (MAV)
María Concepción García Gainza
Spanish
b. 1937
Contemporary art, Spanish Renaissance
Helen Gardner
American
1878–1946
Author of Art Through the Ages , an art history textbook
Mary Garrard
American
b. 1940
Italian Baroque art and feminist art history
Art historian, Author, emerita professor at American University
Catherine Gonnard
French
b. 1958
Women, gender and art
Art historian, journalist, writer, activist
Antje von Graevenitz
German
b. 1940
20th and 21st-century art
Art historian, art critic
Catherine Grenier
French
Alberto Giacometti
Director of the Giacometti Foundation .[ 35]
Tapati Guha-Thakurta
Indian
b. 1957
Indian art of the 19th and 20th century
Professor at the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta .
Navina Najat Haidar
Indian, British
Islamic art
Chief curator of Islamic art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art .
Paula Harper
American
1930–2012
Feminist art, Camille Pissarro , contemporary art
Art historian, art critic, art lecturer, author
Liesbeth Heenk
Dutch
b. 1962
Vincent van Gogh
Hayden Herrera [ 19]
American
b. 1940
Frida Kahlo , Arshile Gorky , Joan Snyder
Art historian, author, foremost scholar on Kahlo.
Helen Hills
British
b 1960
architecture and gender; female conventual architecture in southern Italy; social class and gender and religious devotion and visual art; the baroque south
Professor, curator, writer
Lubaina Himid
English
b. 1954
Contemporary art, United Kingdom's Black Art movement
Professor, curator
Ursula Hoff
German, Australian
1909–2005
Australian art, the works of Rembrandt
Scholar, academic, curator, author, critic, and lecturer. Deputy Director of the National Gallery of Victoria , Melbourne (1968–1973); London Adviser of the Felton Bequest (1975–83).
Meike Hoffmann
German
b. 1962
Die Brücke art movement, German art history
Provenance researcher , author
Stina Högkvist
Swedish
b. 1972
Curator, Director of Collections at National Museum , in Oslo, Norway
Candice Hopkins
Carcross/Tagish First Nation
b. 1977
Indigenous art history
Independent curator, writer, and researcher.
Michael Ann Holly
American
Historiography of art history
Art historian
Agnès Humbert
French
1894–1963
French art, Louis David , Henri Matisse
Art historian, ethnographer, and a member of the French Resistance during World War II .
Heather Igloliorte
Inuit
b. 1979
Indigenous art history
Alice Ming Wai Jim
Canadian
Contemporary Asian art, contemporary Asian Canadian art, remix culture
Professor, art historian, curator
Kellie Jones [ 19]
American
b. 1959
African-American art and artists
Professor, curator, MacArthur Fellow
Amelia Jones
American
b. 1961
Dada , Feminist art, Performance art, Body art
Art historian, art theorist, curator, author, university professor, art critic
Deborah Kahn
American
b. 1953
European Medieval art and architecture, Canterbury Cathedral
Professor, author
Geeta Kapur
Indian
b. 1943
Indian contemporary art
Ebba Koch
Austrian
Indian art history, Mughal-era (architecture, gardens, painting, applied arts), and connecting imperial symbolism.
Professor at the Institute of Art History in Vienna, Austria.
Charlotte Klonk
German
Modern Art , Contemporary Art , Museology
Art historian
Stella Kramrisch
Austrian
1896–1993
Indian art of the 20th-century
Professor, curator
Rosalind Krauss
American
b. 1941
20th-century painting , sculpture and photography
Author, associate editor of Artforum from 1971 to 1974, professor at Columbia University
Annette Kuhn
English
b. 1945
Feminist film theory, visual culture , cultural memory
Author, researcher, historian
Miwon Kwon
Korean
b.1961
Contemporary art, site-specific art, land art
Michelle Kuo
American
b.1977 or 1978
Historian, curator of painting and sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art , editor-in-chief of Artforum from 2010 to 2017
Ewa Lajer-Burcharth
Polish
18th and 19th century European, contemporary art, feminist and critical theory, Jacques-Louis David
Professor at Harvard University .
Lynne Lawner
American
Renaissance
Author, scholar, historian with an emphasis on iconographical themes, the meaning of art, as well as social customs.
Élisabeth Lebovici
French
b. 1953
Contemporary art, feminist art, Queer art, Louise Bourgeois , Nancy Spero ,
Queer theory scholar, art historian, author, writer
Annette Lemieux
American
b. 1957
Contemporary art
Professor, artist
Amelia Sarah Levetus
English, Austrian
1853–1938
Modern art
Author, cultural journalist
Samella Lewis
American
b. 1924
African-American art
Art historian, art critic, and printmaker
Lucy Lippard [ 19]
American
b. 1937
Contemporary art
Art critic, curator
Marcella Lista
French
20th Century art
Chief curator at the Centre Pompidou .
Catherine Mason
Australian, English
Computer art, digital art
Art historian
Christa C. Mayer Thurman
German, American
b. 1934
Textiles
Curator and chair of the textiles department at the Art Institute of Chicago [ 36]
Jennifer Montagu
English
b. 1931
Italian Baroque sculpture
Art historian
Doula Mouriki
Greek
1934–1991
Byzantinologist, Historian of Art
Professor
Claudia Müller-Ebeling
German
b. 1956
Healing arts, shamanism
Author
Laura Mulvey
English
b. 1941
Feminist film theory
feminist film theorist , professor at Birkbeck, University of London
Joanna Mytkowska
Polish
b. 1970
Contemporary art
Director of the Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw , curator, art critic
Mika Natif
Israeli
Islamic painting: Central Asia, Iran, India, and the Mediterranean
Art historian
Linda Nochlin [ 37]
American
1931–2017
Feminist art history
Art historian
Elizabeth Norton
English
Tudor period , queens of England
Author, specializing in archaeology and anthropology.
Nana Oforiatta Ayim
Ghanaian
Pan-African art
Art historian, writer, and filmmaker.
Lotte Brand Philip
German
1910–1986
Michèle Pirazzoli-t'Serstevens
French
1934–2018
Chinese objects
Heleni Polichronatou
Greek
b. 1959
Contemporary public art, land art
Griselda Pollock [ 38]
English, Canadian
b. 1949
Elizabeth Prettejohn
American
b. 1961
Victorian Art, Pre-Raphaelites
Art historian, Professor, curator, author
Nancy Princenthal
American
b. 1955
Shirin Neshat , Doris Salcedo , Robert Mangold , Alfredo Jaar , Jackie Ferrara , Joyce Kozloff , Hannah Wilke , Agnes Martin
Artist biographer, writer
Dragana Lucija Ratković Aydemir
Croatian
b. 1969
Croatian museums
Arlene Raven
American
1944–2006
Feminist art history , Feminist art movement in the United States
Art historian, art critic, and founder of the Los Angeles Woman's Building
Hilla Rebay
German, American
1890–1967
Modern art
Co-founder and first director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum , abstract artist, art collector
Günsel Renda
Turkish
Ottoman art
Professor
Trina Robbins
American
1938–2024
History of comics
Artist and writer
Barbara Rose
American
1936–2020
Moira Roth
English, American
1933–2021
Feminist art history
Author, professor of art history at Mills College in Oakland, California, and taught at the University of California, San Diego
Anda Rottenberg
Polish
b. 1944
Tina Rivers Ryan
American
New media art, digital art, internet art , NFTs
Curator at the Albright–Knox Art Gallery .
Kim Sajet
Netherlands
Museum director of the National Portrait Gallery .
Bénédicte Savoy
French
b. 1972
Modern art, looted art
Professor at Technische Universität Berlin
Bente Scavenius
Danish
b. 1944
Danish art history
Independent scholar, art critic, and author
Véronique Schiltz
French
1942–2019
Scythian art in the first millennium BCE and the first millennium CE
Archaeologist, art historian, and literary translator.
Johanna Schopenhauer [ 39]
German
1766–1838
Artist, author
Nada Shabout [ 19]
American
b. 1962
Modern Iraqi art
Art historian
Mary Sheriff
American
1950–2016
eighteenth-century art
Art Historian
Kaja Silverman
American
b. 1947
Film theorist, art historian
Alessandra Silvestri-Levy
Brazilian
Producer and writer
Jenni Sorkin
American
b. 1977
American craft history
Author, curator, professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara
Anna Spitzmüller
Austrian
1903-2001
Art historian, curator
Barbara Maria Stafford
American
b. 1941
Developments in imaging arts, optical sciences, and performance technologies
Art historian, researcher
Nina Howell Starr
American
1903–2000
American roadside attractions, American folk art , Outsider artists
Art historian, photographer, curator, art dealer[ 40]
Kate Steinitz [ 41]
German, American
1889–1975
Artist, art historian
Klara Steinweg
German
1903–1972
Italian Renaissance
Art historian, co-author of the book series Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting.
Kristine Stiles
American
b. 1947
Art historian, curator
Margaret Stokes [ 42]
Irish
1832–1900
Antiquarian
Marilyn Stokstad [ 43]
American
1929–2016
Medieval and Spanish art
Art historian, professor, author
Z. S. Strother
American
20th and 21st-century Central and West African art history
Professor of African Art at Columbia University
Deborah Swallow
English
b. 1948
Indian art history
Director of the Courtauld Institute of Art since 2004.
Mary Hamilton Swindler [ 44]
American
1884–1967
Ancient classical painting
Archeologist, professor
Vera Tamari
Palestinian
b. 1945
Palestinian art, Palestinian ceramics, Palestinian architecture
Founder of Birzeit Museum Art, former art history professor at Birzeit University , and visual artist[ 45]
Ann Temkin
American
b. 1959
American painting and sculpture
Curator
Dorothy Burr Thompson [ 46]
American
1900–2001
Erica Tietze-Conrat [ 47]
Austrian, American
1883–1958
Contemporary Viennese Art, Renaissance art, the Venetian school
Academic lecturer
Marjorie Tipping [ 48]
Australian
1917–2009
Historian
Virginia Tovar Martín
Spanish
1929–2013
Architecture and urban planning of Madrid during the Baroque period
Spanish art historian , author, and professor
Jocelyn Toynbee [ 49]
English
1897–1985
Rachida Triki
Tunisian
b. 1949
North African art
Professor at Tunis University .
Marcia Tucker [ 50]
American
1940–2006
Eleanor Tufts
American
1927–1991
American women artists, works by Luis Egidio Meléndez
Academic lecturer, writer
Georgiana Uhlyarik
Romanian
b. 1972
Indigenous Canadian art, women artists
Fredrik S. Eaton Curator of Canadian Art at the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO)
Rose Valland
French
1898–1980
Commission for the Recovery of Works of Art (during WWII)
G. T. van Ysselsteyn
Dutch
1892–1975
Dutch textile history
Kapila Vatsyayan
Indian
1928–2020
Indian art
Emily Vermeule
American
1928–2001
Ancient Greek art , Mycenaean culture
Classical scholar and archaeologist, professor at Harvard University.[ 51]
Cecylia Vetulani
Polish
1908–1980
Anne Wagner
American
b. 1949
Modern and contemporary art
Art historian, professor emerita
Renate Wagner-Rieger [ 52]
Austrian
1921–1980
Architecture, historicism
Academic lecturer
Judith Wechsler
American
b. 1940
19th century French art
Documentary filmmaker; professor emerita
Charlotte Weidler
German
1895–1983
German expressionism
Art dealer, curator, and she held a pivotal role in bringing major works of Germany to the United States; resulting restitution claims concerning the collections of Paul Westheim and Alfred Flechtheim .
Evelyn Welch
American
b. 1959
Renaissance and early modern
Art historian, professor
Herta Wescher
German, French
1899–1971
European modern art, abstract art and collage
Journalist, art critic
Edith Wharton [ 53]
American
1862–1937
Architecture
Writer
Margaret Whinney [ 54]
English
1897–1975
English art history
Academic lecturer
Zoé Whitley
American, English
1979
Contemporary art, United Kingdom's Black Art movement , African diaspora
Curator, museum director
Diana Widmaier Picasso
French
b. 1974
Modern art, old master drawings
Curator, author, gallerist
Sylvia Williams
American
1936–1996
African art
Curator, museum director
Deborah Willis (artist) [ 19]
American
1948
African American and Black photographers
Curator, author, photographer, educator
Sarah Wilson
English
Pierre Klossowski , Henri Matisse , Post-structuralism
Professor at Courtauld Institute , author
Juliet Wilson–Bareau
English
b. 1935
Francisco Goya , Édouard Manet
Art historian, scholar, professor at University of Oxford .
Rachel Wischnitzer
German
1885–1989
Jewish art
Architect, professor, author, art historian
Margot Wittkower
German, American
1902–1995
Neo-Palladian Architecture, Italian Renaissance, Baroque
Writer, Interior Design
Joanna Woodall
English
b. 1956
Portraiture, Netherlandish Art
Mary Woodall
English
1901–1988
Thomas Gainsborough scholar
Museum director, curator
Frances Yates [ 55]
English
1899–1981
Renaissance
Stefania Zahorska
Polish
1890–1961
Polish prosaist
Hilde Zaloscer
Austrian
1903–1999
Coptic Art
Art historian, professor at University of Alexandria and Carleton University Ottawa.
Marie-Cécile Zinsou
French, Beninese
b. 1982
Contemporary art in Africa
President of Fondation Zinsou and in 2014 she found the Museum of Contemporary Art in Benin, the first museum of art in the country.
Rebecca Zorach
American
b. 1969
Early modern European, contemporary
Art historian, professor
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