Norman Bryson


William Norman Bryson is an Anglo American art historian who authored several major works that were particularly influential in the 1980s and 1990s. He graduated with a Ph.D from Cambridge University in 1977, and subsequently worked as a professor at King's College until 1988, when he moved to Rochester, NY. There, he worked for two years at the University of Rochester before moving to Harvard University in 1990. In a shift from that earlier period, he now is faculty at University of California, San Diego, and primarily writes about contemporary art, such as Sharon Lockhart. His career is characterized by a move to a more literary theory-based approach to art history, including Word and Image: French Painting of the Ancien Régime, Vision and Painting: The Logic of the Gaze, and Tradition and Desire: From David to Delacroix. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1997.

Works

Word and Image: French Painting in the Ancien Regime
Vision and Painting: The Logic of the Gaze
Tradition and Desire: From David to Delacroix
The Logic of the Gaze
Visual Theory: Painting and Interpretation
Looking at the Overlooked: Four Essays on Still Life Painting
In Medusa's Gaze: Still Life Paintings From Upstate New York Museums
Visual Culture: Images and Interpretations
Inside/ Out: New Chinese Art