Americanist art historian; first associate director of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Abbott was born to Arthur Abbott and Flora Parkman (Abbott). After attending Dexter High School, Abbott graduated from Bowdin College with a bachelor's degree in science and attended graduate school at Harvard University in physics. At Harvard he met Alfred H. Barr, Jr., who would become the first director of the Museum of Modern Art. Barr and Abbott spent time in Paris studying art.

Art educator and theorist, applied Marxist and psychological approaches to his interpretations of art. Sponsored by Barnes Foundation to study in France. Taught: Antioch College, 1925-27; Acadia University (Canada), 1928-43; Michigan State University, 1943-56.

Gérôme and 19th-century French art scholar. Ackerman graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in 1952 with a B.A. He moved to Munich where he studied at the Maximillien University under Hans Sedlmayr between 1956-1958 before returning to the United States where he began teaching as an art history lecturer at Bryn Mawr. He received his MFA at Princeton University in 1960, continuing for his Ph.D. in 1964 with a thesis, written under Erwin Panofsky and Rensselaer W.

Architectural historian and professor of Fine Arts, Harvard University, 1960-1990. Ackerman's father, Lloyd Stuart Ackerman (1882-1968), was a prosperous San Francisco attorney and his mother, Louise Sloss (Ackerman) (1888-1983), was later a librarian at the San Francisco Museum of Art (today the SF Museum of Modern Art). Art as a child, he was exposed to art when his family toured European museums in 1932. At age 15, he read Vision and Design by Roger Fry, which opened him to the formal interpretation of art.

Social historian, novelist; author of a book on medieval architecture. Adams' parents were the diplomat and congressman Charles Francis Adams, Sr. (1807-1886) and shipping heiress Abigail Brooks Adams (1808-1889); he was the grandson of President John Quincy Adams and great-grandson of President John Adams. Adams attended Dixwell School before Harvard College--an experience he valued little--graduating in 1858. Among his life-long friends he met at Harvard was the future architect Henry Hobson Richardson.

Scholar of Dutch baroque art; professor of History of Art, UC Berkeley,1962-1994; exponent of the "new art history." Born Svetlana Leontief, she graduated from Radcliffe College with a B.A. in 1957. She married the following year, assuming her husband's surname of Alpers. She continued graduate work in art history at Harvard University publishing an article on Vasari's verbal descriptions of art (ekphrasis) in 1960 in the Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, which announced her innovative approach to art history.

Corinthian vase painting scholar; co-founder of the History of Art department at the University of California, Berkeley. Amyx attended Stanford University where he received a B. A. in classics in 1930. His graduate work was done at Berkeley. An M.A. in Latin was granted in 1932 (with a thesis on Juvenal). He was a fellow at the American School in Athens for 1935-36. His Ph.D., in Latin and classical archaeology was awarded in 1937. His dissertation, on Eritrean black-figure painting, was written under H. R. W. Smith.

University of California, Santa Barbara medievalist architectural historian. Armi was the son of Edgar Leo Armi and Emita December (Armi). He graduated from Columbia College, Columbia University with a B. A. in 1967, continuing for his M.A. and Ph.D. After research as a Woodrow Wilson fellow, 1970-1972, his dissertation on Romanesque wall structure was accepted in 1973. Armi secured an appointment at the University of Chicago as an assistant professor in 1974.

New York Times critic, professor at Cooper Hewitt and scholar of the New York School of art. Aston was the daughter of Ralph Neil Ashton and Sylvia Smith Shapiro (Ashton). Her father was a medical doctor. She obtained a B.A. from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, in 1949, continuing for an M.A. at Harvard University the following year. Ashton began her career as associate editor of the magazine Art Digest, published in New York beginning in 1951. She married Adja Yunkers (d.1983), an artist, in 1953.

Askew's father was the art historian Arthur K. McComb and mother Constance Atwood. She was born while her father was teaching art history at Vassar. Her parents were divorced when she was young and her step father, the art dealer R. Kirk Askew (1903-1974), adopted her. Askew grew up in New York City. As a college student, she majored in English at Vassar College. Her A.M. from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University was completed in 1951.

Director of the Wadsworth Atheneum, early exponent of modern art in America. Austin was born to wealthy Boston parents, his father was a research, Arthur Everett Austin, Sr.(1861-1938) and his mother, Laura Ann Etnier (Austin) (1864-1944), who was herself independently wealthy. Raised essentially by his mother, Austin attended local grammar schools and visited Europe as a child. Never a good student, he entered Harvard but was asked to leave because of poor grades.

Medieval art scholar and chair of Department of Art, Wellesley College; influential in1920s-30s. Avery graduated from Wellesley in 1891 majoring in Greek. She taught Greek and Latin briefly before moving to the University of the State of New York, Albany. She was employed in the library system at Albany, organizing the first traveling library and working on a bachelors in library science which she received in 1895. While a librarian organizing pictures for schools and clubs, she became interested in art.

Americanist art historian and professor of art history at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, N. J. Baigell graduated undergraduate from the University of Vermont in 1954 and received his M.A. from Columbia University in 1955. He married Renee Moses in 1959. His Ph.D. was awarded at the University of Pennsylvania in 1965. He served in the U.S. Air Force between 1955-57 as lieutenant. Between 1961-65 was an instructor at Ohio State University, advancing to assistant professor, 1965-67, and then associate professor of art, 1967-68.

Vassar faculty member from 1931 to 1968 known for lectures on 14th and 15th century Italian painters; led Vassar College wartime defense program during WWII. Barber was raised in Chicago, IL. She graduated with a B.A. from Bryn Mawr in philosophy and psychology while she studying under famed medievalist and art historian Georgiana Goddard King. She received an M.A. in art history from Radcliffe in medieval sculpture and Renaissance painting, continuing graduate work at Radcliffe until 1931.

Collector

Founder, Museum of Modern Art, New York. Barr was the son of a Presbyterian minister, Alfred Hamilton Barr, Sr., and a homemaker Annie Elizabeth Wilson (Barr). The family moved to Baltimore where Barr was raised. His childhood friends included Edward Stauffer King, later director of the Walters Art Gallery. Barr graduated at age 16 (valedictorian) from high school and entered Princeton University in 1918. At that the same year he read Henry Adam's Mont Saint Michel and Chartres influencing him toward art history.

Explored transformation of Classicism into Baroque; suggested "anti-Renaissance" as intermediary term (versus Mannerism).

Americanist and Director of the Whitney Museum of American Art, 1968-74. Baur was the son of a Yale professor of archaeology, Paul V. C. Baur (1872-1951) and mother Susan Whiting. The younger Baur attended Yale, graduating with a B.A. in English in 1932. Finding little teaching work during the height of the depression, he returned to Yale on an art history scholarship. At Yale he studied with Henri Focillon and Marcel Aubert. His 1934 M.A. thesis was on a topic of baroque art.

Winslow Homer scholar and professor of art, Bowdoin College, 1936-1978. Beam's parents were Millard Filmore Beam and Georgia Bettye Avera (Beam). He graduated from Harvard University, cum laude in 1933, joining the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art (later Nelson-Atkins Museum) in Kansas City, MO, the same year, under Paul Gardner, and working with Otto Wittmann, Jr. Beam was appointed professor at the Kansas City Art Institute as well. He traveled to London receiving a Certificate of the Courtauld Institute in 1936.

Columbia University professor of art history for Italian Renaissance; critic of vigorous art restoration. Beck was the son of Samuel Beck, a businessman, and Margaret Weisz (Beck). He studied history, political science and painting at Oberlin, graduating with a B. A. in 1952. He continued study in studio art at New York University, gaining his master's degree in studio in 1954, and then studied at the Accademia delle Belle Arti in Florence with the hopes of becoming a painter. There he met and married Darma Tercinod in 1956.

Americanist art historian and architect. Belknap came to art history comparatively late in his career. His father, of the same name (1873-1943), was a vice president of Bankers Trust. His mother was Rey Sealy Hutchings Belknap (1885-1960). Belknap graduated magna cum laude at St. Paul's School, Concord, NH, in 1916 and attended Harvard University. Although his college years were interrupted by war service, he nevertheless graduated with his class in 1920. Following his father's profession, he worked in various finance and investment firms in New York and London until 1928.

Self-taught historian and critic of American art. Benjamin was born in Argos, Greece in 1837 where his parents were American missionaries. He was educated at the English College in Smyrna, Turkey and Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts. He graduated from Williams College in 1859 having studied both law and art, also seamanship. During his travels, he gained experience as a maritime painter and illustrator. Benjamin published a series of marine depictions of the Crimean War in the London Illustrated News in 1854. He married Clara Stowell, (d. 1880) in 1863.

Wife of Bernard Berenson and scholar of Italian paintings. Mary Berenson was born Mary Smith to Robert Pearsall Smith (1827-1899), an evangelizing preacher and Hannah Whitall (Smith) (1832-1911), both of Quaker extraction. She was given the nick-name "Mariechen" (little Mary) by a German nursemaid. She attended Smith College and Harvard Annex (later Radcliffe College). At Harvard Annex she met the Scots-Irish Benjamin Francis Conn "Frank" Costelloe (1855-1899). The future barrister and political reformer and Smith married in 1885.

Harvard professor and director of the Walters Art Gallery and Cleveland Museum of Art. Bergman attended Rutgers University undergraduate, graduating in 1966. His master's degree, 1969 and Ph.D., 1972, were both awarded from Princeton University. He received Fulbright and Guggenheim fellowships. His dissertation, written under Kurt Weitzmann was on the Salerno Ivories. In 1971 he taught as an assistant at Princeton, joining Harvard in 1976 as associate professor of fine arts. He published a revised version of his thesis in 1980.

Gentileschi (family) scholar; University of Michigan Italianist art historian. Bissell was the son of Raymond A. Bissell (1909-1992) a heating & air dealer, and Elizabeth I Weston (Bissell) (1906-1993). He received his Ph.D. in 1968, writing his dissertation on Orazio Gentileschi under Harold E. Wethey. He wrote a book on Orazio in 1981. Gentileschi's daughter, Aremisia, was at the same time rising in interest due to women's studies courses. Bissell published the catalogue raisonné on the work of Artemisia in 1998. He retired from the University in 2006.