This spring, second-year doctoral student Sarah Mathiesen participated in the Sacral Space: Theology – Art – History conference hosted by the Catholic Theological Faculty at Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic. One of only two Americans at the conference, Sarah presented “The Last Judgment of Yılanlı Kilise: The Iconography and Function of Sacral Space.” This paper is her first presentation on her dissertation topic, the Middle Byzantine rock-cut church in Cappadocia, Turkey known as Yılanlı Kilise, or the “Church of the Snakes.” Sarah followed this presentation with another on Yılanlı Kilise in May at the International Congress on Medieval Studies at Kalamazoo.
For the summer of 2019, Sarah has received the departmental Gerson Medieval Doctoral Research Grant and the MAA/CARA Summer Scholarship from the Medieval Academy of America to continue her study of Byzantine Greek at the International Byzantine Greek Summer School (IBGSS) at Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland. During the two-week intensive language study program, Sarah will build on the Byzantine Greek reading and translation skills she gained from a month-long stay at the program during the previous summer.
She will return to FSU in the fall and take on her new position as a Program for Instructional Excellence Teaching Associate for the 2019-2020 school year. As a PIE Teaching Associate she will help the Art History department enhance its own TA training and graduate student preparation programs. She will serve as a mentor to other Art History TAs and will develop and assist PIE with university-wide workshops, conferences, and other events.