Posted by vrcvanderbilt on Monday, January 23, 2017 in HART, Student/Alumni, VRC.

Vanderbilt’s History of Art students are encouraged to apply for a spring 2017 Downing grant by Monday, February 6. The department awards these Downing grants for travel to exhibitions and research centers to supplement academic instruction for HART majors who are in the Honors Program, in advanced seminars, or in upper-level “W” (writing) courses. These grants, which provide assistance for up to $1,500 in travel costs, are awarded in the fall and spring of each academic year.

Applications for the spring 2017 Downing grants—due Monday, February 6—should be addressed to the Downing Grants Committee, c/o Professor Elizabeth Moodey and submitted by email. Please email them to Professor Moodey (elizabeth.j.moodey@vanderbilt.edu).

The application should consist of a detailed proposal of one page explaining the purpose and rationale of the proposed travel; projected costs (accommodation, food, travel expenses, and research costs); and a supporting letter by the instructor in charge of the project.

Jalen Chang, HART and economics major, Class of 2016, was awarded a Downing grant for the fall semester 2015 and traveled to Germany to pursue his research over Thanksgiving break. “In the seven days I spent in Germany, I traveled to Hamburg, Berlin, and Dresden, and saw more than forty Caspar David Friedrich paintings,” said Chang.  “This was crucial to the quality of my project (involving the nationalistic and anti-Napoleonic interpretations of the German painter’s works), as his pieces have a unique and complicated meaning to Germany’s people and history.”

Past Downing Grants have also supported travel for research on photojournalism in post-war Berlin, a Marcel Duchamp installation in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Elgin marbles from the Parthenon in the British Museum, and a Gothic reliquary in the Louvre, among others.

*Jalen Chang posed in front of the Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin; and Berlin at night