Robert Foster named Paul Mellon Visiting Senior Fellow
Foster will conduct research at the National Gallery of Art
Robert J. Foster, the Richard L. Turner Professor of Humanities in the Department of Anthropology and the Graduate Program in Visual and Cultural Studies, has been awarded a Paul Mellon Visiting Senior Fellowship.
The fellowship provides scholars with two-month appointments to conduct research in residence full time at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. There, fellows have access to the notable resources of the museum, including its library and art collection.
Foster will be conducting archival research for his project titled, “Tracking ‘Primitive Art’ from New Guinea: How Morton D. May Assembled Department Store Exhibition Sales for Middlebrow America (A Detective Story).”
May, who died in 1983, was the head of the May Department Stores Company, formerly one of the largest retail chains in the United States, and an ardent collector of so-called “primitive art” from New Guinea and elsewhere around the globe.
In a move that brought him national recognition and upgraded his company’s image, May arranged for a series of exhibition sales in his stores, beginning in 1963 with objects from New Guinea. The items, priced from $3 to $6,000, reportedly sold quickly, according to his obituary in The New York Times. May also donated objects to major fine art museums across the US.