Profile
Dr. Anastasia Aukeman is an art historian and curator living and working in New York City. Her recent book, Welcome to Painterland: Bruce Conner and the Rat Bastard Protective Association (University of California Press, 2016) is the first study devoted to the Rat Bastard Protective Association, a community of artists who lived and worked together in and around a building they dubbed Painterland in San Francisco. Her next book, also with University of California Press, continues exploring artistic collaborations and the role of the arts in social change in the Bay Area and is due out in 2022.
Aukeman teaches art history at Parsons School of Design and has curated numerous exhibitions, most recently two shows on the artists of the Rat Bastard Protective Association, one in Los Angeles (The Landing, Oct 1, 2016-Jan 7, 2017) and another in New York (Susan Inglett Gallery, April 27-June 3, 2017). She has written articles and reviews for Art in America, Art on Paper, ARTnews, and Elephant, among other publications. She earned her Ph.D. at the Graduate Center, City University New York.
Degrees Held
Ph.D., Art History, Graduate School and University Center, City University New York.
M.A., Art History, Queens College, City University, New York.
B.A., English Literature, Calvin College, Grand Rapids, MI.
Recent Publications
Anastasia Aukeman, Welcome to Painterland: Bruce Conner and the Rat Bastard Protective Association (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2016).
Anastasia Aukeman, "It's a Rat Trip, Baby," Elephant, no. 29 (Winter 2017).
"Bruce Conner and the Making of Community," University of California Press Author’s Blog, August 11, 2016 [http://www.ucpress.edu/blog/22062/bruce-conner-and-the-making-of-a-community/]. Anastasia Aukeman, “Mythology, Politics, Art: Lydia Venieri,” in Lydia Venieri:Theogeny (New York: Charta Books, D.A.P. / Distributed Art Publishers, Inc., 2010): 138-145. “Margarita Cabrera at Sara Meltzer Gallery,” Art in America, Jan. 2007, 140. “Mona Hatoum at Alexander and Bonin Gallery,” Art in America, March 2006, 146-7. “Sam Durant at Paula Cooper Gallery,” Art in America, Dec. 2005, 139 (illus.). “Richard Serra: Line Drawings,” Art on Paper, Jan.-Feb. 2003, 75 (illus.). “Weegee’s Trick Photography,” Art on Paper, April 2003, 60 (illus.). “About Paper: Amanda Guest, Maureen McQuillan, and Kate Teale,” Art on Paper, Nov.-Dec. 2002, 61-62 (illus.).
Performances and Appearances
Panelist, “Creative Art Book Promotion and How to Find Audiences that Matter,” College Art Association Annual Conference, Los Angeles, February 23, 2018 (upcoming).
Moderator, “In Conversation with Jean Conner and Franklin Williams,” Karma Gallery, New York, Nov. 12, 2017.
Guest Speaker, “Revisiting the Summer of Love, Rethinking the Counterculture,” Northwestern University and the California Historical Society, San Francisco, July 29, 2017.
“Anastasia Aukeman with New Yorker fiction editor Deborah Treisman, moderated by Paul Yamazaki” at City Lights Bookstore, San Francisco, June 29, 2017.
Guest Speaker, “Rat Bastard Protective Association” at the di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art (organized by Amy Owen), Napa, March 25, 2017.
Featured Speaker, Bruce Conner: It’s All True symposium at The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (organized by Frank Smigiel), October 28, 2016.
Featured Speaker, Bruce Conner: It’s All True symposium at The Museum of Modern Art (organized by Stuart Comer and Laura Hoptman), Sept 23, 2016.
“Gallery Talk: Anastasia Aukeman on Bernd & Hilla Becher,” at Dia: Beacon, Aug. 10, 2013.
Research Interests
Post-WWII art of the United States, artistic collaborations, the role of the arts in social change; performance art, dance.
Awards And Honors
Meiss / Mellon Author Book Award 2015
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
Wyeth Foundation for American Art Publication Grant 2015
Wyeth Foundation for American Art
Luce/ACLS Dissertation Fellowship in American Art, 2011/2012
The Luce Foundation/American Council of Learned Societies
University Fellowship in Art History, 2011/2012
Graduate School and University Center, City University New York
Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Curatorial Fellowship, 2007/2008
The Museum of Modern Art, New York