Fall 2009 is a very exciting time for us all. It marks the opening of our new state-of-the-art academic center on West 86^th street. This is a beautiful building, with a much expanded library, digital media lab, additional classrooms and office space for visiting researchers.  But it is also a building with an idea: rather than separating off the library from classrooms and faculty offices we have used books to draw together all the parts of the institution, very concretely making the point that any institution of learning there are no barriers between teaching and research.

This Fall also marks the arrival of two new faculty members,  in medieval European art and material culture and Islamic material culture,   21 Masters students and 2 Ph.D students.  Also opening this Fall is our newest collaborative student-faculty exhibition, Dutch New York Between East and West: the World of Margrieta van Varick, done with the New-York Historical Society, part of our Cultural Sciences Campus.