Faculty

Posted on by Art Department Art History, Department, Department History, Faculty, Faculty Scholarship and Creative Work, News and Events, Uncategorized

New Faculty Member: Dr. Josh Hainy

Dr. Josh Hainy in front of the “American Gothic” house in Eldon, IA.

Josh Hainy joined the Truman State University Art Department in August 2017. He received his Ph.D. in Art History from the University of Iowa with a specialization in 18th– and 19th-century European Art. Before the University of Iowa, Hainy attended the University of Oregon, where he got a Master’s degree in Classics. Drawing from his background in the classical languages, for his dissertation in Art History, he examined the ways in which British draughtsman and sculptor John Flaxman (1755-1826) depicted subject matter taken from ancient literature. Flaxman’s drawings of Homer’s Iliad received particular emphasis. These images—done in the contour style of the late 18th and early 19th centuries—became quite popular throughout Europe, but scholarly interest traditionally focused on Flaxman’s use of contour, not the ways in which he presented the narrative of the Iliad through a series of images.

“Ajax Defending the Greek Ships against the Trojans” by John Flaxman.

 

In addition to presenting his research on Flaxman’s narratives at The Art Institute of Chicago Graduate Symposium, Dr. Hainy has presented other papers about Flaxman and his interactions with classical antiquity at the annual conferences of the American Society of Eighteenth-Century Studies and the Nineteenth Century Studies Association. He talked about the role of the human body in the lectures Flaxman delivered as the first Professor of Sculpture at the Royal Academy of Art at a symposium about art, anatomy, and medicine held at the Columbia Museum of Art. This paper will be part of an edited volume about art, anatomy, and medicine since c. 1800.

At Truman State this fall, Hainy is teaching “Introduction to the Visual Arts”, the survey of Western Art from the Renaissance to the present, and Renaissance Art in the fall. In the spring he will teach the second half of the western survey, as well as one course on Modern Art and a topics (Art 428) section on art from the 18th and early 19th centuries, titled “Rococo to Romanticism.”

We extend our enthusiastic welcome to Josh Hainy, a valued addition to the Art Department at Truman!

Posted on by Art Department Department, Design, Faculty, Travel, Uncategorized

Design Faculty Road Trip Over Labor Day Weekend

Over the Labor day weekend Design professors Rusty Nelson, Matt Derezinski, and Aaron Neeley took a trip to Detroit, Michigan to see the House Industries Exhibition at the Henry Ford Museum. Known throughout the world for its eclectic font collections and far-reaching creative exploits, House Industries has been a standard-bearer for American graphic design for 25 years. House has worked with a diverse list of collaborators including Jimmy Kimmel, Hermès, The New Yorker, John Mayer, Muji, the Estate of Charles and Ray Eames, and Heath Ceramics.

Posted on by Art Department Ceramics, Department, Design, Faculty, Gallery, News and Events, Painting, Uncategorized

University Gallery Opening August 29th

Works by Professors Rusty Nelson (left) and Wynne Wilbur (right).

Join us Tuesday, August 29th at 5pm for the Fall 2017 New Work by Truman State Art Faculty show, featuring works from Professors Matt Derezinski, Lindsey Dunnagan, Aaron Neeley, Russell Nelson, and Wynne Wilbur.  The show will be up through the 6th of October.

Posted on by Art Department Art History, Department, Faculty, Uncategorized

Goodbye to Dr. Julia DeLancey

Dr. DeLancey with current students and alumni at her goodbye reception.

We are saddened to say goodbye to Art Historian Dr. Julia DeLancey, who will be moving to Virginia for a new academic position.  She has been at Truman for more than twenty years, and although we will miss her, we wish her luck in her new position.  A reception was held in the University Gallery on July 20th, in honor of her and her husband, Dr. Peter Kelly, and several students and alumni were able to say goodbye in person.

Posted on by Art Department Department, Faculty, News and Events, Uncategorized

Art Faculty Attend Institute in Asheville, NC

Art faculty Julia DeLancey, Aaron Fine, Aaron Neeley, and Sara Orel, along with Amanda Langendoerfer, who is the Head of Special Collections and University Museums at Truman, attended a Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges Summer Institute on Liberal Learning in Asheville from June 8-10, 2017.  This year the annual institute focused on art programs.  Titled “Adaptations: Working in Art Departments at Public Liberal Arts Colleges,” the program brought together faculty from 18 universities to share ideas and discuss such topics as encouraging undergraduate research in Art, teaching Art History without having major museum collections nearby, and partnering with community arts organizations.

Photograph of participants in the COPLAC Summer Institute, courtesy of Emma Anderson.

Truman Faculty (all in the front row): Aaron Neeley, Julia DeLancey (2nd and 3rd from the left, respectively), Sara Orel (8th from left), Amanda Langendoerfer (5th from right), and Aaron Fine (2nd from right).

At the Institute Truman faculty also had the opportunity to congratulate the incoming Executive Director of COPLAC, our former colleague Cole Woodcox, who has retired from Truman to take the position. (He is the first person on the right in the back row of the photo above).

Posted on by Art Department Art History, Faculty, Faculty Scholarship and Creative Work, News and Events, Uncategorized

Congratulations Dr. Heidi Cook!

Assistant Professor of Art Heidi Cook completed her Ph.D. this year in the history of art and architecture at the University of Pittsburgh with advisor Barbara McCloskey. Her dissertation was titled “Picturing Peasants: Maksimilijan Vanka’s Folkloric Paintings and the ‘Croatian Question’ from Habsburg Empire to Croatian Nation-State.” Using the work of Croatian-American artist Vanka as a linking thread, her project explored how the production, circulation, and reception of objects and images related to Croatian folk culture played an active role in imagining a spectrum of competing national and imperial identities in early twentieth-century Yugoslavia. She received an American Councils Title VIII Fellowship, Foreign Language and Area Studies Academic-year Fellowships, and a Mellon Predoctoral Fellowship from the University of Pittsburgh among other grants to fund her research and writing. Her research will continue to focus on visual constructions of nationalisms and other competing political identities in the modern art, architecture, design, and cultural history of Central and Eastern Europe.

Dr. Cook and Dr. McCloskey at the University of Pittsburgh Commencement.

Posted on by Art Department Department, Faculty, Faculty Scholarship and Creative Work, News and Events

Faculty in New York for Research and Book Signing

Dr. Julia DeLancey’s current research into melancholy in the Italian Renaissance, perhaps a manifestation of what we now call “depression,” led her to research in New York, at the New York Public Library and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  She has shared these two images taken during the research trip, funded in part by a fellowship established by former Truman State University president Barbara Dixon.

The New York Public Library, photo courtesy of Julia DeLancey.

Visitors to the Metropolitan Museum of Art walk past Albrecht Dürer’s Melancholia I, photo courtesy of Julia DeLancey.

Continue reading →

Posted on by Art Department Alumni, Art History, Department, Faculty, Faculty Scholarship and Creative Work, News and Events, Travel

Art Faculty and Alumnae at CAA

Several Art faculty attended the annual meeting of the College Art Association in New York this past week.  Professor Aaron Fine had the launch of his book on color theory (Dialogues on Color), while Dr. Heidi Cook (Truman alumna and now a faculty member here) gave a paper on Croatian art.  Dr. Julia DeLancey hosted a reception for art faculty from institutions that are members of the Consortium of Public Liberal Arts Colleges, and Dr. Sara Orel co-chaired a workshop on undergraduate research in Art History with Dr. Alexa Sand of Utah State University.  Dr. Cole Woodcox also attended the conference, taking advantage of the wide range of sessions and museums available in New York.

In addition to the Art faculty, several alumnae attended the conference or otherwise participated in the week’s events.  Dr. Jasmine Cloud (now a professor at the University of Central Missouri) gave a paper, and we saw Emily Nickel (now an MFA student at the University of Iowa), Lori Nix (an artist working in New York), and Emily Hagen (a graduate student at Penn State).  Some of the alumnae and faculty got together for lunch at the conference.  Although not shown in the photograph, we have Aaron Fine to thank for the record of the event.

From left to right:  Dr. Julia DeLancey, Dr. Cole Woodcox, Dr. Jasmine Cloud, Emily Hagen, Dr. Heidi Cook.  Photo courtesy of Professor Aaron Fine.