Tomasz Grusiecki
Associate
Professor, Early Modern Art and Visual Culture
PhD, McGill University
MRes, European University Institute
BA, MA, University College London
Contact via email: tomaszgrusiecki@boisestate.edu
Tomasz teaches courses on the history of visual and material culture in Europe and the wider world from 1500 through 1700, a period that is now often described as early modernity. Inquiring into the origins of modernity and how it changed our ideas about what it means to be a human being, an individual, and a citizen, these courses engage students with critical theories and debates to help them historicize today’s forms of visual representation, from selfies and memes to fashion and urban landscape.
His primary field of research is the art and visual culture of the early modern period, with an emphasis on Germanic and Slavonic Europe, but he ventures out into the modern period to provide a longue-durée perspective on this region. He focuses on topics that connect past and present, including early modern nationalism, globalisation, cultural entanglement, and perceptions of selfhood and alterity. You can see the full list of his publications here. His CV is available here.
His first book, Transcultural Things and the Spectre of Orientalism in Early Modern Poland-Lithuania, is forthcoming with Manchester University Press.
He is also a co-investigator on the AHRC-funded research project, Connected Central European Worlds, 1500–1700. Its purpose is to foster debate about methodological approaches to artefacts produced and consumed in the region of Europe that stretches from the Baltic to the Adriatic, and from the Rhine to the Danube and the Dnipro. In 2022, he serves as a steering committee member of From Kyivan Rus’ to Modern Ukraine: Virtual Conversations on History, Art, and Cultural Heritage, a year-long public lecture and roundtable series organised by Dumbarton Oaks; Connected Central European Worlds; and North of Byzantium.