Research Areas

Dr. Cereceda's research has since focused on collection management and conservation. A combination of personal passion and research opportunities have allowed her to apply these skills to costume, textiles, and decorative arts’ collections. She is currently immersed in the development of a curatorial and research project looking at pre-1920’s headgear, researching the figure of Isabel Bader as a costume collector, and cataloguing the collection of heritage and artistic objects at Herstmonceux Castle, home to Bader College.

Dr. Cereceda began lecturing at Bader College in 2009. Since 2015 she is also responsible for its Experiential Learning program. In this capacity she joined the transdisciplinary project Environments of Change as co-investigator in 2021, with the Making sense of Experiential Learning. Strategies to support students in the identification of learning skills research project, where she is identifying models for students’ self-awareness of learning and developing strategies to enhance this process. Environment of Change is a collaborative research project led by Professor Steven Bednarski (University of Waterloo, Canada) and supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).

Biography

Dr. Cereceda received her Licentiate (BA+MA) degree in Art History from Universidad de Oviedo (Spain) in 2001, after which she began working in the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Santander and in the Juan Silio Art Gallery (Spain). During this period, she specialised in Contemporary Art, worked with international contemporary artists such as Norman Bechtold, Joan Fontcuberta, Michael Najjar, Juan Ugalde or Abraham Lacalle, trained in Art Valuation and curated temporary exhibitions for public and private institutions. Her experience with artist and collection management was key when she returned to Universidad de Oviedo in 2010 for her PhD, where she researched the figure of contemporary landscape painter Eduardo Sanz Fraile (1928-2013) and created the Catalogue raisonné of his work. Dr. Cereceda was awarded her doctoral degree in 2015 with Cum Laude and International Honours.

Courses taught

ARTH116 Art & Architecture in Britain from the Classical Period to c.1700 is a chronological survey of painting, sculpture, and architecture in western culture, tracing the development of the classical world and the medieval period, through the Renaissance and the Baroque. Taught at Bader College.

ARTH117 Art and Architecture c.1700 to the Present Day begins with 18^th Century art in England and France and continues with Neo-Classical art and Romanticism in Revolutionary France throughout Europe, with the English Pre-Raphaelites and the French Impressionists. In the second half of the term abstract art is debated from 20^th Century Modernism to the Conceptual Art of the present day. Taught at Bader College.

ARTH293 Image/Self explores some of the many ways in which representations of real human beings have played a role in art and culture throughout recorded history and in diverse societies around the world. While charting the history of portraiture, we discuss how portraits have helped to express ideals of personal and collective identity and shape ideas about private and public identity that continue to affect art and society today. Taught at Bader College.

Stream: Treatment
Specialization: Paintings
Areas of interest: Conservation Ethics; Technical Art Analysis; Reverse Glass Paintings

Travis Zuidema graduated from the University of South Carolina in 2018 with a BS in Chemistry and a double major in Art History.  His degree studies focused mainly on organic and analytical chemistry.  His studies in art history concentrated on Northern Renaissance and Baroque art, as well as Modern artists fostered by Peggy Guggenheim.  Upon graduation, Travis began an internship at a private conservation studio in Columbia, SC. Under the direction of Jennifer Bullock and Massimiliano Bernasconi, Travis received hands-on experience treating paintings and paper objects.  Travis served as the South Carolina Regional Co-liaison in the Emerging Conservation Professionals Network before moving to Kingston.

Stream: Treatment
Specialization: Paper
Areas of interest: Illuminated manuscripts, works on parchment, egg tempera, bookbinding and the history and technology of papermaking in the Middle East.

John Habib graduated from Queen’s University in 2022 with a B.Sc. (honours) in chemistry. His undergraduate thesis focused on genomic mining for thermophilic enzymes that can degrade polyethylene terephthalate, a common polluting plastic. He interned at the St. Shenouda the Archimandrite Coptic Society where he worked on transcribing the texts of medieval Coptic manuscripts and attended a course on the Coptic language. John also held the position of collections assistant at Bradley Museum in Mississauga, Ontario, where he completed inventory, rehoused artifacts, wrote condition reports and visually documented a variety of objects including books, posters, textiles, figurines, and historic farming equipment. He was also responsible for preventive conservation measures such as monitoring the temperature and relative humidity in the storage areas.

Stream: Treatment
Specialization: Paintings
Areas of Interest: Italian and Spanish early modern paintings, technical art analysis and decolonizing art perspectives within the conservation field.

Doris Fuller Ruiz graduated with high distinction from the University of British Columbia (UBC) with an Honours BA in Art History in 2022. Her thesis focused on analyzing the interconnection of artworks made with different materials from Sicily, Spain and North Africa. During her studies, she gained pre-program experience at private conservation lab Fraser Spafford-Ricci where she was introduced to paintings conservation and assisted conservators with various treatments. In 2022, she published a paper in the Undergraduate Journal of Art History and Visual Culture at UBC on colonial architecture from Southern Mexico and how it was influenced by local indigenous culture. This past summer she interned at the National Gallery of Canada working on Canadian and European paintings in the collection.

Stream: Treatment
Specialization: Paper
Areas of interest: historical bookbinding structures, hand papermaking, pulp infills, artists’ books. 

Maia holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Distinction from Concordia University (2019) in printmaking, painting, and drawing. Her professional experience as a bookbinder and master papermaker contributed to her seeing each element in the making of books as a repository of technical know-how and cultural history. She has worked as a Conservation Technician at the Canadian Centre for Architecture, where she also completed a pre-program conservation internship. Most recently, Maia interned at the Library of Parliament’s bindery and conservation lab.
Maia has curated an exhibition of artists’ books for the Art Matters festival (2018) and was Programming Director and Coordinator of the Volume Art Book Fair in Montreal (2020). She has led bookbinding and papermaking workshops, and has presented at academic conferences, art festivals, and art book fairs. Her personal art practice has been recognized by publication grants, artists’ residencies, research residencies, and the Canada Council for the Arts. 

Stream: Treatment
Specialization: Paper
Areas of interest: illuminated manuscripts, relief printmaking, book conservation, archival documents

Frances Opferman graduated from Purdue University in 2021 with a BA in Art History and minors in Anthropology and Studio Art. During her studies, she interned with Purdue Galleries, assisting with collections management, exhibition preparation, and relocating the entire collection(!) to a new storage space. Frances spent the summer of 2019 in Florence, studying Renaissance art history and secretly touching the walls of cathedrals. Upon completion of her undergraduate degree, Frances was a pre-program intern at the Indiana State Library, treating marriage certificates from the early 1900s, photographs, Civil War-era broadsides, and making oodles of boxes. Frances also worked at an Indianapolis custom frame shop, mounting and framing works of art ranging from family photos to Tigger erotica to Renoir reproductions to Hermès scarves. She also worked at a small bindery repairing books. In her spare time, Frances enjoys powerlifting.