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Here you can carry out art historical and design research; apply the theories and practice of information science; design and curate digital libraries, archives, and exhibitions; and communicate arts content and design effectively across diverse cultures and societies.
Pratt students at the Morgan Library Reading Room (courtesy Polly Cancro, History of Art and Design / Library and Information Science '18)

Pratt students at the Morgan Library Reading Room (courtesy Polly Cancro, History of Art and Design / Library and Information Science '18)

Type
Graduate, MAL
Start Term
Fall Only
Credits
60
Duration
3 years (typically)
Courses
Plan of Study
Student reading in the book stacks of the history Pratt Library on the Brooklyn campus.

History of Art and Design / Library and Information Science at Pratt

The MSLIS/MA History of Art and Design dual-degree program prepares you for careers in art and design, museum, and academic libraries. In this program, you will become an expert on the intersection of art and design and information, going deep into art, design, and historical archives, art and design collections, and more. With fellowship opportunities at NYC’s leading museums, libraries, and archives, such as The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Frick Art Reference Library, and MoMA, the dual-degree program offers unique experiential learning opportunities.

Student Work

You may also browse completed M.A. History of Art & Design Theses at the Pratt Institute Libraries.

The Experience

professor speaking with class, reviewing artwork onsite

Students in the dual-degree MSLIS/MA History of Art and Design program get to experience all Pratt has to offer by taking half of their program (30 credits) at the School of Information based in Manhattan, and the other half in the Department of History of Art and Design on the Brooklyn campus (30 credits). The first two years students take courses in both departments, with much of the thesis work taking place in the third year. With class sizes of just 8-12, you’ll collaborate closely with your cohort and faculty and be learning at the nexus of NYC arts and culture communities.

Internships

Internships at museums, libraries, nonprofit art organizations, and galleries provide professional opportunities in your area of interest and prepare you for future careers. Recent students have interned at prestigious institutions such as the New York Public Library, Franklin Furnace, and the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Study Abroad

Bernini's fountain in the Piazza Navona, Rome, Italy.

We are pleased to offer study abroad options for dual-degree students, including a new course offered for the first time during spring break 2024: “Artist Archives: Rome/New York”. We also recently celebrated the 35th anniversary of Pratt in Venice, which is a 6-week program that occurs each June and July. For more information on Study Abroad, see where you can go.

Learning Resources

We develop disciplinary fluency in our program of study and we celebrate the interdisciplinary nature of design critical to address the plurality and complexity of the environments in which we operate. Learning resources.

Our Faculty

Pratt’s distinguished faculty of outstanding creative professionals and scholars share a common desire to develop each student’s potential and creativity to the fullest. Bringing different views, methods, and perspectives, they provide a rigorous educational model in which students make and learn. See all History of Art and Design faculty and administrators and School of Information faculty and administrators.

Our Alumni

Pratt’s distinguished alumni are leading diverse and thriving careers, addressing critical challenges and creating innovative work that reimagines our world.

Where They Work

  • Librarian, Photographs and Prints Division, New York Public Library
  • Archivist, Center for Brooklyn History at Brooklyn Public Library
  • IT Project Manager, J. Paul Getty Trust
  • Head, Reference & Reader Services, Teachers College, Columbia University
  • Web Collection Librarian, Columbia University Libraries
  • Dean and Director of Libraries, Bard College

Success Stories

Ready for More?

HERE’S HOW TO APPLYOUR CAMPUS & BEYOND
Join us at Pratt. Learn more about admissions requirements, plan your visit, talk to a counselor, and start your application. Take the next step.You’ll find yourself at home at Pratt. Learn more about our residence halls, student organizations, athletics, gallery exhibitions, events, the amazing City of New York and our Brooklyn neighborhood communities. Check us out.

Social media

@hadpratt
History of Art and Design Dep.

@hadpratt

  • You are invited to “Heirlooms and Heiresses: How women who inherited Caribbean Slavery wealth funded British art, architecture and interiors,” by Dr. Miranda Kaufmann.

Date: Wednesday, October 22, 2025
Time: 5:30 pm
Venue: ARC E-02
If you are interested in attending, please RSVP using the link in the bio. 
* This event is open to general public.

About the Project: A century or two before New York’s wealthiest families sent their daughters to marry into the British aristocracy, heiresses to equally irresistible fortunes founded on Caribbean slavery bought their way into British society. But their global stories touch unexpected people and places, from Marie Antoinette, Napoleon and America’s Founding Fathers, to India and Australia; Charleston, East Florida and New York’s Chelsea. Join Miranda to hear their stories, learn how the story of African enslavement in the Americas was not limited to the United States, and how these heiresses’ heirlooms – their portraits, fine art and furniture – are now scattered across collections globally, including the Met, the Frick, the Getty, even Windsor Castle.

About the Speaker: Dr. Miranda Kaufmann is the author of the Wolfson History Prize-shortlisted book Black Tudors: The Untold Story (2017). She read History at Christ Church, Oxford and is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London. She has worked with English Heritage and the National Trust, taken her work into schools with her Teaching Black Tudors project and to the world with her free Black Tudors: The Untold Story FutureLearn course. Her second book, Heiresses: Marriage, Inheritance and Slavery in the Caribbean (2025), tells the stories of nine British female enslavers and the people they enslaved. www.mirandakaufmann.com

 #historyofart #arthistory #ArtAndDesign #pratt #historyofdesign
  • You are invited to “Becoming Leonor Fini – Theatrical Self-Performances between Art and Life,” by Andrea Kollnitz.

* This event is for Pratt community only.
Date: Wednesday, October 15, 2025
Time: 5:30 pm
Venue: ARC E-02

About the Project: Using theories of performativity, this talk explores Leonor Fini’s (1907-1996) self-fashioning and dressing-up practices, highlighting how her extension of artistic creative practices, from painted artworks to her self-creation through costumes, masks and fashion, allowed her to become a living artwork. Fini’s personal theatricality, photographic self-portraits and self-transformative, genderbending, transgressive dressing-up games in relation to surrealist practices, reveal the hybrid identities that made up Fini’s character. Here, the artist’s self-fashioning must be understood as a substantial creative practice developing and confirming artistic and personal autonomy and pointing to an extended concept of art where creation and self-creation powerfully enable each other.

About the Speaker: Andrea Kollnitz is Professor in Art History and Head of the Art History Department at the Department of Culture and Aesthetics at Stockholm University. Her research focuses on the self-fashioning of avant-garde artists; art and nationalism; the Nordic avant-garde from transnational perspectives. Kollnitz is co-editor of the books "Fashion and Modernism" (Bloomsbury 2018), "A Cultural History of the Avant-Garde in the Nordic Countries, vol 2: 1925-1950" (Brill, 2019), "Fashion, Performance & Performativity" (Bloomsbury, 2021), and "Fashion Aesthetics and Ethics" (Bloomsbury, 2023). She is currently leading a research project on Surrealism in Sweden and recently published "Becoming Leonor Fini: Theatrical Self-Performances between Art and Life" (Bloomsbury, 2025).

 #historyofart #pratt #arthistory #artanddesign
  • Professor Eana Kim and her Art Since the Sixties class visited MoMA for a hands-on session of object-based research and discussion. Students explored Pop Art and Fluxus in the galleries, bringing their classroom debates to life among iconic works by George Maciunas, Andy Warhol, Yoko Ono, and more!
  • Pratt will again join with other partners throughout the five boroughs to be part of Open House New York (OHNY). OHNY is a unique opportunity to share our campus and welcome fellow New Yorkers to Pratt. It promotes broad, unparalleled access to the city—to the places, people, projects, systems, and ideas that define New York and its future. Through their year-round programming, including the annual OHNY Weekend festival, OHNY offers a citywide platform for education, exploration, and engagement about the connections between quality of place and quality of life for all New Yorkers.

Launched in 2003, Open House New York Weekend is an annual festival that opens hundreds of noteworthy or significant places across the five boroughs to foster discovery and delight for New Yorkers and visitors alike.

Participants are invited to the Pratt campus to take a self-guided tour of the sculpture garden or participate in an HAD facilitated guided campus tour (reservations required). The tour will provide access to spaces not usually open to non-Pratt community members. #OHNYwknd

Follow our social media @hadpratt and @openhousenewyork on Instagram or @hadpratt and @ohny on Twitter to learn more. Also learn more at ohny.org/weekend.

#OHNYwknd #ohny #nyc #historyofart ##OHNYwknd #ohny #nyc #historyofart ##historyofdesignhistoryofdesign
  • You are invited to an HAD Faculty Conversations by Kate Minniti, “More than countless trinkets: Egyptian objects in Archaic Sicily (776-480 BCE).”

* This event is for Pratt community.
Date: Wednesday, October 8th, 2025
Time: 12:00 – 1:00 pm
Venue: Main 210

About the Speaker: Kate Minniti holds a PhD in Classical Archaeology from the University of British Columbia, BC, and degrees in Egyptian Archaeology from UCL and History of Art and Archaeology from NYU. She has been working as a field archaeologist around the Mediterranean for more than a decade, and she is a senior member of the NYU-UniMi archaeological expedition in Selinunte, Italy. Her main research interests are Archaic-Period connectivity and local responses to globalization in the Mediterranean. She is also interested in reception studies, and since 2013 has been exploring and publishing on the representation of Ancient Egypt in video games.

About the Project: Sicily has yielded roughly 300 Egyptian-looking objects, commonly referred to as Aegyptiaca, found in Archaic (ca. 776-480 BCE) archaeological contexts. Earlier studies have focused only on the formal elements of the artifacts, and even less often have they framed the data in the context of pan-Mediterranean trends. My research sits at the intersection of trade, politics, and religion, as it focuses not only on the roles that Aegyptiaca played in the lives of the inhabitants of Sicily – as religious and élite objects – but also on how their use can help us reassess Sicily’s position in Archaic-period Mediterranean networks of trade and exchange.
  • Artwork Spotlight: Georges Seurat, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte (1884–86)

Seurat’s monumental painting is one of the most celebrated works of Post-Impressionism. Instead of using broad brushstrokes, Seurat employed a method called pointillism, applying countless small dots of pure color that blend in the viewer’s eye.

Why It Matters:

Introduced scientific approaches to color and perception

Transformed Impressionist spontaneity into calculated structure

Captures modern Parisian leisure life with timeless rhythm

The painting is not just a scene of people relaxing by the Seine. It is also a study of light, atmosphere, and the psychology of vision. Seurat sought to merge art and science, creating a new way of seeing that still fascinates audiences today.

#art #arthistory #arthistory101 #pratt
You are invited to “Heirlooms and Heiresses: How women who inherited Caribbean Slavery wealth funded British art, architecture and interiors,” by Dr. Miranda Kaufmann. Date: Wednesday, October 22, 2025 Time: 5:30 pm Venue: ARC E-02 If you are interested in attending, please RSVP using the link in the bio. * This event is open to general public. About the Project: A century or two before New York’s wealthiest families sent their daughters to marry into the British aristocracy, heiresses to equally irresistible fortunes founded on Caribbean slavery bought their way into British society. But their global stories touch unexpected people and places, from Marie Antoinette, Napoleon and America’s Founding Fathers, to India and Australia; Charleston, East Florida and New York’s Chelsea. Join Miranda to hear their stories, learn how the story of African enslavement in the Americas was not limited to the United States, and how these heiresses’ heirlooms – their portraits, fine art and furniture – are now scattered across collections globally, including the Met, the Frick, the Getty, even Windsor Castle. About the Speaker: Dr. Miranda Kaufmann is the author of the Wolfson History Prize-shortlisted book Black Tudors: The Untold Story (2017). She read History at Christ Church, Oxford and is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London. She has worked with English Heritage and the National Trust, taken her work into schools with her Teaching Black Tudors project and to the world with her free Black Tudors: The Untold Story FutureLearn course. Her second book, Heiresses: Marriage, Inheritance and Slavery in the Caribbean (2025), tells the stories of nine British female enslavers and the people they enslaved. www.mirandakaufmann.com #historyofart #arthistory #ArtAndDesign #pratt #historyofdesign
2 days ago
View on Instagram |
1/6
You are invited to “Becoming Leonor Fini – Theatrical Self-Performances between Art and Life,” by Andrea Kollnitz. * This event is for Pratt community only. Date: Wednesday, October 15, 2025 Time: 5:30 pm Venue: ARC E-02 About the Project: Using theories of performativity, this talk explores Leonor Fini’s (1907-1996) self-fashioning and dressing-up practices, highlighting how her extension of artistic creative practices, from painted artworks to her self-creation through costumes, masks and fashion, allowed her to become a living artwork. Fini’s personal theatricality, photographic self-portraits and self-transformative, genderbending, transgressive dressing-up games in relation to surrealist practices, reveal the hybrid identities that made up Fini’s character. Here, the artist’s self-fashioning must be understood as a substantial creative practice developing and confirming artistic and personal autonomy and pointing to an extended concept of art where creation and self-creation powerfully enable each other. About the Speaker: Andrea Kollnitz is Professor in Art History and Head of the Art History Department at the Department of Culture and Aesthetics at Stockholm University. Her research focuses on the self-fashioning of avant-garde artists; art and nationalism; the Nordic avant-garde from transnational perspectives. Kollnitz is co-editor of the books "Fashion and Modernism" (Bloomsbury 2018), "A Cultural History of the Avant-Garde in the Nordic Countries, vol 2: 1925-1950" (Brill, 2019), "Fashion, Performance & Performativity" (Bloomsbury, 2021), and "Fashion Aesthetics and Ethics" (Bloomsbury, 2023). She is currently leading a research project on Surrealism in Sweden and recently published "Becoming Leonor Fini: Theatrical Self-Performances between Art and Life" (Bloomsbury, 2025). #historyofart #pratt #arthistory #artanddesign
5 days ago
View on Instagram |
2/6
Professor Eana Kim and her Art Since the Sixties class visited MoMA for a hands-on session of object-based research and discussion. Students explored Pop Art and Fluxus in the galleries, bringing their classroom debates to life among iconic works by George Maciunas, Andy Warhol, Yoko Ono, and more!
Professor Eana Kim and her Art Since the Sixties class visited MoMA for a hands-on session of object-based research and discussion. Students explored Pop Art and Fluxus in the galleries, bringing their classroom debates to life among iconic works by George Maciunas, Andy Warhol, Yoko Ono, and more!
Professor Eana Kim and her Art Since the Sixties class visited MoMA for a hands-on session of object-based research and discussion. Students explored Pop Art and Fluxus in the galleries, bringing their classroom debates to life among iconic works by George Maciunas, Andy Warhol, Yoko Ono, and more!
2 weeks ago
View on Instagram |
3/6
Pratt will again join with other partners throughout the five boroughs to be part of Open House New York (OHNY). OHNY is a unique opportunity to share our campus and welcome fellow New Yorkers to Pratt. It promotes broad, unparalleled access to the city—to the places, people, projects, systems, and ideas that define New York and its future. Through their year-round programming, including the annual OHNY Weekend festival, OHNY offers a citywide platform for education, exploration, and engagement about the connections between quality of place and quality of life for all New Yorkers.

Launched in 2003, Open House New York Weekend is an annual festival that opens hundreds of noteworthy or significant places across the five boroughs to foster discovery and delight for New Yorkers and visitors alike.

Participants are invited to the Pratt campus to take a self-guided tour of the sculpture garden or participate in an HAD facilitated guided campus tour (reservations required). The tour will provide access to spaces not usually open to non-Pratt community members. #OHNYwknd

Follow our social media @hadpratt and @openhousenewyork on Instagram or @hadpratt and @ohny on Twitter to learn more. Also learn more at ohny.org/weekend.

#OHNYwknd #ohny #nyc #historyofart ##OHNYwknd #ohny #nyc #historyofart ##historyofdesignhistoryofdesign
Pratt will again join with other partners throughout the five boroughs to be part of Open House New York (OHNY). OHNY is a unique opportunity to share our campus and welcome fellow New Yorkers to Pratt. It promotes broad, unparalleled access to the city—to the places, people, projects, systems, and ideas that define New York and its future. Through their year-round programming, including the annual OHNY Weekend festival, OHNY offers a citywide platform for education, exploration, and engagement about the connections between quality of place and quality of life for all New Yorkers. Launched in 2003, Open House New York Weekend is an annual festival that opens hundreds of noteworthy or significant places across the five boroughs to foster discovery and delight for New Yorkers and visitors alike. Participants are invited to the Pratt campus to take a self-guided tour of the sculpture garden or participate in an HAD facilitated guided campus tour (reservations required). The tour will provide access to spaces not usually open to non-Pratt community members. #OHNYwknd Follow our social media @hadpratt and @openhousenewyork on Instagram or @hadpratt and @ohny on Twitter to learn more. Also learn more at ohny.org/weekend. #OHNYwknd #ohny #nyc #historyofart ##OHNYwknd #ohny #nyc #historyofart ##historyofdesignhistoryofdesign
3 weeks ago
View on Instagram |
4/6
You are invited to an HAD Faculty Conversations by Kate Minniti, “More than countless trinkets: Egyptian objects in Archaic Sicily (776-480 BCE).” * This event is for Pratt community. Date: Wednesday, October 8th, 2025 Time: 12:00 – 1:00 pm Venue: Main 210 About the Speaker: Kate Minniti holds a PhD in Classical Archaeology from the University of British Columbia, BC, and degrees in Egyptian Archaeology from UCL and History of Art and Archaeology from NYU. She has been working as a field archaeologist around the Mediterranean for more than a decade, and she is a senior member of the NYU-UniMi archaeological expedition in Selinunte, Italy. Her main research interests are Archaic-Period connectivity and local responses to globalization in the Mediterranean. She is also interested in reception studies, and since 2013 has been exploring and publishing on the representation of Ancient Egypt in video games. About the Project: Sicily has yielded roughly 300 Egyptian-looking objects, commonly referred to as Aegyptiaca, found in Archaic (ca. 776-480 BCE) archaeological contexts. Earlier studies have focused only on the formal elements of the artifacts, and even less often have they framed the data in the context of pan-Mediterranean trends. My research sits at the intersection of trade, politics, and religion, as it focuses not only on the roles that Aegyptiaca played in the lives of the inhabitants of Sicily – as religious and élite objects – but also on how their use can help us reassess Sicily’s position in Archaic-period Mediterranean networks of trade and exchange.
3 weeks ago
View on Instagram |
5/6
Artwork Spotlight: Georges Seurat, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte (1884–86) Seurat’s monumental painting is one of the most celebrated works of Post-Impressionism. Instead of using broad brushstrokes, Seurat employed a method called pointillism, applying countless small dots of pure color that blend in the viewer’s eye. Why It Matters: Introduced scientific approaches to color and perception Transformed Impressionist spontaneity into calculated structure Captures modern Parisian leisure life with timeless rhythm The painting is not just a scene of people relaxing by the Seine. It is also a study of light, atmosphere, and the psychology of vision. Seurat sought to merge art and science, creating a new way of seeing that still fascinates audiences today. #art #arthistory #arthistory101 #pratt
4 weeks ago
View on Instagram |
6/6
@prattischool
Pratt iSchool

@prattischool

  • We have been invaded by evil spirits!!!! 👻👹🎃🏮 This news and more in the @prattischool October '25 newsletter; link available in our bio.
  • We’re hiring full-time and part-time faculty to teach in-person in Manhattan! Checkout the opportunities at Pratt.edu or visit the link in our bio.
  • The information you see changes the world that you perceiv. Across four core programs, we explore everything from algorithms to archives with the goal of improving lives and culture through information. Through hands-on learning experiences, you’ll not only learn how to manage knowledge and information, but how to make it useful, available, and accessible to all.

To learn more about our masters programs, sign-up to attend an upcoming information session. Next session is September 9 at 6pm ET. Link to sign-up is available in our bio.
  • It's the @prattischool September '25 newsletter with events, student and alumni news, and more! Link available bio our bio.
  • Find out the speaker at our 6th Annual Ethics & Technology Forum, as well as student, alumni and faculty news, in our August '25 newsletter! Link available in our bio.
  • It's the School of Information July newsletter with Space and Technology Updates, faculty news, and more! Link available in our bio.
We have been invaded by evil spirits!!!! 👻👹🎃🏮 This news and more in the @prattischool October '25 newsletter; link available in our bio.
We have been invaded by evil spirits!!!! 👻👹🎃🏮 This news and more in the @prattischool October '25 newsletter; link available in our bio.
14 hours ago
View on Instagram |
1/6
We’re hiring full-time and part-time faculty to teach in-person in Manhattan! Checkout the opportunities at Pratt.edu or visit the link in our bio.
We’re hiring full-time and part-time faculty to teach in-person in Manhattan! Checkout the opportunities at Pratt.edu or visit the link in our bio.
1 week ago
View on Instagram |
2/6
The information you see changes the world that you perceiv. Across four core programs, we explore everything from algorithms to archives with the goal of improving lives and culture through information. Through hands-on learning experiences, you’ll not only learn how to manage knowledge and information, but how to make it useful, available, and accessible to all.

To learn more about our masters programs, sign-up to attend an upcoming information session. Next session is September 9 at 6pm ET. Link to sign-up is available in our bio.
The information you see changes the world that you perceiv. Across four core programs, we explore everything from algorithms to archives with the goal of improving lives and culture through information. Through hands-on learning experiences, you’ll not only learn how to manage knowledge and information, but how to make it useful, available, and accessible to all.

To learn more about our masters programs, sign-up to attend an upcoming information session. Next session is September 9 at 6pm ET. Link to sign-up is available in our bio.
The information you see changes the world that you perceiv. Across four core programs, we explore everything from algorithms to archives with the goal of improving lives and culture through information. Through hands-on learning experiences, you’ll not only learn how to manage knowledge and information, but how to make it useful, available, and accessible to all.

To learn more about our masters programs, sign-up to attend an upcoming information session. Next session is September 9 at 6pm ET. Link to sign-up is available in our bio.
The information you see changes the world that you perceiv. Across four core programs, we explore everything from algorithms to archives with the goal of improving lives and culture through information. Through hands-on learning experiences, you’ll not only learn how to manage knowledge and information, but how to make it useful, available, and accessible to all. To learn more about our masters programs, sign-up to attend an upcoming information session. Next session is September 9 at 6pm ET. Link to sign-up is available in our bio.
1 month ago
View on Instagram |
3/6
It's the @prattischool September '25 newsletter with events, student and alumni news, and more! Link available bio our bio.
It's the @prattischool September '25 newsletter with events, student and alumni news, and more! Link available bio our bio.
1 month ago
View on Instagram |
4/6
Find out the speaker at our 6th Annual Ethics & Technology Forum, as well as student, alumni and faculty news, in our August '25 newsletter! Link available in our bio.
Find out the speaker at our 6th Annual Ethics & Technology Forum, as well as student, alumni and faculty news, in our August '25 newsletter! Link available in our bio.
2 months ago
View on Instagram |
5/6
It's the School of Information July newsletter with Space and Technology Updates, faculty news, and more! Link available in our bio.
It's the School of Information July newsletter with Space and Technology Updates, faculty news, and more! Link available in our bio.
3 months ago
View on Instagram |
6/6

From the Catalog