A current graduate student and a recent alumna of UA’s Master of Arts in art history program were selected to present their research at the international Vagantes Conference on Medieval Studies at Harvard University in March. The 2023 conference was sponsored by the Harvard Medieval Graduate Interdisciplinary Workshop and the Harvard English Department Medieval Colloquium.
Riley Balzer presented “Deconstructing Nazi Visual Politics, Symbolic Representations of Power, and The Savior Complex: Notre-Dame de Paris from 1940–1944.” Balzer, a second-year student in the MA program at UA, holds an assistantship. She developed this research paper in Dr. Jennifer M. Feltman‘s seminar, Notre Dame Through Time (Special Topics, ARH 560).
Rebecca Lowery (MA 2022, art history) presented “The Parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man at the Church of Saint Pierre: Economic Morality in the Middle Ages.” Lowery is in the PhD program in the history of art and architecture at the University of Pittsburgh. She originally developed this research paper in Dr. Feltman’s seminar, Medieval Sculpture (Special Topics, ARH 560).
This is the first time students from The University of Alabama have presented at the international conference. They were joined by MA and PhD students from Brown University, Simmons College, Johns Hopkins University, University of Cambridge, University of Montreal, Case Western Reserve University, University of Wisconsin-Madison, University of Texas, and Harvard University, among others.
The Vagantes Conference on Medieval Studies is sponsored by the Medieval Academy of America’s graduate student committee. Founded in 1925, the MAA is the largest organization in the United States dedicated to the study and teaching of the Middle Ages.
For more information about The University of Alabama’s programs in studio art and art history, visit our Degree Programs page.