About Me

Izabel Galliera holds a Ph.D. in art history from the University of Pittsburgh. She is Assistant Professor of Art History in the Department of Art and Design at Susquehanna University in Pennsylvania. Galliera is also one of the three faculty members overseeing the interdisciplinary Minor in Museum Studies at SU. Previously, she has taught at the University of Pittsburgh, in Pennsylvania, McDaniel College in Maryland, and McDaniel-Budapest in Budapest, Hungary.

Galliera’s research interests are at the intersection of art, politics and social justice, contemporary art in a global context with a particular focus on activist art forms and practices, socially engaged art, theories of public space and social capital, histories of exhibitions, and contemporary curatorial models for exhibition making. Her book Socially Engaged Art After Socialism: Art and Civil Society in Central and Eastern Europe was published in 2017 by I.B. Taurus – now Bloomsbury Press. She has been invited to present on her book at Union College in Schenectady, New York, at the University of Pittsburgh, and at the Ludwig Museum of Contemporary Art in Budapest, Hungary.

Her research has also been published in peer-reviewed journals such as Journal of Curatorial Studies, ARTMargins, FIELD: Journal of Socially Engaged Art and anthologies such as Collaborating Now: Art in the Twenty First Century (2016), Creative Collaboration in Art Practice, Research and Pedagogy (2018), and Social Practice Art in Turbulent Times: The Revolution Will Be Live (2019). Galliera has chaired and organized numerous panels, as well as presented her work at a number of national, regional and international conferences. She had also organized and curated several solo and group exhibitions, such as Subversive Play: Artists Challenging Mechanisms of Social Control on view at the Struktura Gallery in Sofia, Bulgaria in the fall of 2018, Alternative Cartographies: Artists Claiming Public Space on view at Rice Gallery, McDaniel College, Maryland in early fall 2015 and A Social Geography of Hair: Performing Gender and Identity in Contemporary Art as part of DownStreet Art Festival in North Adams, Massachusetts in the summer of 2011. Her wealth of curatorial experience accumulated over the years as a former museum curator, gallery director, private collection curator, and independent curator, has informed both her academic research and pedagogical work.

As a teacher, Galliera’s goals are to instill in students valuable creative, analytical and critical skills to assess and evaluate the culture and society around them, to broaden their intellectual horizons, feel comfortable before an unfamiliar form of art, and continue to search out and visit art museums and galleries whenever they find themselves in a new city. As outlined by the authors in the book How Learning Works (eds. Susan Ambrose, Michael W. Bridges, Marsha C, Lovett, Michele DiPietro, Marie K, Norman, 2010), learning is a process not a product, it involves change in knowledge, beliefs, behaviors and attitudes and most importantly learning is not something done to students, but rather something students themselves do. Such principles have guided her teaching and design of her courses. Often, in her classes, she employs the innovative pedagogy called Reacting to the Past (RTTP). In historical role-playing games, such as Il Duomo di Santa Maria del Fiore set in the Florentine Renaissance of the 15^th century, The Society of Independent Artists, 1917, and Guerrilla Girls in our Midst: 1984 – 1987, students are prepared to take the roles of historical figures in moments of historical tension. With the instructor taking a back seat, students accomplish the objectives of their assigned character. This immersive pedagogy teaches and offers a platform for students to engage in persuasive writing, problem solving, critical and creative thinking, reading comprehension, public speaking and negotiation.

http://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/socially-engaged-art-after-socialism-9781786732224/

Courses Taught