I am a PhD candidate in the History of Art + Architecture (secondary field in American Studies) where my research focuses on intersections between the history of craft and design, Indigenous Studies, and American imperialism. Broadly, I am interested in questions about craft/design as a mobile form of knowledge: how is craft knowledge transmitted over time and geography? Is this kind of knowledge place-based, and what are the conditions that allow it to move? Under what circumstances--and by whom--can this knowledge be ethically accessed? Other topics of interest include intermediality, the visual history of the natural and social sciences, repatriation, and intellectual property.

My dissertation-in-progress examines Native American craft and design projects developed during the 1930s, a period marked by the seeming reversal of assimilationist Indian policy and the search for an American "useable past." As non-Native anthropologists, legislators, and arts professionals sought to define and regulate concepts like "tradition" and "authenticity" in Native art--often for the consumption of outsiders--my dissertation returns focus to project participants and the long term effects of these projects within their respective communities. From a museum's attempt to "invent" a Hopi style to the interwar manufacture of a Seneca ethnographic collection to an Iñupiat sewing collective's lucrative military contract, I highlight how Indigenous artists continually roriented these projects to suit local social and political needs. This work has been supported by the Center for Craft, Crystal Bridges Museum, the University of Arkansas, The Decorative Arts Trust, the D'Arcy McNickle Center at the Newberry Library, and the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard, among others.

Stemming from my interests in historical epistemologies and knowledge-production, I strive to use methods that resist the extractive dynamics of academic research. These include working with descendant communities and living artists in addition to critical archival methods, scholarly collaborations and attention to institutional politics. An interest in "the local" as an art historical analytic represents one attempt to put these thoughts in print.

During the 2023-2024 academic year, I will be in residence in the Edmond & Lily Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard. I am also the 2023-2025 Wyeth Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art.