Kirk Varnedoe Visiting Professor

Esther da Costa Meyer

Esther da Costa Meyer, Professor emerita in the Department of Art and Archaeology, Princeton University, and Visiting Professor at the Yale School of Architecture, has worked on both modern and contemporary architecture, and on issues of gender and design. Another focus of her research has been the architectural practices of the old colonial powers and the resilient cultures of resistance in colonized nations. Her book Dividing Paris: Urban Renewal and Social Inequality, 1852-1870 (Princeton University Press) was published in February 2022. Her curatorial work includes Frank Gehry: On Line, at the Princeton University Art Museum (2008); at the Jewish Museum in New York, she curated Pierre Chareau: Modern Architecture and Design (2016) and co-curated The Sassoons (2023). During the past five years, her teaching has focused on architecture’s complicity with climate change, and, more recently, the architecture of refugee camps around the world.

The Kirk Varnedoe Visiting Professorship brings a distinguished scholar to the Institute each year to teach a course and give a series of public lectures in the area of modern and contemporary art. The Professorship was endowed in 2006 by the late Professor Varnedoe's friends and colleagues to honor and perpetuate his legacy of innovative teaching and remarkable public presence. Past holders of this position include Juan José Lahuerta (2023), Anna Indych-López (2022), Chika Okeke-Agulu (2020), Nina M. Athanassoglou-Kallmyer (2019) Lowery Stokes Sims (2018) Jacqueline Lichtenstein (2016) S. Hollis Clayson (2015) Briony Fer (2014), Thierry de Duve (2013), Okwui Enwezor (2012) Wu Hung (2011), David Joselit (2010), Alexander Potts (2009), Molly Nesbit (2008), and Jeffrey Weiss (2007).

Watch the public lectures of previous Kirk Varnedoe visiting professors.