Linda Stratford, Ph.D. – Asbury University
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Linda Stratford

Professor of Art History & History
Director, Paris Semester

Departments: Art & Design, Social Science & History

Office: McCreless 215

Contact Linda Stratford

Biographical Information

Linda Stratford received her Ph.D. from the State University of New York, Stony Brook, in history, with emphasis on Art and Society. Before her Ph.D. she completed an undergraduate studio art degree at Vanderbilt University and spent a year studying art history in France. She makes regular research trips to France and is founder and director of Asbury’s Paris Semester program.

Her primary interest is critical examination of the impact of identity politics on the reception of various art movements. One particular focus is the dynamics of inclusion and exclusion impacting the reception of expressionist abstraction in post-World War II France. Since 2005, when she was appointed Lilly Scholar at Asbury, she has also pursued research on the theological foundations of artistic expression, co-founding ASCHA and stimulating critique of modern and contemporary art as autonomous from religious purposes. Both realms of research focus on the ways in which ideological constructs not only arise from but can themselves confine, historical narratives.

Education

  • Ph.D., State University of New York, Stony Brook
  • M.A., Florida Atlantic University
  • B.S., Vanderbilt University

Courses Offered

  • HIS 393 – Seminar in French History/taught in Paris
  • ART 252 – Art 1500 to the Present/taught in Paris
  • ART 300 – Art Theory and Criticism
  • ART 360 – Aesthetics 
  • ART 456 – Advanced Topics in Art History

Recent Lectures

“Barnett Newman’s Stations of the Cross Reconsidered” Asbury University, September 2020; chapter forthcoming in God in the Modern Wing (IVP)

“Abstract Painting and Tradition Française” conference presentation, Jeune France 1930-1959, Maison Française, Oxford University, June 2016

American Church in Paris
American Library in Paris

Kangnam University, Seoul, South Korea

Sample Publications

(2021) “Barnett Newman’s Stations of the Cross  Reconsidered” chapter in God in the Modern Wing, Cameron J. Anderson and G. Walter Hansen, eds., InterVarsity Press, forthcoming

(2021) “Visual Arts: Realism and Naturalism” in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Religion co-authored with William Dyrness, forthcoming

(2017) Vocation and the Common Good Working Group, a project of The Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture, University of Virginia. Lead writer for funded 3-year study and report on the vocational challenges posted to the sphere of visual art in late modernity.

(2017) “Art and Christian Pilgrimage: A Response” chapter in Contemporary Art and the Church: A Conversation Between Two Worlds, W. David O Taylor and Taylor Worley, eds., IVP Academic, 2017.

(2014) “Carnal Beauties: The Art of Allison Luce” Image winter/spring 2014, no. 80

(2014) ReVisioning: Methodological Studies of Christianity in the History of Art. Cascade. A critical examination of scholarly methodologies applied to the study of Christian subjects, themes and contexts in art. Co-edited with James Romaine.

(2013) “Cadillacs, Jet Planes and H-bombs: American Art in France Following the Liberation” presentation October 2013 at the annual conference of The Western Society for French History, Atlanta. Awarded the Amy Millstone Prize for best interdisciplinary paper presented at the annual conference.

(2012) “Spiritually Charged Visual Strategy: Jackson Pollock’s Autumn Rhythm in Art as Spiritual Perception. Crossway.

(2007) “French Classicism in the 1950’s” in Salon America

(2006) “Challenge to a National School at Risk” in Metamorphosis. Creative Imagination in Fine Arts between Life-Projects and Human Aesthetic Aspirations. Kluwer Academic. Metaporhosis flyer.

(2006) A Romance with the Landscape: Realism to Impressionism. University of Kentucky Art Museum/distributed by University of Washington Press. Romance with the Landscape flyer.

(2004) “Scholars and the Boundaries of ‘Truly French’ Art in the Fourth Republic” in Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Western Society for French History.

Administrative Experience

Founding Director, Asbury University Paris Semester

President of the Board, CIVA, 2009-2013

Co-founder, The Association of Scholars of Christianity in the History of Art (ASCHA).

Department Chair, Asbury University, 2007-2009

Presidential Inauguration Committee, Asbury University, 2007

Tenure and Promotion Committee; Artist Series Committee; Reaccreditation sub-committee; Institutional Effectiveness Committee; Cross-Cultural Studies Committee; Academic Policies and Curriculum Committee

Grants and Fund Development

“Art and the Search for Meaning” film series pilot 2021

Scholar in Residence, fall 2016, The American Church in Paris

Fund development for Asbury University Paris Semester exploratory work and promotional video, 2013

Lilly Scholar Award through Asbury University’s Transformations Project, 2005-2007

Fund development through Asbury University’s Transformations Project for Continuity and Rupture: A Symposium on Christianity and Art History. Paris. May, 2010

Fund development through Asbury University’s Transformations Project and Asbury Theological Seminary for Bringing Creation to Praise conference, Asbury University and Asbury Theological Seminary. October, 2007

Faculty Development Grant from The Christian College Consortium for 2007 photography exhibit Sacred Spaces in Central Kentucky

Fund development from the Staley Lecture Series for campus exhibit Wholly Family, Holy Ground. March 6 – 16, 2007, Asbury University

Fund development through Asbury University’s Transformations Project for undergraduate student research project, 2004, The American Cathedral in Paris

Research Residency, The Hans Hartung and Anna-Eva Bergman Foundation, Antibes, France, summer 2004

AU faculty professional development grants 2013, 2010, 2008, 2006, 2004, 2003, 2002

Fund development work for CIVA (www.civa.org) 2009 to present

Resume and Teaching Philosophy

Teaching Philosophy

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