Curating as World Building: Women, Occulture, and Wholeness in the 鈥楢nti-Museum鈥, 1920-1960
Supervisor: Professor Robin Schuldenfrei
Advisor: Professor Gavin Parkinson
Funded by the Tavolozza Foundation
My doctoral project takes as its focus four female curators who founded avant-garde institutions for the promotion of modern art in the United States between the 1920s and 30s鈥撯揔atherine Dreier of Soci茅t茅 Anonyme, Hilla Rebay of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Alma Reed of Delphic Studios, and Galka Scheyer of The Blue Four. Influenced by the period鈥檚 occulture, these women shared a belief in the power of modern art to bring forth a new spiritual futurity in a society disenchanted by materialism.听
My research approaches alternative spirituality as a methodology to these figures鈥 curation of art and founding of experimental museums for its display. Drawing on the spiritual and spatial turn in recent art historical discourse, this PhD examines female agency in the design of spaces and experiences which mediate the perception of art in the public sphere, building bridges between the worlds of the phenomenal and ideal.听
While this project offers a new approach to curating as world building, it also challenges the alterity of both occulture and female agency in modern art history by recentering the perspectives of Dreier, Rebay, Reed, and Scheyer who contributed to the formation of a new transnational and utopian understanding of modernism scarcely acknowledged in its historiography.
Education
PhD History of Art, 91制片厂 (2023 – present)
MA History of Art, 91制片厂 (2021 – 2022) – Awarded High Distinction
Dissertation: 鈥楢rchitectonics of Spirit: Galka Scheyer鈥檚 Modern Modes of Display in 1930s Los Angeles’
Publications
‘Katherine Dreier鈥檚 Modern Art’, chapter in edited volume, The Photographically–Illustrated Art Book, 1900-1955听(forthcoming)
‘The Seeker as Weaver: A Matrixial Approach to Feminist Futurity in the Artistic Praxis of Paulina Peavy’, Approaching Religion 15 no. 2, Special Issue on Art, Women, and Esotericism, December 2025
Teaching
Guest Lecture, Seminar on Katherine Dreier, Occulture, and Feminism in Professor Gavin Parkinson’s BA3 module Modernist Art in Theory, 91制片厂, March 2026
Guest Lecture, Seminar on Curating as World Building: Women, Occulture, and Wholeness in the ‘Anti-Museum’, 1920-60 in Professor Robin Schuldenfrei’s MA History of Art Special Option, Experiencing Modernism: Utopia, Politics, and Times of Turmoil, 91制片厂, February 2026
Teaching Assistant, BA2 module Exhibiting Art, 91制片厂, Spring 2026
Papers and Invited Talks
鈥淭he Seeker as Weaver: A Matrixial Approach to Feminist Futurity in the Artistic Praxis of Paulina Peavy,鈥 Seminar on Women, Art, and Esotericism, Finnish National Gallery / Ateneum Art Museum and University of Helsinki, August 2025
鈥楥urating as World Building: Katherine Dreier, Alma Reed, and the Delphic Sisterhood in 1930s New York鈥, 2nd Year PhD Symposium, 91制片厂, May 2025
‘Barbara Hepworth鈥檚 Single Form, 1937,’ gallery talks, The Courtauld Gallery, London, January 2025
鈥楽pace, the Senses, and the Affective Exhibition in the 鈥淢useum as Temple鈥: a comparative study of Hilla Rebay and Galka Scheyer鈥檚 Curating as Esoteric Practice’, The Aesthetics of Esoteric Practices: Materialities, Performances, Senses conference hosted by Centro Studi di Civilt脿 e Spiritualit脿 Comparate, Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, Italy, November 2024听
鈥楢 Comparative 91制片厂 of Hilla Rebay and Galka Scheyer鈥檚 Affective Exhibitions in the 鈥淢useum as Temple鈥濃, Graduate Thesis Workshop, European Society for the 91制片厂 of Western Esotericism, Ascona, Switzerland, September 2024
鈥楥urating the 鈥淎nti-Museum鈥濃: Katherine Dreier, Galka Scheyer, Hilla Rebay and the Promotion of Spiritual Modernism in the United States, 1920-45鈥, Collecting Her Thoughts: Women Collectors Across Time, Conference, Boston University, June 2024
Grants, Awards, and Residencies
Tavolozza Foundation PhD Scholar, 2023-2026
Hilla von Rebay Foundation Grant, 2026
Scholar-in-Residence, The Robert Gore Rifkind Center for German Expressionist Studies, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2024
European Society for the 91制片厂 of Western Esotericism Travel Bursary, 2024
Research England Grant, 91制片厂, 2023-2025
Goethe Institute Grant for German Language 91制片厂, 2021
The Gerard Maurice Doyon Award in Art History
The Thomas V. Litzenberg, Jr. Prize in Museum Studies
Research Interests
- European and American modernism
- Utopias and alternative spiritualities
- Design and interiors
- Exhibition histories and museology
- Artist homes and studios
- Women’s voices