Alumni Sharing Their Research

Truman State University Art History alumni Jasmine (Fry) Cloud and Ryan Gregg both presented new research at this year’s Sixteenth Century Studies conference in mid-October. The meeting marked the 50th anniversary of that interdisciplinary organization for scholars of the early modern or Renaissance period. Dr. Cloud, now Associate Professor in the Department of Art & Design at the University of Central Missouri gave her paper–“Early Modern Infrastructure: The Routes and Roads of the Roman Forum”–in a session entitled “The Built Environment of Rome”. Dr. Gregg, department chair of the Department of Art, Design, and Art History at Webster University in St. Louis, presented his research in a session on artistic identity; his paper carried the title “Francesco da Sangallo’s Beard: Artistic Identity in Portraits of Cinquecento Sculptors”. Congratulations to both!

Professor Josh Hainy Published!

Assistant Professor of Art History Josh Hainy has had an article included in Visualizing the Body in Art, Anatomy, and Medicine Since 1800: Models and Modelling, edited by Andrew Graciano, and published by Routledge.

The article, “Grecian Theory at the Royal Academy: John Flaxman and the Pedagogy of Corporeal Representation,” grows out of research on John Flaxman that was a part of his dissertation at the University of Iowa.

Photographs from High School Workshop

While judging took place during the April 10th Clarence Cannon Conference (CCC) Annual Art Show on Wednesday April 10th, the visiting high school students participated in a variety of workshops to experience working in the art studios and getting a taste of the university experience. In art history, students tried out an eighteenth century experience, copying the poses in paintings and sculptures to create tableaux vivantes, or “living scenes.”

Field Trip to Kansas City

Truman’s Art Department rounded up a bus and the students to fill it to go on a trip March 23rd to Kansas City’s Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.  Students from several art and museum studies classes took advantage of the day-long adventure.  Dr. Sara Orel and Associate Dean of Libraries for Special Collections Amanda Langendoerfer led the trip, and they were joined by Dr. Heidi Cook and recent Truman graduate Nick Phan while at the museum.  It was a full day, but a fun one.  Stay tuned for more student travel photos and stories, coming soon!

Updates on some recent graduates

Congratulations to the following students who have sent us their recent news:

Katie Feldkamp, a 2017 Art History/History double major, will be attending graduate school abroad this fall. She writes:

I will be attending the University of St. Andrews in Scotland this September for their Museum and Gallery Studies MLitt program. The program is a year-long course that focuses on practical hands-on skills as well as more theoretical coursework and provides students with broad training in all types of museums, galleries and other heritage facilities.

Lisa Simms’ news comes from painting professor Lindsey Dunnagan:

Lisa Simms has been working as a Teaching Artist at Resident Arts in Columbus, MO.  She works with teen artists to teach them different painting techniques and they are also working on a large public mural along the MKT trail under Elm Street.  The position will come to a close around the end of the summer when the full-time person returns from maternity leave.

Lisa Simms (right) with professor Lindsey Dunnagan (left) at Simms’ capstone exhibit.

Art History grad Kathryn Hodge, who has been a curatorial intern at the St. Louis Art Museum this summer, writes to say she has accepted a part time position with Leslie Hindman Auctioneers as a client services specialist.  As she has always been interested in the collecting aspect of art, this is a great move for her.  We wish her the best of success!


If you are a Truman art student alumna/alumnus and would like to share your adventures with us, please write us at art@truman.edu.  We’d love to hear from you!

News from Art History Majors (Past and Present)

Kalven Duncan is one of three Truman students with curatorial internships at the St. Louis Art Museum this summer.  He sends us this update:

I know you have always encouraged us to send you travel and summer project updates for possible art department blog material, so I am sending you a few photos of my recent trip to NYC and its institutions (Met, Frick, and Guggenheim–maybe I will get to the MoMA another time!)

I am writing you after my return back to Saint Louis from New York.

For my research on a city-scape of Rome in a Capitoline altarpiece by Marcello Venusti, I had recently reached out and got in touch with Truman alumnus, Dr. Ryan E. Gregg. He was gracious enough with his time and met me for coffee in Saint Louis to discuss my research.

Ryan Gregg (on left) and Kalven Duncan. Art History majors past and present.

While I was in NYC, I made stops to the Guggenheim for the Giacometti exhibition, the Met to see their collection and the Visitors to Versailles exhibition, and of course the Fired by Passion exhibition on French Porcelain at the Frick.

I am attaching a few highlight photos that you are more than welcome to rummage through and enjoy!

Always wishing the best,
Kalven

Dr. Sara Orel Leads Tour of Egyptian Exhibit in St. Louis

Art History professor Sara Orel, whose speciality is ancient Egypt (she has her Ph.D. in Egyptian Archaeology), led a June 10th tour of the Sunken Cities exhibition at the St. Louis Art Museum for members of Truman State University’s Alumni Association.  The show includes objects from underwater excavations of the lost cities of Thonis-Heracleion and Canopus, off the northern coast of Egypt in the Mediterranean sea.  In addition there are several pieces on loan from the Greco-Roman Museum in Alexandria, Egypt, and the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.  Thirty former (and current) Truman students and their friends and family got to see the objects which included beautiful jewelry and statues, including three colossal statues of granite set up in the lobby of the museum.  Art History graduate Krista Garcia took several pictures and was willing to let us use them here.

Congratulations to May 2018 Graduates!

Congratulations to May 2018 graduates from Truman State University’s Art Department.  Our graduates are going on to take up exciting jobs, graduate programs in a variety of fields, and internships in businesses and museums.  Three Art History majors are going to serve as curatorial interns this summer at the St. Louis Art Museum.  These include the two graduates shown here, Amelia Goldsby and Kathryn Hodge, as well as rising senior Kalven Duncan.

We look forward to hearing from all of our graduates about your post-Truman experiences.  Please keep in touch and send your updates to art@truman.edu.

Truman Gallery Hosts Museums Conference

Friday evening, October 27th, the University Gallery hosted a reception for the Missouri Associations for Museums and Archives, whose annual meeting was in Kirksville this year (October 26-28).  Amanda Langendoerfer, Associate Dean of Libraries for Special Collections and Museums, was the local representative for the conference, and organizer of the events.  Several students attended the conference, which included pre-conference workshops at the Museum of Osteopathic Medicine and days of presentations from museum and archive professionals at the Missouri Department of Conservation regional office on Friday, and at Truman State University on Saturday. Art faculty members Dr. Heidi Cook, Dr. Josh Hainy, and Dr. Sara Orel attended all or part of the conference, along with several Truman students and others from as far away as Kyrgyzstan.