Ripples: The Impact of UMass Art History from Ancient to Contemporary

How has art history pedagogy changed over the last several decades? How has it impacted other disciplines? These questions and many others will be raised in a conference honoring Professor Laetitia La Follette upon her retirement from UMass Amherst (spring 2026) after more than three decades of teaching ancient Greek and Roman art, cultural property and technology. Though her primary field was ancient art, she has had a great influence over those teaching in other fields from landscape to modern art. To consider how art history pedagogy has changed, her former students from the MA program at UMass will convene, give talks and discuss how what they learned from Professor La Follette has shaped their careers as academics and curators. Their discussions with attendees will help faculty and students at UMass think about today's teaching methods, especially in relationship to new digital platforms and AI. The conference will also be an alumni event for the college, attracting graduates from art history and other departments, such as classics, with which Professor La Follette has long collaborated.
 

These graduates of UM/A art history will speak:
Kim Cabrera, Manager of Social Media, The New York Historical Society
Daniel Healey, Provenance Specialist, Worcester Art Museum
Ewa Matyzyk, PhD, Assistant Professor, Modern and Contemporary Art, UNC Wilmington
Kaja Tally Schumacher, PhD, Assistant Professor, Landscape History, Harvard University
Hyewon Yi, PhD, Assistant Professor, Curator, Museum Director, Modern and Contemporary, SUNY Old Westbury