Bard Graduate Center is devoted to the study of decorative arts, design history, and material culture through research, advanced degrees, exhibitions, publications, and events.

Bard Graduate Center advances the study of decorative arts, design history, and material culture through its object-centered approach to teaching, research, exhibitions, publications, and events.

At BGC, we study the human past and present through their material expressions. We focus on objects and other material forms—from those valued for their aesthetic elements to the ordinary things used in everyday life.

Our accomplished interdisciplinary faculty inspires and prepares students in our MA and PhD programs for successful careers in academia, museums, and the private sector. We bring equal intellectual rigor to our acclaimed exhibitions, award-winning catalogues and scholarly publications, and innovative public programs, and we view all of these integrated elements as vital to our curriculum.

BGC’s campus comprises a state-of-the-art academic programs building at 38 West 86th Street, a gallery at 18 West 86th Street, and a residence hall at 410 West 58th Street. A new collection study center will open at 8 West 86th Street in 2026.

Founded by Dr. Susan Weber in 1993, Bard Graduate Center has become the preeminent institute for academic research and exhibition of decorative arts, design history, and material culture. BGC is an accredited unit of Bard College and a member of the Association of Research Institutes in Art History (ARIAH).

Ruggero Longo is Research Assistant in the Dipartimento di Scienze dei Beni Culturali at the Università della Tuscia, Viterbo. His PhD is in Art History, and he specializes in archaeometric and diagnostic systems for cultural heritage. His research concerns the opus sectile decorations of Norman Southern Italy and intercultural relationships and exchanges in the medieval Mediterranean. He initiated a project concerning the Romanesque church of San Menna in Campania in 2009 and organized a conference on this topic in June 2010. Since 2009, he has worked on the nomination of “Palermo arabo-normanna and the cathedrals of Cefalù and Monreale” as a UNESCO World Heritage site. In 2012, he was awarded the Aga-Khan Postdoctoral Fellowship at Harvard University, where he did research concerning the opus sectile decoration of Mamluk Cairo and its relationship with Norman Sicily. He is currently working on a project based on cognitive study, archaeological researches, and the valorization of the Norman Palace in Palermo. He will be a Research Fellow at the Bard Graduate Center from December 2014 to January 2015. While in residence at the BGC, he will conduct research on workshop dynamics in the Middle Ages.