Sara James

Sara N. James, Professor Emerita of Art History at Mary Baldwin University, combines her passion for art, architecture, and gardens with her sense of adventure and love of travel. She specializes in Italian Renaissance art with a particular passion for narrative fresco programs. However, over her 30-year teaching career, Sara has taught courses in Renaissance (Italian and Northern), Baroque, Greek, Roman, Medieval, and English art and architecture, as well as interdisciplinary honors courses. She also served as director of the Renaissance Studies Abroad Program, teaching students on site in Italy and Northern Europe. An avid gardener and garden lover, she is a certified Master Gardener and a member of the Garden Club of Virginia and the Garden Club of America. Her publications include two books: Signorelli and Fra Angelico at Orvieto: Liturgy, Poetry and a Vision of the End-time (Ashgate, 2003) and Art in England from the Saxons to the Tudors: 600-1600 (Oxbow/Casemate, 2016) and numerous chapters, articles, and reviews. Her frequent speaking engagements include the Renaissance Society of America, the College Art Association, the Chief Executives Organization, and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Sara holds a Ph.D. in Art History from the University of Virginia. She has spent three sabbaticals at the American Academy in Rome and one at the Paul Mellon Centre in London. She is a member of Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society and currently serves on the faculty of the OLLI life learning program at the University of Virginia.

Sheri Shaneyfelt

Sheri Shaneyfelt is an art historian of the Italian Renaissance and Principal Senior Lecturer in Renaissance art at Vanderbilt University, where she is also Director of Undergraduate Studies for the History of Art department. An award-winning lecturer, she also teaches courses in Northern European Renaissance and Baroque art at Vanderbilt. She earned her Ph.D. at Indiana University-Bloomington, with an M.A. from Vanderbilt, both in the History of Art, and an undergraduate B.S. in Biology from Centre College. Dr. Shaneyfelt specializes in Central Italian art, particularly that of Umbria and Tuscany. She lived and worked in Italy for long periods of time teaching for study-abroad programs in Perugia and Florence. Her research has been published in top art-historical journals, including The Art Bulletin, The Burlington Magazine, and Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte. Dr. Shaneyfelt's research and publication emphasis will continue her focus on Renaissance Umbria and painting and workshop practices in the later fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, primarily centering on Pietro Perugino and the early Raphael. She has extensive experience leading groups and teaching on site, and emphasizes the role of art and architecture in context.

Luca Zavagno

Luca Zavagno graduated from the University of Venice (2002); he obtained his Ph.D. (2007) at the University of Birmingham with a dissertation on the society, economics and politics of Byzantine cities in the early middle ages. He is Assistant Professor of Byzantine Studies in the Department of History at Bilkent University where is currently working on his third monography entitled Beyond the Periphery. The Byzantine Insular World between Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (c.a. 600–c.a. 900) (ARC-Medieval Press).

Dr. Zavagno is the author of many articles on the early Medieval and Byzantine Mediterranean, as well as two monographs: Cities in Transition: Urbanism in Byzantium Between Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (British Archaeological Reports-International Series, 2009) and Cyprus between Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. An Island in Transition (Routledge, 2017). He co-authored (with Özlem Caykent) the edited volumes Islands of Eastern Mediterranean. A History of Cross Cultural Encounters (I.B. Tauris, 2014) and People and Goods on the Move. Merchants, Networks and Communication Routes in the Medieval and Early Modern Mediterranean (IMK, 2016). 

He was also twice awarded the Dumbarton Oaks Summer Fellowship (2011 and 2016) as well as the prestigious Stanley Seeger Fellowship of the Hellenic Studies Center at Princeton University (2012).

David Guinee

David A. Guinee teaches at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, where he is the Edwin Minar Professor of Classical Studies. He coordinates the Latin program at DePauw University and teaches courses in Latin and Greek at all levels and periods, with courses ranging from Homeric Greek to Late Antique and Medieval Latin, as well as a wide range of courses in Classics in translation, including Greek and Roman Mythology, Greek and Roman Law, Roman Civilization, the Age of Augustus, and the Legacies of Constantine. From 2009 to 2012 Dave served as DePauw's Faculty Development Coordinator. He earned his BA in Classical Languages at Carleton College and his PhD in Classical Philology at the University of Michigan. Dave's research is focused on Latin poetry, particularly epic after Vergil. He has been an active participant with the Center for Hellenic Studies' Sunoikisis project, developing collaborative inter-institution courses in Greek and Latin literature, and has been a CHS Sunoikisis Fellow for Curricular Development. He has led many student study tours through Italy and has lived in Rome and Siena, where he served as a Visiting Faculty member for the AHA International Study Program. In addition to Classics, Dave enjoys flyfishing and playing bluegrass 5-string banjo.