Art and Art History

In its Honors Program the Department of Art and Art History awards one level of Honors to student research projects. The projects listed below have been defended successfully, and a copy of the thesis deposited in Swem Library.

Key:

Student, "Thesis" (Honors level)
Committee Chair + Other Committee Members

2023-2024

Alice Taylor Baughman, "Re-evaluating Egalitarian Design in Contemporary Danish Society" (Honors)
Sibel Zandi-Sayek + Cristina Stancioiu, Giulia Pacini
Cecilia Anne Deasy, "Shades of Green: Fragmentation in Contemporary Sustainable Design" (Honors)
Sibel Zandi-Sayek + Fernando Galeana-Rodriguez, Alan Braddock
Anna C. Wershbale, "Beyond the Exit: MoMA Design Store & the Extended Museum Experience" (Honors)
Alan C. Braddock + Sibel Zandi-Sayek, Dawn Edmiston
Anna Idonna Wilkinson, "Seba’s Snakes: Exploring the Shifting Relationship between Art, Economy, and Science in 18th-century Europe" (Honors)
Alan Braddock + James Tumulty, Catherine Levesque

2022-2023

Sandra Kaitlyn Kelso, "Curating Couture: Collaborative Collections of Art & Design" (Honors)
Cristina Stancioiu + Elizabeth Clayton Moran, David Garrett, Charles Palermo
Tara Vasanth, "Embodied Nature: Biomimetic Architecture as a Philosophy and Practice" (Honors)
Sibel Zandi-Sayek + Alan Braddock, John Swaddle
Yaxi Xiao, "Goodbye... Ripples" (Honors)
Eliot Dudik + Elizabeth Mead, Keith Johnson

2021-2022

Victoria Erisman, "The Apocalyptic Mode in Contemporary Environmental Art" (Honors)
Alan Braddock + Charles Palermo, Chitralekha Zutshi
Yuchen Zhou, "Art Collectors and Collections in Contemporary China" (Honors)
Xin Wu + Charles J Palermo, Sibel Zandi-Sayek, Kaitlyn Harrigan
Yuhua Luo, "Zao Wou-Ki: The Infinite Landscape" (Honors)
Xin Conan-Wu + Charles J Palermo, Sibel Zandi-Sayek, Michael Gibbs Hill

2020-2021

Charles Parsons, "The Line of Dichotomy: Standpoints and Meaning in Anne Truitt's Art" (Honors)
Charles Palermo + Elizabeth Mead, Timothy Costelloe, Xin Conan-Wu
Sarah Robers, "Abraham Hondius's Dog Market: Early Modern Animal Imagery in Transition" (Honors)
Catherine Levesque + Alan Braddock, Elizabeth Radcliff
Jingxin Wu, "Echo Fragments" (Honors)
Eliot Dudik + Elizabeth Mead, Charles Palermo, Richard Lowry

2019-2020

Virginia (Grace) Bland, "The Carver's Choice: Tilman Riemenschneider's Monochromatic Altarpiece of the Holy Blood" (Honors)

Catherine Levesque + Cristina Stancioiu, Philip Daileader
Evan Broennimann, "Skin and Bones: A Sculptural Exploration of Form and Structure" (Honors)

Elizabeth Mead + Mike Jabbur (Co-Advisors), Dan Cristol
Elizabeth Dowker, "Rethinking the Genesis of Mudéjar Architecture in Medieval Toledo" (Honors)

Sibel Zandi-Sayek + Cristina Stancioiu, Philip Daileader, Anne Williams
Elanor Pschirrer-West, "Constructing History: John Everett Millais and The North-West Passage" (Honors)

Catherine Levesque + Cristina Stancioiu, Simon Joyce
Samantha Ros, "The Mexican Ex-Voto Tradition as a Potential Subversion of Authority" (Honors)

Anne Williams + Cristina Stancioiu, Betsy Konefal

2018-19

Rachel Ciampoli, “'Deceived by Misrepresentations': An Examination of Nicolino Calyo’s 'Servants at a Pump'" (Honors)
SusanWebster + Alan Braddock, Melvin Ely
Emma Efkeman, "(Re-) Staging Translation: Meaningful Interaction with Hindu Devotional Objects in the Western museum" (Honors)
Susan Webster + Alan Braddock, Mark McLaughlin, Patton Burchett
Zhengyang Huang, "Image at Surface"
Elizabeth Mead + Eliot Dudik, Michael Gaynes, Tanya Stadelmann

2017-18

Erin Lottes, "Lost and Found in Figurative Painting" (Honors)
Nicole Santiago + Brian Kreydatus, David Campbell, Gregory Conradi-Smith

2016-17

Jacqueline Chapman, "Paintings with Doors: Three Case Studies from the Fifteenth Century Netherlands" (Honors)
Catherine Levesque + Cristina Stancioiu, Monica Potkay
Tianchu Gao, "Nameless Art in the Mao Era" (Honors)
Xin Conan-Wu + Sibel Zandi-Sayek, Charles Palermo, Michael Hill
Kexin Ma, "A Cup of Imperial Taste: The Formation of Ceramic Aesthetics under Emperor Huizong (r. 1100-1126)" (Honors)
Xin Conan-Wu + Catherine Levesque, Kevin Vose, Cristina Stancioiu

2015-16

Ethan Davis, "That Which Caresses Me" (High Honors)
Elizabeth Mead + John Lee, Allan Braddock and Tucker McKinney
Katie Fee, "Interactive Relationships: An Exploration of Ceramic Surface and Form" (Highest Honors)
Michael Jabbur + Elizabeth Mead, Joe Bova, Carey Bagdassarian and Jennifer Stevens

2014-15

No Honors students this year

2013-14

Erin Gregory, "Storytelling in Bronze: The Doors of the Baptistery of San Giovanni as Emblems of Florence's Roman History and Artistic Progression" (Honors)
Catherine Levesque + Monica Potkay and Cristina Stancioiu

2012-13

Nina Cavazos, "Divine on Display: The Siva Nataraja Bronze in an American Museum" (High Honors)
Ravi Gupta + Grey Gundaker and Charles Palermo
Jarrett Ley, "Human Praxis: LGBTQ Homeless Youth Center" (Highest Honors)
Edwin Pease + Joanne Braxton, Elizabeth Mead and Sibel Zandi-Sayek
Barbara Pearsall, "Materially Mandated" (Highest Honors)
Elizabeth Mead + Carey Bagdassarian, Ed Pease, Sibel Zandi-Sayek and Kara Thompson
Michelle Repper, "Amrita Sher-Gil: Conversations in Modernism" (High Honors)
Charles Palermo + Alan Braddock, Nancy Gray and Xin Conan-Wu

2010-11

Erin Sexton, "The Art Museum as a Socio-political Actor: El Museo del Barrio and the Museo de Arte y Memoria as Activist Cultural Productions in their Respective Communities" (Honors)
Alan Wallach + Silvia Tandeciarz and Susan Webster

2009-10

Kiernan Lofland, "Prints and Sculpture, a Tactile World" (High Honors)
Elizabeth Mead + Brian Kreydatus, Edwin Pease, Jason Lowery and Daniel Cristol
Rusty Meadows, "Appropriating from the World of Business: Andy Warhol's Key to Success" (Honors)
Alan Wallach + Danielle Moretti-Langholtz and Charles Palermo
Sarah Williams, "Interiors: A Study of Human Core Samples" (Highest Honors)
Nicole McCormick Santiago + Elizabeth Mead, Timothy Costelloe and Naomi Falk

2008-09

Andrea Alvarez, "Jasper Johns: A Crisis in Criticism" (High Honors)
Charles Palmero + Victoria Scott, Alan Wallach and Melanie Dawson
Joan Bowlen, "Body Language: The Presence and Absence of Cindy Sherman, Sherrie Levine and Barbara Kruger" (Honors)
Alan Wallach + Victoria Scott, Sibel Zandi-Sayek and Christy Burns
Greta Glaser, "An Introduction to Painting Conservation" (High Honors)
Catherine Levesque + Alan Wallach, Shelley Svoboda and J.C. Poutsma
Amy Sedivi, "Unveiling the Unconscious: The Influence of Jungian Psychology on Jackson Pollack and Mark Rothko" (Honors)
Alan Wallach + Victoria Scott and Michael Nichols
John Starcher, "Portraits of Professional Men in the Gilded Age: An Investigation of the Life and Art of Thomas Eakins" (High Honors)
Alan Wallach + Susan Webster and Bob Scholnick
Peter Zimmerman, "Body Language: The Presence and Absence of Cindy Sherman, Sherrie Levine and Barbara Kruger" (Honors)
Alan Wallach + Victoria Scott, Sibel Zandi-Sayek and Christy Burns

2007-08

Sarah Gowen, "The Convergence of Science and Art: Conserving a Print of Hannah Snell" (High Honors)
Barbara Watkinson + Charles Palermo, Pam Young and Elizabeth Harbron
John Hawley, "'Spreekt, Schilderij...Swijgt, Schilderij': Some Thoughts on Thomas de Keyser's 1627 Portrait of Constantijn Huygens and His Clerk" (Highest Honors)
Catherine Levesque + Charles Palermo, Barbara Watkinson and Dale Hoak
Mary Ramsey, "The Vanitas of Jacques de Gheyn II: Technë as an Expression of an Artist" (Honors)
Catherine Levesque + Charles Palermo and LuAnn Homza
Kathryn Swanson, "John Steuart Curry: A Pictorial Autobiography" (Honors)
Alan Wallach + Charles Palermo and Kimberly Phillips

2006-07

Naomi Ocko, "Everett Stockton: Proposal for Affordable Housing Structure in Manchester, Richmond" (High Honors)
Edwin Pease + Margaret Grubiak, Elizabeth Mead and David Phillips
Amanda Stuckey, "Joseph Cornell and Visual Possession" (Honors)
Alan Wallach + Eun Jung and Nancy Gray
Bonnie Wilson, "Bodies of Work: Marc Quinn, Tim Hawkinson, and the Quest for Immortality" (Highest Honors)
Charles Palermo + Sally Price, Eun Jung and Elizabeth Mead

2004-05

Kate Zimmermann
Alan Wallach + Sibel Zandi Sayek and Christy Burns
Caitlin Freeman
Catherine Levesque + Miles Chappell and Dorothy Chansky