Steven Nelson (art historian)
{{Short description|American art historian (born 1962)}}
Steven D. Nelson (born 1962){{cite linked authority file |id=96086167 |text= |accessdate=2024-12-18 }} is an American art historian. Nelson is the dean of the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts (CASVA) at the National Gallery of Art in Washingon, D.C.
Early life and education
As an undergraduate, Nelson studied studio art at Yale University, where he earned a Bachelor of the Arts in 1985.{{Cite web |last=Valentine |first=Victoria L. |date=2020-03-11 |title=Historic Appointment: Steven Nelson Named Dean of Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at National Gallery of Art |url=https://www.culturetype.com/2020/03/11/steven-nelson-appointed-dean-of-center-for-advanced-study-in-the-visual-arts-at-national-gallery-of-art/ |access-date=2024-12-18 |website=Culture Type |language=en-US}} He worked as a graphic artist for newspapers for several years before going on to earn a master's degree (1994) and PhD (1998) in art history from Harvard University.{{Cite web |title=Steven Nelson |url=https://arthistory.ucla.edu/person/steven-nelson/ |access-date=2024-12-18 |website=UCLA Art History |language=en}}{{Cite web |title=Art historian takes reins of African Studies Center at UCLA |url=https://newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/art-historian-takes-reins-of-african-studies-center-at-ucla |access-date=2024-12-18 |website=UCLA |language=en-us}}
Career
Nelson served as Professor of African and African American Art at the University of California, Los Angeles, from 2000 – 2020 before retiring from that role.{{Cite web |last=Roeder |first=Kaela |date=2020-08-06 |title=National Gallery of Art’s new dean talks diversity, COVID |url=https://www.washingtonblade.com/2020/08/06/national-gallery-of-arts-new-dean-talks-diversity-covid/ |access-date=2024-12-18 |website=Washington Blade |language=en-US}} He was appointed director of the UCLA African Studies Center in 2015, where he worked with faculty at UCLA, other University of California campuses, the Fowler Museum, and cultural institutions at Los Angeles.{{Cite web |title=Professor Steven Nelson Announced as New Dean of the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at National Gallery of Art, Washington |url=https://www.nga.gov/press/2020/casva-nelson.html |access-date=2024-12-18 |website=National Gallery of Art}} Nelson has also taught at Tufts University and Wellesley College as well as held visiting faculty appointments at the University of the Andes in Bogotá, Colombia and the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences in Paris, France.
Nelson's scholarship focuses on contemporary and historical African and African diasporic arts, architecture, and urbanism, as well as African American art history and queer studies. His book, From Cameroon to Paris: Mousgoum Architecture In and Out of Africa, was published by the University of Chicago Press in 2007.{{Cite journal |last=Glover |first=Will |date=2010 |title=Review of From Cameroon to Paris: Mousgoum Architecture In and Out of Africa |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/jsah.2010.69.2.280 |journal=Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians |volume=69 |issue=2 |pages=280–282 |doi=10.1525/jsah.2010.69.2.280 |issn=0037-9808}}{{Cite journal |last=Delancey |first=Mark D. |date=2007 |title=Review of From Cameroon to Paris: Mousgoum Architecture in and out of Africa |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40033951 |journal=The International Journal of African Historical Studies |volume=40 |issue=2 |pages=368–370 |issn=0361-7882}} His writing has frequently appeared in African Arts,{{Cite journal |last=Nelson |first=Steven |date=2001 |title=Writing Architecture: The Mousgoum Tòlék and Cultural Self-Fashioning at the New Fin de Siècle |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3337877 |journal=African Arts |volume=34 |issue=3 |pages=38–93 |doi=10.2307/3337877 |issn=0001-9933}} where he formerly served as a consulting editor, as well as in other scholarly journals such as Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art{{Cite journal |last=Okeke-Agulu |first=Chika |date=2010 |title=Nka Roundtable II: Contemporary African Art History and the Scholarship |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/425396/pdf |journal=Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art |volume=26 |issue=1 |pages=80–151 |issn=2152-7792}} and Art Journal, where he also served as a former reviews editor.{{Cite web |title=Steven D. Nelson |url=https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/people/steven-d-nelson |access-date=2024-12-18 |website=Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University |language=en}} He more recently co-edited Visualizing Empire: Africa, Europe, and the Politics of Representation with Rebecca Peabody and Dominic Thomas, published in 2021.{{Cite journal |last=Steiner |first=Benjamin |date=2021 |title=Visualizing Empire. Africa, Europe, and the politics of representation ed. by Rebecca Peabody et al. (review) |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/article/841356/pdf |journal=Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History |volume=22 |issue=3 |issn=1532-5768}}
Nelson has received grants and fellowships from the Getty Research Institute, the Kress Foundation, and Harvard University Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. In 2018, Nelson became the Andrew W. Mellon Professor at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art while on leave from his appointment at UCLA. In March 2020, his appointment as the third dean of CASVA was announced, and he began his position in July of that year.{{Cite web |last=News Desk |first= |date=2020-03-09 |title=Washington, DC's National Gallery of Art Appoints New Dean of Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Art |url=https://www.artforum.com/news/washington-dcs-national-gallery-of-art-appoints-new-dean-of-center-for-advanced-study-in-the-visual-arts-246811/ |access-date=2024-12-18 |website=Artforum |language=en-US}}
References
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Category:American art historians
Category:Harvard University alumni