Graduate Program
The Department of Art History and Archaeology at the University of Maryland offers a master of arts and a doctor of philosophy degree within the context of a major research university.
About The Graduate Programs
We're here for Diversity, Equity, and Justice
The M.A. program provides a sound knowledge of art history, essential bibliography and basic methods of research. The Ph.D. program trains scholars to pursue advanced research in more specific areas of study.
Our distinguished faculty practices diverse approaches to art, archaeology and visual culture across Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas. This provides graduate students with an extraordinary range of expertise in both scholarly and pedagogical contexts. The Washington Area Art History Consortium also allows students to take courses at affiliated area institutions. The department’s particular areas of strength include:
- Global Modern & Contemporary Art
- Digital Art History
- Art of the Americas
- African American/ African Diaspora Art
- Asian Art
- Art and Archaeology of the Ancient Mediterranean
- Early Modern Art of Northern and Southern Europe
- Visual and Material Culture Studies
Students enrolled in our graduate program come from a variety of academic and professional backgrounds and hold equal interest in employment within higher education and institutions including libraries, museums and galleries, or related fields such as publishing. In order to maintain its exemplary record in job placement, the department provides all Ph.D. students with the opportunity to teach undergraduate courses, actively cultivates relationships with area museums and collecting institutions (including the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art, the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Phillips Collection) and regularly offers workshops in grant-writing and publishing. Students in their final year of study are eligible for the Museum Fellowship program, which allows them to gain curatorial and museum research experience at one of the many museums in Washington, D.C., and Baltimore. Graduate students also benefit from a rich array of resources on campus, including an Art Library with over 100,000 volumes, the permanent collections at the University Art Gallery and the David C. Driskell Center for the Study of Visual Art and Culture of African Americans and the African Diaspora, a hands-on study collection of archaeological objects and the Michelle Smith Collaboratory for Visual Culture.