These fellowships enhance the educational experiences provided by academic course work and teaching assistantships at the university, allowing students to extend their range of academic specializations and expertise, and to augment research skills by direct contact with objects in the collections.
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The deadline for the 2025–2026 Graduate Museum Fellowship application has passed. Please check back here for the next cycle.
Academic Year 2025–2026 Graduate Museum Fellowships
Curatorial: George Stubbs
Supervised by Lucinda Lax, Curator of Paintings and Sculpture
Full academic year
The department of Paintings and Sculpture at the Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) seeks to appoint a Graduate Museum Fellow (GMF) for the academic year to assist in the development of a future exhibition focused on the work of the eighteenth-century painter, engraver, and anatomist George Stubbs (1724–1806).
The YCBA has particularly rich holdings of Stubbs’ work: major paintings together with important examples of his engraved work, smaller-scale pieces on copper and panel, and drawn studies showing his skill in rendering human and animal anatomy. The successful candidate will work with curatorial staff to undertake detailed research on these objects, as well as selected works in other public and private collections, with the aim of helping to develop a representative exhibition checklist. In addition, they will undertake wider historical and contextual research that will inform the exhibition’s overall narrative framework and its key themes. Particular areas of interest include Stubbs’s place in the Enlightenment world; his personal and professional networks; and the ways his practice and oeuvre can illuminate shifting concepts of the natural environment and ecology at a time of major developments in the study of animal anatomy, zoology, and natural history.
The fellowship provides an excellent opportunity to work with a curatorial team in the early stages of developing a major exhibition project and to contribute to its formation. The GMF will also gain hands-on experience working directly with objects spanning a range of media in the YCBA’s collection and may have the opportunity to collaborate with conservators in the technical examination of YCBA collections material. The successful candidate will have excellent research skills, familiarity with working directly with primary source and archival materials, and interest in British art history and the development of scientific thought and knowledge.
Curatorial: Michel Jean Cazabon and the Landscapes of Trinidad
Supervised by Laurel Peterson, Assistant Curator of Prints and Drawings
Full academic year
The department of Prints and Drawings at the Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) seeks to appoint a Graduate Museum Fellow (GMF) for the academic year to assist in the development of a future exhibition focused on the artist Michel Jean Cazabon (1813–1888).
One of Trinidad’s most acclaimed artists, Cazabon spent much of his career capturing the island’s verdant scenery and portraying his compatriots. Cazabon was born in Trinidad to free Black immigrants from Martinique. His parents had moved to Trinidad after the Cedula of Population in 1783, when the Spanish Crown offered grants of land to those willing populate the island. The eventual sale of his mother’s family’s profitable sugar plantation enabled the young Cazabon to be educated in England. In 1837, he moved to Paris to train as an artist, and would live there on and off until 1852, exhibiting his work regularly. He then returned to the Caribbean, continuing to hone his artistic practice inspired by his surroundings. Best known as a landscape painter, Cazabon also worked as a portraitist and art teacher and remains celebrated in Trinidad today.
The successful candidate will work with curatorial staff to research and catalog objects and to develop the exhibition checklist, layout, and themes. Throughout the project, the GMF will gain valuable subject knowledge of nineteenth-century landscape drawing and of art in the Caribbean; have the opportunity to collaborate with conservators in the technical examination of YCBA collections material; contribute to the exhibition and catalogue framework; and be guided in the research and writing of object labels and catalogue entries. The fellowship provides an excellent opportunity to work with a curatorial team in the early stages of exhibition research and development and to contribute to the project’s formation while also gaining hands-on experience working directly with works of art. The successful candidate will have a strong interest in the art, history, and/or literature of the Caribbean in the nineteenth century.
Collections Information Access: Provenance Research
Supervised by Emmanuelle Delmas-Glass, Head of Collections Information Access
Full academic year
The department of Collections Information Access at the Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) seeks to appoint a Graduate Museum Fellow (GMF) for the academic year to contribute to the provenance research campaign currently underway at the museum.
Provenance research is a growing field, as museums, galleries, and auction houses work to ensure that items were and are acquired legally and ethically, support the restitution of looted or stolen objects, and enhance transparency and trust with the public. The burgeoning role of provenance curators also deepens our understanding of cultural heritage and fosters responsible stewardship of collections. The successful candidate will receive training in provenance research and will work directly with paintings in the YCBA collection with a primary focus on the work of John Constable (1776–1837) and Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851).
The GMF will work independently and in consultation with YCBA curators and cataloguers, and their contributions will be published on the YCBA’s online collections catalogue to ensure that this critical information is publicly available. In addition to honing their research skills, the successful candidate will gain valuable knowledge of how provenance research is determined, verified, and applied in the museum context. The GMF will also develop knowledge of the standards related to writing provenance entries; the research tasks of curators, museum assistants, and cataloguers; the ethical and legal nuances of assessing ownership; and the YCBA’s collection information management infrastructure.
The successful candidate will have practical research skills and strong organizational, communication, and collaboration skills. In addition, experience in historical or art historical research, tools, and methodology is preferred but not required.
Eligibility
Graduate Museum Fellows at the Yale Center for British Art and the Yale University Art Gallery are open to PhD candidates in all disciplines. The number of fellowships offered may vary each year. Graduate Museum Fellows are designed to provide Yale University doctoral students, in their second through sixth year, the opportunity to work as part of an intellectual team on a major scholarly project at one of the museums.
Contact the Research department at
ycba.research@yale.edu | +1 203 432 2824