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portrait of scad faculty H Christian Carr

H. Christian Carr

Chair, art history

Education

  • Ph.D., art history, Virginia Commonwealth University
  • M.A., history of the decorative arts, Bard College
  • B.A., English, art history, Hollins University
  • Certificate, Arts Administration, New York University

Credentials

  • Chair of art history, 2025–present, Savannah College of Art and Design, Savannah, GA
    • Academic lead, SCAD Lacoste, 2025
    • Associate chair of art history, 2020–25
    • Graduate coordinator, 2017–19, 2022
    • Professor of art history, 2012–20
  • Professor and program coordinator of art history; director of the Tony Hungerford Memorial Art Gallery, 2011–12, College of Southern Maryland, La Plata, MD
  • Director, arts management program, 2008–11, Sweet Briar College, Sweet Briar, VA
    • Director and assistant professor of arts management and art history at the Sweet Briar Museum, 2002–11
    • Assistant professor of arts management, Jessie Ball duPont scholar-in-residence, 2001–02
  • Consulting curator, 2002–04, Whalehead Preservation Trust, Corolla, NC
  • Curatorial assistant, 1998–99, American Craft Museum (now Museum of Arts and Design), New York
  • Curatorial intern, 1998, National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, UK
  • Registrar’s intern, 1996–97, Biltmore House, Asheville, NC
  • Staff assistant, department of photographs, 1994–96, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Awards, recognitions, and honors

  • Sabbatical Award, Savannah College of Art and Design, "Curating, Contextualizing, and Communicating Culture," 2022
  • Dean's Award for Teaching Effectiveness, Savannah College of Art and Design, 2018
  • Stewart G. Rosenblum Scholar, Royal Collections Studies, Windsor, UK, 2018
  • Presidential Fellowship, Savannah College of Art and Design, Royal Collection Studies: Art Collecting from English Sovereigns to Elite Southerners, 2018
  • Scholarship, International Council of Museums, to speak at conference as a representative of US-ICOM, 2014
  • Sydney and Frances Lewis Fellowship for Gender and Women's Studies Recipient for summer residency, Virginia Historical Society, Richmond, VA, 2014

Organizations

  • Association of Academic Museums and Galleries, member
  • Association of American Art Historians, member
  • Coastal Museums Association, member
  • Southeastern Museums Conference, member
  • Victorian Society in America, member

Publications and presentations

  • Panel chair and speaker, "More Than Meets the Eye: Accessibility in Art and Exhibitions for the Southeastern Museums Conference," 2021
  • Panel chair, "Developing, Sustaining and Revitalizing the Teaching Museum" for Why Museums Matter: The Teaching Museum Today at the Association of Academic Museums and Galleries Annual Conference at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, June 2017
  • Out of the Classroom and Into the Galleries for the panel "21st-Century Issues for University Museums and Galleries" at the Southeastern College Art Conference in Roanoke, VA, Oct. 2016
  • Can We Teach Collaboration? for the Experiential Education panel at the 9th Annual Scholarship of Teaching and Learning conference, Savannah, GA, March 2016
  • Essay on The Garden, an etching by James McNeill Whistler (c. 1880) for "Fine Impressions: Whistler, Freer and Venice," an exhibition held at the Smithsonian's Freer Gallery of Art, 2015
  • Museums as a Catalyst for Tourism in the American South for the International Council of Museums conference Museums: Power and Politics, St. Petersburg, Russia, Aug. 2014
  • Essay, "Young Audiences for Old Collections: Implementing Children's Programming at Academic Museums," reprinted in 10 Must Reads: Learning, Engaging, Enriching, published by Museums Etc., 2014
  • Bringing Home the World: The Artistic Collections and Architectural Patronage of Indiana Fletcher Williams of Sweet Briar, 1828-1900 for the symposium Transactions: Transnationalism and the Formation of American Culture at Brigham Young University, Provo, UT, Jan. 2012
  • Essay, "Young Audiences for Old Collections: Implementing Children's Programming at Academic Museums," Rethinking Learning: Museums and Young People, 2009