MOUNT HOLYOKE COLLEGE Art Museum (MHCAM) has a new associate curator. Stephanie Sparling Williams joined the museum in South Hadley, Mass., in June. She previously served as assistant curator for the Addison Gallery of American Art at Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass.
MHCAM Director Tricia Y. Paik said she was thrilled to welcome Sparling Williams to her dedicated team. “She brings a curatorial practice grounded in community and social justice, as well as scholarship deeply invested in women artists and artists of color,” Paik said when the appointment was announced.
“With such commitments and her passion for student, faculty and public engagement, I know that Stephanie will make significant contributions, helping us move the museum’s mission forward as we serve our College and broader communities.”
“She brings a curatorial practice grounded in community and social justice, as well as scholarship deeply invested in women artists and artists of color. I know that Stephanie will make significant contributions, helping us move the museum’s mission forward.” — MHCAM Director Tricia Y. Paik
SPARLING WILLIAMS earned an undergraduate degree in ethnic studies and fine art/studio art from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and a Ph.D., in American studies and ethnicity from the University of Southern California. She was a John Walsh Fellow at Yale University Art Gallery in 2016.
For her doctoral dissertation, Sparling Williams focused on artist Lorraine O’Grady. She hopes to publish the manuscript, “Speaking Out of Turn: Lorraine O’Grady and the Art of Language.” Her teaching experience includes current faculty appointments at the University of Massachusetts in Lowell and Phillips Academy.
Modern and contemporary art and culture and critical race and gender theory, are among her research and teaching interests, which also include, more specifically, American, African American, and African/Diasporic art and culture; performance and embodiment; ethnographic, feminist, and phenomenological approaches to art-historical writing; blackness in the visual field; transnational intersections of race, class, gender, and sexuality; and institutional critique.
At Addision Gallery, Sparling Williams curated the recent exhibition “Harlem: In Situ.” Forthcoming in spring 2020, she is co-curating with Allison Kemmerer, “Wayfinding: Contemporary Artists Explore the Sydney R. Knafel Map Collection.”
Meanwhile, Sparling Williams is embarking on a new chapter in her career at the Mount Holyoke College Art Museum. She said: “I am excited to join a team dedicated to the mission of teaching with objects, and to contribute to a collecting and exhibition program where visitors, regardless of background or training, can have meaningful interactions with works of art.” CT
IMAGE: Stephanie Sparling Williams. | Photo by Hector Membreno-Canales
