Virginia Chieffo Raguin

Professor of Art History 
161A College of the Holy Cross 
Worcester MA 01610-2395

  • Office: Fenwick 407
  • Phone: (508) 793-3480
  • Email: vraguin@holycross.edu

    • Yale University MA, Ph.D.; University of Toulouse France: certificat d'histoire de l'art moderne; certificat de l'art medieval; Marymount College, Tarrytown, B.A., magna cum laude.

    Fellowships: Fulbright Scholarship, Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, National Endowment for the Humanities Boston, Rakow Grant from the Corning Museum of Glass, Society of Architects Award for Historic Preservation, Holy Cross Faculty Fellowships

    Courses: I teach courses in historic periods, Medieval Art and Northern Renaissance Art and thematic/criticism courses Structures of Faith and Narrative in Art and Film. All art historians teach entrance level courses such as Survey of Art and Introduction to Art.

    Interests: Both in teaching and scholarship, I am interested in religious art of all kinds, patterns of collecting, and intersections of the visual image and written culture. For example Sarah Stanbury, Department of English, and I photographed East Anglian churches and guild halls to explore the physical context of medieval literary figures such as Julian of Norwich (Revelations) William Langland (Piers Plowman) Margery Kempe (The Book of Margery Kempe) and John Lydgate (poetry). I have team taught with many professors, including Thomas Lawler, John Wilson, and Sarah Stanbury (English) and Thomas Feehan (Philosophy). Simply put, if you like the X Files you probably will like my classes.

    Recently studies of art collecting and religious context of 19th century have encouraged an interest in Isabella Stewart Gardner and Harriet Beecher Stowe as representatives of women's culture of this time. Both were concerned with the embellishment of the home and both collected art. (Inspired by their example) I actually have a growing collection of 19th-century religious art, predominantly prints, many in their original frames. They include Lutheran baptismal certificates (in German), Catholic marriage and communion certificates (in French, German, and English), devotional imagery, including a Currier and Ives Sacred Heart of Mary, an Italian (Naples) image of St. Rocco, patron of victims of the plague. a Latino image of Christ in Gethsemane, and Currier and Ives prints, such as The Mother's Dream, Looking unto Jesus, and Bed Time (a mother teaching her young children to say their prayers). I love to talk about this stuff!

    Languages I am bilingual in English and French and have considerable German skills since a great deal of my recent research has been on German, Swiss, and Austrian stained glass of both the Middle Ages and the 19th century.

    Teaching Directions My courses try to include experiences where students get to work with real objects, especially buildings. In Structures of Faith, for example, as a final project, students work in teams surveying a building in the Worcester area (or another site of their choice). Cooperative projects are encouraged. In one course students helped produce a 30 minute video Margery Kempe: A Medieval Woman. In a seminar, six students produced a book on a 19th-century Boston artist distributed to regional libraries, including Boston Public Library and the American Antiquarian Society. I am very interested in encouraging efforts to record and preservation historic buildings.

    A selected list of publications and other activities may give you more information about the direction of my teaching and research.
     

    PUBLICATIONS

    CATALOGUES
    Glory in Glass: Stained Glass in the United States American Bible Society (New York, 1999) see website
    Santos: Devotional Images from the American Southwest, College of the Holy Cross, (Worcester, 1992)
    Northern Renaissance Stained Glass: Continuity and Transformations, College of the Holy Cross (Worcester, 1987)
    BOOKS
    Artistic Integration in Gothic Buildings, with K. Brush and P. Draper, chief editor and contributor (Toronto University Press, 1995).
    Stained Glass Before 1700 in the Mid-West (Michigan, Illinois, Ohio, Indiana) with Helen Zakin. In press, Harvey Miller.
    In preparation: Architectural Stained Glass in America 1830-1930: An Essay into the Origin and Meaning of Styles. European and American products in America in the 19th and early 20th centuries
    Stained Glass in Thirteenth-Century Burgundy, Princeton University Press, 1982.
    Editor and contributor Conservation and Restoration of Stained Glass: An Owner's Guide (The Census of Stained Glass Windows in America) 1988 (40 pages, illustrated).
    Contributor to Stained Glass before 1700 in American Collections Corpus Vitrearum Checklists 1-3 Studies in the History of Art (National Gallery, Washington, D.C., 1985, 1987, 1989).
    ARTICLES
    Articles in The Dictionary of Art, Macmillan Company, 1996 "Stained Glass Iconography", "Overview from 850 to 1450", "Gothic Stained Glass in France", and profiles for Chartres, Bourges, Le Mans, Poitiers, Notre- Dame of Paris, the Sainte-Chapelle, biographies of the Le Prince and the Lindtmayer families of glasspainters, and Arnouldt de Nimègue. (in press)
    "Mid-Thirteenth Century Patronage at Auxerre and the Sculptural Program of the Cathedral," Studies in Iconography 14 (1995), 131-151.
    "The Living Museum of the American City: Reflections on Stained Glass In Buildings and Museum," Journal of the Walters Art Gallery 52/53 (1994/95), 49-60.
    "Revivals, Revivalists, and Architectural Stained Glass," The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 49 (1990), 310-139.
    "Die heilige Gereon aus Koln in San Francisco," Bau- und Bildkunst im Spiegel internationaler Forschung Festschrift Edgar Lehmann (Berlin, 1989), 217- 221.
    "The Thirteenth-Century Glazing Program of Saint-Fargeau (Yonne)," Corpus Vitrearum, United States, Occasional Papers I, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1985, pp. 70-81.
    "The Visual Designer in the Middle Ages: The Case for Stained Glass," Journal of Glass Studies 28 (1986), 30-39.
    "Worcester's Tradition of Stained Glass Windows," Worcester Art Museum Journal 6 (1982-83), 40-51.
    "The College Gallery Program: Workings of the Program," Worcester Art Museum Journal 1 (1977-78), pp. 30-36.
    Articles and Reviews in the Art Bulletin, Speculum, Stained Glass Magazine and others.
    SELF PUBLICATION
    Proceedings of the International Seminar of 19th and Early 20th-Century Stained Glass Philadelphia April 27-May (240 pages) (The Census of Stained Glass Windows in America and Society of Architectural Historians, 1994) Videotape: Margery Kempe: A Medieval Woman (1994) 30 minutes. Distributed to Departments of Religious Studies, English, History, Visual Arts, Experimental and Interdisciplinary Studies, Dinand Library, Women's Studies. Seminar Papers: Sarah Wyman Whitman, 1842-1904: The Cultural Climate in Boston (College of the Holy Cross, 1993). An artist in stained glass. (Dinand Library)
    PROFESSIONAL REVIEWS and CONSULTING
    1. COLLEGE GALLERY PROGRAM: designed and/or edited 32 cooperative exhibitions in the Worcester Art Museum with over 40 Worcester Consortium faculty from 1976- 1984.
    2. Reader and reviewer for Bunting Fellowship Program, Getty Grant Foundation, Canadian Humanities Council, Princeton University Press, Cambridge University Press, University of Georgia Press, University of Toronto Press, Gesta, Speculum, Art Bulletin, and Stained Glass Magazine
    3. Director of The Census of Stained Glass Windows in America
    4. Consultant to Archdiocese of Boston, Restoration of the Cathedral of the Holy Cross (stained glass installed 1876-1880)
    5. Consultant to Harvard University's Restoration of Memorial Hall's Stained Glass (1874-1903 by Tiffany, La Farge, Holiday, etc.)
    6. Consultant to Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, SC, Restoration of University Chapel., Archdiocese of Charleston, SC, Restoration of the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist, and Archdiocese of Birmingham, AL, Restoration of the Cathedral of St. Paul
    7. Museum Education Consultant, Tour Organizer, and Lecturer for the Worcester Art Museum and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts

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