Carl Knappett — a professor in the Department of Art History and holder of the Walter Graham/Homer Thompson Chair in Aegean Prehistory — has been awarded a 2024 Guggenheim Fellowship.
The prestigious fellowships, presented annually since 1925, support mid-career professionals who have shown exceptional capacity as scholars or artists, and who continue to produce transformative work.
Knappett’s research concerns the character and organization of Bronze Age societies in the eastern Mediterranean, as revealed through pottery production, exchange, and use.
His book Aegean Bronze Age Art: Meaning in the Making appeared in 2020. He is currently directing fieldwork at Palaikastro in eastern Crete, and also conducts research on pottery from a variety of other Aegean sites. His work on pottery relates to his general interest in material culture, and in the methodological and theoretical challenges involved in its study.
“I am thrilled to receive this honour,” says Knappett. “It is really invigorating to be recognized in this way, and to join such a cohort of scholars and artists. This fellowship will allow me to write my next book, on practices of containment. I will look at the fundamental role containers have played in humanity’s past, and how they continue to shape contemporary lifeways, in ways we often to choose to overlook or forget."
“Working at the intersection of art, history and archaeology, Professor Knappett’s work continues to reveal the richness and complexity of material culture in the Aegean Bronze Age. It is my honour to congratulate him on being named as a 2024 Guggenheim fellow,” says Melanie Woodin, dean of the Faculty of Arts & Science.