Dr. Alexandra Carpino
Alexandra Carpino, PhD
Professor of Art History and
Department Chair, CCS
Riles 104B
(928) 523-8801
Alexandra.Carpino@nau.edu
Background
Dr. Carpino grew up in
Amherst, Massachusetts. She attended Bryn Mawr College in the early
1980s, and received her A.B. degree in Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology
in 1986. She spent seven years at the University of Iowa pursing her
Ph.D. in Art History (it was conferred in 1993). While at Iowa, she also
had the opportunity to serve as a field researcher in connection with the
archaeological excavations at the Etruscan site of Poggio Civitate (Murlo), not
too far from Siena.
She met her husband,
Shawn R. Skabelund, at the University of Iowa (he received his MFA in Drawing
in 1990). They have two children, Adrian and Chiara Rose. As a
family, they enjoy traveling, hiking, camping, biking, cooking and art.
Research and Teaching
Interests
Dr. Carpino’s
dissertation focused on the Etruscans’ bronze mirrors, and her book, Discs
of Splendor: The Relief Mirrors of the Etruscans (Madison: The University
of Wisconsin Press, 2003), was based on this research. She is currently working on a Companion to the Etruscans with her
colleague, Dr. Sinclair Bell from Northern Illinois University (this anthology
of essays on the most current research on Etruscan art and culture will be
published by Wiley-Blackwell in 2014).
She organized a session of the Companion’s papers for the 2013 Annual
Meetings of the Archaeological Institute of America held in Seattle where she
presented her research on “The Iconography of Violence Against Women on
Engraved Etruscan Bronze Mirrors.” Dr.
Carpino’s essay on Etruscan portraiture will also be part of Routledge’s 2013
volume, The Etruscan World, edited by
Jean M. Turfa (http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415673082/). Dr. Carpino promotes awareness of Etruscan
culture through her teaching and her work with The Etruscan Foundation (www.etruscanfoundation.org). She is the Editor-in-Chief of Etruscan Studies: Journal of the
Etruscan Foundation, and delivered the Archaeological Institute of
America’s 2012/2013 Ferdinando and Sarah Cinelli Lecture in Etruscan and Italic
Archaeology at the Nashville Parthenon in February 2013.
After teaching for five
years at the University of Michigan-Dearborn, Dr. Carpino came to Flagstaff in
1998. She teaches the introductory western art surveys and upper division
courses in Greek, Etruscan and Roman art. She also organizes study abroad trips
to Italy so that her students can experience art in its original context—during
Spring Break 2007, for example, she took 18 students to Florence, Siena and
Pisa, and during the Fall of 2011, she was a Visiting Professor at the Siena
School for Liberal Arts. She taught a
course on Etruscan art and culture and served as the faculty advisor for the
NAU students in attendance. Dr. Carpino
hopes to return to Tuscany in Summer 2013 as the faculty director of an immersion
experience on “Art and Life in Tuscany.”
Dr. Carpino is also
active in the Masterpiece Art Program of Flagstaff, a community organization
which provides opportunities for elementary school children to become familiar
with the work of local, national and international artists through monthly
class visits and art projects. Most
recently, she curated an exhibition called Learning
from the Masters: Celebrating Flagstaff’s
Masterpiece Art Program, which was on display at the Coconino Center for the
Arts during March 2012. Learning from the Masters II will go on
display in March 2014.
Selected Publications and
Conference Papers/Panels
The AIA’s La Follette Lecture, Amherst,
MA, Apr. 11, 2013: “Beauty and
Violence: Matricide Myths on Etruscan
Bronze Mirrors”
The AIA Cinelli Lecture, Nashville, TN,
Feb. 5, 2013: “Etruscan Faces: From the Symbolic to the Real”
Panel Organized and Chaired: The Archaeological Institute of America’s
Annual Meetings, Seattle, 2013: “New Approaches and Insights on Etruscan Art
and Culture”
Conference Presentation at the
Archaeological Institute of America’s Annual Meetings, Seattle, Jan. 2013: “The Iconography of Violence against Women on
Engraved Etruscan Bronze Mirrors”
“Killing Klytaimnestra: Matricide Myths on Etruscan Bronze
Mirrors.” Etruscan Studies 14 (2011):
3- 37.
“Art, Etruscan.” In Oxford Bibliographies Online: Classics.
New York: Oxford University
Press, April 2011, www.oxfordbibliographiesonline.com.
“Mirrors.”
The OxfordEncyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome. New York:
Oxford University Press, 2009.
“Dueling Warriors on Two Etruscan
Bronze Mirrors from the Fifth Century B.C. E.” In New Perspectives on
Etruria and Early Rome: Papers in Honor
ofRichard D. De Puma, edited by
Sinclair Bell and Helen Nagy, 182-197.
Madison: The University of
Wisconsin Press, 2009.
Meadows
Museum, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX, 2009: Public Lecture: “Death, Decapitation and Dismemberment on
Etruscan Bronze Mirrors”
“Reflections from the Tomb: Mirrors as
Grave Goods in Hellenistic Tarquinia.” Etruscan Studies 11 (2008): 1-33.
Conference Presentation
at the College Art Association’s Annual Meetings, Dallas, 2008:
“The
Murder of Clytemnestra on Etruscan Bronze Mirrors”
Panel Organized for the
College Art Association’s Annual Meetings, Boston, 2006: “A Taste for Violence: Images of Cruelty
and Death in Etruscan Art”
Professional
Service/Awards
Editor-in-Chief, Etruscan Studies: Journal of the Etruscan Foundation
Department Chair,
2008-present
Associate Chair and Art
History Program Coordinator, 2007-2008
Assistant Chair and
Director of Student Services, 2005-2007
Publication Subvention
Grant, The Dr. M. Aylwin Cotton Foundation, Great Britain, 2002
Teaching and Learning
Effectiveness Grant, Northern Arizona University, 2000
Vice President and Grant
Writer, The Masterpiece Art Program of Flagstaff, 2008-present
Member of the
Archaeological Institute of America, the Etruscan Foundation, and the College
Art Association.
Complete Curriculum Vitae