Art History Department honors founder at African Art symposium

The Art History Association at SUNY New Paltz held its marquee spring event, “Studies in African Art: a Symposium Commemorating Hugo Munsterberg’s Legacy,” on April 6.

The event was the culmination of a year-long programming cycle commemorating the centennial of Hugo Munsterberg (1916-1995), who founded the Art History department and taught courses on world art during the 1950s, ‘60s and ’70s.

The symposium featured two keynote addresses. Ikem Okoye of the University of Delaware delivered remarks on how the notions of “ancient” and “modern” can be difficult to pin down in surveys of African art, and SUNY New Paltz alumna Christine Mullen Kreamer ’75 (Art History) of the National Museum of African Art (Smithsonian) came to speak about her experiences as a student and mentee of Munsterberg.

“My years as an undergraduate in Art History at SUNY New Paltz were shaped by the diversity of courses taught by the renowned art historian, Hugo Munsterberg,” Kreamer said. “A recognized scholar in the study of the arts of Japan, Hugo Munsterberg expanded my horizons – and those of countless other students – by courses he taught in the global art histories of Japan, China, Southeast Asia, Africa, Oceania, and the Americas. I took all of his courses, captivated especially by the ways that objects from cultures other than my own opened my mind, eyes, and heart to the aesthetic power of art.

“Studying with Hugo Munsterberg meant first-hand encounters with objects. These encounters took place at least once a semester at his home, where students were privileged to see and, at times, handle artworks from the collection he built over the years with his wife, Marjorie. It was during those afternoon sessions at his home, watching him engage with works of art, that I began to understand the intersection of intellectual knowledge and visual acuity that demonstrates a connoisseur’s expertise.”

Art History Professor Emerita Jaimee Uhlenbrock, who began as Munsterberg’s student and later became his colleague in the department, contributed additional recollections and words of tribute at the symposium.

In the years since Munsterberg’s retirement, the Art History Department at SUNY New Paltz has grown to offer a wide array of courses rarely found at four-year colleges. Visit the department online to learn more.