Nancy J. Troy

Nancy J. Troy is Victoria and Roger Sant Professor in Art, Department of Art & Art History, at Stanford University. In addition to The De Stijl Environment (MIT Press, 1983), she is the author of Modernism and the Decorative Arts in France: Art Nouveau to Le Corbusier (Yale University Press, 1991), Couture Culture: A Study in Modern Art and Fashion(MIT Press, 2003), and, most recently, The Afterlife of Piet Mondrian(University of Chicago Press, 2013). In this book about Mondrian after his death in 1944, Troy examines the trajectories of the artist's work and legacy as they circulated through  the realms of elite and popular culture -- culminating in the creation of what Troy describes as "the Mondrian brand."  In the process, Troy exposes the ways in which the dominant historical narrative of Mondrian and his work has been shaped by art-market forces.  Her current research focuses on Yves Saint Laurent's Mondrian dresses of 1965, the knock-offs they have generated and the art world they continue to inhabit.

Professor Troy received her PhD from Yale University in 1979, and thereafter taught at The Johns Hopkins University (1979-83), Northwestern University (1983-93), and the University of Southern California (1994-2010).  A past president of the National Committee for the History of Art, she was Editor-in-Chief of the flagship art history journal, The Art Bulletin, from 1994 to 1997.  She has been awarded many fellowships, most notably from the Guggenheim Foundation, the American Council of Learned Societies, the Getty Research Institute, the Institute for Advanced Study, and the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts.

At Stanford, Professor Troy teaches courses on modern European and American art, architecture and design; cubism; modern art and fashion; art, business and the law; the art market, and topics generated by the collections and exhibitions of the Cantor Arts Center and the Bowes (Art and Architecture) Library.