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Graduate

Welcome to the Art History Graduate Program

Rutgers University, New Brunswick Campus 

Strategically located on the Northeast Corridor between New York City and Philadelphia, Rutgers University’s Art History Department offers both M.A. and Ph.D. students an exceptional combination of an outstanding faculty, rigorous, imaginative scholarship, innovative critical approaches, a spectrum of cross-disciplinary programs, and professional opportunities.

Faculty

Our distinguished faculty offers an intellectually rigorous and theoretically sophisticated program of study.  The faculty comprises eleven full-time members whose research interests and teaching span Europe, Asia, North America, and the Middle East.  

Global Research and Inclusivity

The increasingly global and interdisciplinary scope of the department has fostered new collaborative research in fields such as gender and women’s studies, visual culture, and the history of science and medicine.  Many faculty and students have been actively involved with the vital research institutes and programs within Rutgers.

Our department is committed to working closely with graduate students coming from any background to develop their own voice in their research. We have a strong commitment to cultivating an equitable, affirming, and inclusive graduate learning and research environment to enable students to thrive regardless of their race, ethnicity, gender identity, citizenship status, religion, age, relationship status, socioeconomic status, nationality, and sexual orientation.

Consortium Connections

Taking full advantage of the great museums, galleries and academic institutions in the northeast, our students benefit from internships in the New York/New Jersey/Philadelphia area and from a consortium of art history programs that allows our PhD students to register for a limited number of graduate courses at Columbia University, Fordham University, The Graduate Center at CUNY, the Institute of Fine Arts, The New School, New York University, SUNY at Stony Brook, Princeton University and the University of Pennsylvania.

Interdisciplinary Research Centers And Interdepartmental Collaborations

Faculty and graduate students in the department have been actively involved with interdisciplinary centers, including the Center for Cultural Analysis, the British Studies Center, the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, the Institute for Research on Women, the Center for Historical Analysis, and the Global Asias Initiative.

They have been particularly active in facilitating the ongoing success of The Developing Room, a working group sponsored through the Center for Cultural Analysis, that has brought together scholars at Rutgers and from elsewhere whose research and teaching engages with the histories, theories, and practices of photography.

Degrees and Certificate Programs

Over its forty-four year history as the Rutgers Art History Department, the graduate program has awarded over seventy-five Doctoral and about one hundred and fifty Master’s degrees. For the past two decades, many students have also pursued a certificate in Curatorial Studies, Historic Preservation and can now also obtain an Architectural Studies Certificate.

Funding Opportunities

Students admitted into the Ph D. program usually are awarded a funding package which includes a combination of fellowships and teaching assistantships. Additional research assistantships may be available through the Norton Dodge Collection of Soviet Non-Conformist Art. Both the department and the graduate school also provide opportunities to apply for additional funding to support conference travel, summer research, and dissertation completion.  Please note that a student fee will be charged to your account in the fall. This fee is approx. $1,500.  If you are awarded a fellowship or TAship, you might not receive your first paycheck until the third week of September.  

Our doctoral students have been very successful in securing external grant and foundation funding for their dissertation travel, research, and writing. A selection of the honors recently awarded includes: 

  • Two different Kress Institutional Fellowships for study at the Hertziana Library in Rome
  • Fulbright Fellowships to Austria, Estonia, Germany, Italy, and Moscow
  • The Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD)
  • The  INHA (Institut National d'Histoire de l'Art); and
  • Residential fellowships at the Smithsonian Institution
  • Residential fellowships at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
  • Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, Washington DC 

We are unfortunately unable to promise financial support for M.A. students.

Art History Graduate Student Association (AHSGO)

The Art History Graduate Student Association (AHSGO) also offer students many opportunities to engage and organize a wide range of graduate student symposia, as well as international conferences. The Art History Graduate Student Organization arranges a Distinguished Speakers Series each year, complemented by the annual Sydney Jacobs Lecture in American Art and the newly inaugurated Edwin L. Weisl Lecture in Early Modern Art and Architecture.

Rutgers Art Review

The Rutgers Art Review is the oldest journal of graduate scholarship in Art History in the country. It is published annually and produced entirely by graduate students, Program faculty and students have repeatedly won competitive awards from the School of Graduate Studies, as well as national and international awards, for distinction in both teaching and research. 

Rutgers Art Library

Graduate students make frequent use of the Rutgers Art Library, which is located conveniently next to the department's main office in historic Voorhees Hall. The Art Library not only supports research and instructional needs, but also has been an active partner in co-sponsoring cultural events, lectures and exhibitions. The Art Library is closed in the summer. 

 

Zimmerli Museum

Program faculty and students closely collaborate with The Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Museum on exhibitions and research. 

Alumni/Alumnae

Many alumni/ae currently hold academic and/or curatorial appointments at distinguished institutions, among them Smith College, Boston College, the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Brooklyn Museum, and the Morgan Library.