Ashley Lindeman Inaugurates New Florence Program Teaching Post for PhD Students
A renewed collaboration between Art History and International Programs at FSU gave second-year doctoral student Ashley Lindeman exciting opportunities for research, travel, and development as an educator in the summer of 2017. Ashley received an International Programs Teaching Appointment to spend one summer semester teaching on the FSU Florence Program.
Ashley developed her section of ARH 2000 “from the ground up,” rooting the course material in the physical experience of the Italian Renaissance in Florence. Ashley and her 22 students spent their class time in the monuments, churches, and museums of the great Renaissance city, learning the techniques and traditions of Italian painters, sculptors, and architects. Some of her favorite teaching locations were the Galleria dell’Accademia, the Palazzo Pitti, the Uffizi Gallery, and the Bargello Museum. She also introduced students to lesser-known Florence highlights like the Museo Novecento, to teach them about modern Italian art, and the Frilli Gallery, to discus the importance of the contemporary art market.
The travel funding provided by the appointment also gave Ashley the opportunity to conduct preliminary dissertation research at the Museo dell’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea archives in Rovereto, the Biblioteca Nazionale of Florence, and the Palazzo Ducale in Genova. She gathered documents pertaining to her dissertation topic on the twentieth-century Italian mural and its important to the identity and culture of the nation, especially during the 1930s and 1940s.
While in Florence, Ashley worked with FSU alumnus Frank Nero, now director of the FSU Florence Program. Nero, who was once offered the same ARH 2000 teaching opportunity over a decade ago as a Ph.D. student in the department, was excited to rebuild this new bond between International Programs Florence and the Department of Art History.
In the summer of 2018, the teaching appointment will be expanded to support two doctoral students. First-year PhD student Rachel Carlisle will teach on one 6-week summer session, and Ashley will return for the other. Ashley is looking forward to continuing her dissertation research with studies of Gino Severino murals in Rome, as well as expanding her teaching experience to include team-teaching with Nero on group excursions around Italy with the entire 150-student body of the program.
