Graduating Art History senior Willow Hackett has been named the 2025 recipient of the Rose Award for Outstanding Undergraduate Achievement in Art History. Named in honor of the first chair of the Department, Dr. Patricia Rose, the Rose Award recognizes exceptional undergraduate students in Art History who have demonstrated consistent excellence in course study, research, and leadership in the major. Rose Recipients receive books in their area of study, award certificates, and commemoration on a plaque dedicated to the award, on display in the Art History office.
Graduating summa cum laude with a 3.984 GPA, Willow is a Bachelor of Arts recipient with Honors in Art History and a minor in Museum Studies. In her honors thesis, entitled “Beast of Burden: Medieval Interpretations of the Seven-Headed Beast in the Illustrated Beatus,” directed by Dr. Erika Loic, Willow worked on apocalyptic iconographies in a genre of manuscript produced in medieval Iberian monasteries. In contrast to the more traditionally style-based studies of these manuscripts, Dr. Loic notes, Willow engaged with the region’s political history and the artists’ visualizations of interreligious interaction through the lens of biblical narrative.
During her thesis year, Willow reached out to the Associate Curator of Medieval & Renaissance Manuscripts at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York to discuss her professional aspirations. She subsequently organized a trip to look at relevant facsimiles in the Morgan’s collection, supported by the Department’s 2024–25 Helen J. Beard Undergraduate Research Scholarship in Art History, which she received to support her thesis work.
Beyond her thesis work, during her time at FSU Willow also graduated from the University Honors Program and participated in the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program. She studied abroad in FSU’s International Program in London and completed her Global Citizenship Certificate. She was also an intern at COCA, Tallahassee’s Council on Culture and Arts (COCA), in the summer and fall of last year.
In addition to this impressive work, Willow has been a leader in our undergraduate community, serving for two years as an officer of UAHA, the Undergraduate Art History Association. This fall, she will continue her studies at New York University, pursuing a Master’s in the History of Art and Archaeology at the Institute of Fine Arts. She aims to pursue a PhD in art history in the future and to pursue a career in a museum, library, or archive.