Humanities and Social Sciences

Art History

Staff Directory - Academic

Sylvia Harrison joined the Art History Program in 1986. She teaches courses in visual culture: "Fashion, Art and Identity" and "Photography to Post-Photography." A further course on the history of haute couture ("Designer Fashion: Haute Couture from Worth to Calvin Klein") is scheduled for 2004. Sylvia has published on issues in contemporary art in Australia and America. Her major publication to date is Pop Art and the Origins of Post-Modernism (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001). At present she is working on a book-length project on theoretical issues in fashion photography. She has undertaken extensive research in England and America, including the Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh.

Teaching
Sylvia Harrison supervises and teaches in the first year Art History unit, Art from Rembrandt to Warhol: Constructing the Modern and teaches the units, Fashion, Art and Identity, Photography to Post-Photography and Designer Fashion: Haute Couture from Worth to Calvin Klein, and in the fourth year unit, Theory and Method in Art History. She is also involved in teaching collaborations with Dr. Richard Haese (Art History) and Dr. Diane Kirkby (History) in the units, America Since 1945, Pop Art, Politics and Popular Culture and Making America.

Research Interests
The theory and criticism of contemporary art in Australia and America, including the art and associated cultural activities of Andy Warhol; the history and theory of fashion and photography.