Background

Thomas Crow was born in 1948, in Chicago, Illinois.

Education

Thomas Crow studied at Pomona College, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts in 1969. He continued his education in the University of California, Los Angeles, where he earned both Master of Arts in 1975 and a Ph.D. in 1978.

Career

Thomas E. Crow is an art historian and critic whose works defy easy summarization. His essays on issues involving the social and aesthetic aims of artworks range widely, from the eighteenth century through the modern era. As Roger Malbert noted in the Times Literary Supplement, Crow's “exemplary texts are all firmly grounded in the empirical study of particular objects/' Crow's first books Painters and Public Life in Eighteenth-Century Paris concern the schools of painting in eighteenth-century France, including the French Revolution. More recently he has discussed the production of art in a cultural context, from the uses of art for political purposes in the 1960s to the commercial and social imperatives placed upon art in the modern world.

Crow's career includes work at California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, California, where he worked from 1977 to 1978 as an instructor in critical studies. Later he was employed at the University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, as an assistant professor of history of art from 1978 to 1980. At Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey Crow worked as an assistant professor of art and archaeology from 1980 to 1986. Later he changed his place of work to the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, where he worked as an associate professor of history of art from 1986 to 1990. At the University of Sussex, Sussex, England, he worked as a professor of history of art and a chairman of the department from 1990 to 1996. His career continues with Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, where he was a Robert Lehman Professor of the History of Art from 1996 to 2000, and department chairman from 1997 to 2000. At Getty Research Institute, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, Crow works as a director from 2000 to 2007. He also works as a lecturer at symposia on artists and art history. In September 2007 he became the Rosalie Solow Professor of Modern Art at New York University's Institute of Fine Arts.

Achievements

• Through the course of his career, Thomas Crow achieved a position of the Rosalie Solow Professor of Modern Art, and Associate Provost for the Arts at New York University. He has authored two influential studies of eighteenth-century French painting: Painters and Public Life in Eighteenth-Century Paris (1985) and Emulation: Making Artists for Revolutionary France (1995).

Works

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  • The Rise of the Sixties: American and European Art in the Era of Dissent

    (One of Thomas Crow’s most influential titles, The Rise of...)

    1996
  • Modern Art in the Common Culture

    (In this illuminating book, a prominent art historian expl...)

    1996
  • Painters and Public Life in Eighteenth-Century Paris

    (The book describes how the eighteenth century open Salon ...)

    1985
  • The Intelligence of Art

    (With this book, Thomas Crow contributes a refreshing anal...)

    1999
  • John Chamberlain: New Sculpture

    (John Chamberlain: New Sculpture was published in conjunct...)

    2011
  • Under the Big Black Sun: California Art 1974-1981

    (This comprehensive survey examines the fertile and divers...)

    2011
  • No Idols of Art : The Missing Theology

    (Thomas Crow’s No Idols: The Missing Theology of Art tackl...)

    2017
  • Endgame: Reference and Simulation in Recent Painting and Sculpture

    (Preface by David A. Ross Endgame provides the first compr...)

    1987
  • Emulation: Making Artists for Revolutionary France 1995
  • Nineteenth Century Art: A Critical History 1994

Membership

Thomas Crow was a senior fellow at the Michigan Society of Fellows from 1987 to 1990 and a fellow of the National Endowment for the Humanities from 1988 to 1989.

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  Thomas Crow was a senior fellow at the Michigan Society of Fellows from 1987 to 1990.

  Michigan Society of Fellows , United States

  1987 - 1990

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  Thomas Crow was a fellow of the National Endowment for the Humanities from 1988 to 1989.

  National Endowment for the Humanities , United States

  1988 - 1989

References

• Contemporary Authors vol. 233