Faculty Member, Newcomb Art Department
Rutgers, Art History
University of Toronto, Art History
Visiting Assistant Professor
About
I specialize in Italian Baroque art and architecture. My interests range from tapestry to urbanism, and my work focuses above all on the many strata of the physical and social fabric of Rome. My research focuses on papal patronage and politics, the history of the early modern family and adoption, sacred sculpture in Italy, and the work of Gian Lorenzo Bernini; my teaching interests are in European Baroque art, Italian sculpture, early modern architecture and urbanism, and women and the family in early modern Italy.
I earned an Honours BA in Art History from the University of Toronto (2003), and a PhD from Rutgers University (2010) with the dissertation 'Adopted papal kin as art patrons in early modern Rome (1592-1676)'. The first study of the practice of adoption in early modern Rome, my dissertation examines the use of the arts by adopted papal nephews for political and personal legitimation within the ideology of nepotism.
Currently I am finalizing an article on Bernini’s equestrian statues and deepening my thesis work with a project on Scipione Borghese’s early patronage. I have received grants and fellowships from the Institut National de l’Histoire d’Art/French Academy in Rome - Villa Medici, the Mellon Foundation, and the Kress Foundation, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and the Social Sciences Research Council, among others.
