New chairs join CVAD on Aug. 2, 2021! Coming from Tennessee, Ohio and Indiana are Nicole Foran, Department of Studio Art, Manisha Sharma, Department of Art Education, and Heidi Strobel, Department of Art History.

“I’m thrilled to welcome Drs. Sharma and Strobel and Ms. Foran to the CVAD leadership team at this important moment when we are all returning to a full university experience," said Dean Karen Hutzel. "Each brings a wealth of leadership experiences and reputations as scholars and artists in their fields of study and practice. They are joining an existing leadership team and community of people who are generously supportive and have a wealth of knowledge and experience. I especially want to thank former-Dean Greg Watts, Associate Deans Dr. Denise Amy Baxter and Mr. Eric Ligon for leading as interim-chairs, overseeing the search committees and planning for their integration into the CVAD community.”

Our new CVAD department chairs will serve as both faculty members and academic administrators providing leadership and management to the department consistent with the university mission and goals. Chairs at UNT also engage in teaching and scholarship as determined by the overall distribution of their workload. Each department chair will serve on the UNT Chair Academy and meet monthly with chairs from across campus to explore contemporary issues and best practices through engagement and collaborative dialogue. 

About our new department chairs

Nicole Foran

Nicole Foran holds an M.F.A. (2008) in Studio Art from the University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio, and a B.F.A. (2005) from the University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada.

Foran is a mixed media artist whose work investigates memory, moral reasoning and identity. Foran’s artwork is exhibited internationally, and she was recently featured in solo exhibitions at the Edward Whitney Center in Sheridan, Wyo., Holy Family University in Philadelphia, and at the Art Reach of Mid Michigan, City of Mount Pleasant, Mich. She has upcoming solo exhibitions at the Fitton Center, Hamilton, Ohio, and at the University of Mobile, Mobile, Ala. Her work also will be presented in a small group exhibition at the James May Gallery in Milwaukee, Wis. Foran comes to UNT from Middle Tennessee State University, Murfreesboro, Tenn., where she served as the chair of the Department of Art and Design.

Manisha Sharma

Manisha Sharma holds a Ph.D. (2015) and M.A. (2003) in art education, from The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, and the Art Institute of Chicago, and a B.F.A. (1998) in Photography from the Delhi College of Art, Delhi, India. She is a Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society member.

Sharma's research examines how perceptions of culture and community are formed, internalized, and acted out within communities, through the production and consumption of art and visual culture artifacts. Specifically, her research and teaching (1) unpack the role of identity in the teaching of art, (2) strategize community-oriented arts programming, and (3) explore decolonizing art education praxis. Her research has been disseminated at international conferences, and in several scholarly journals and books. She has co-edited the Routledge publication Makers, Crafters, Educators: Working for Social Change (2018) and is a member of the 2020-21 Review Board of The Journal of Social Theory in Art Education, the official journal of the Caucus of Social Theory in Art Education, an issues group of the National Art Education Association. 

She has lived and worked in India, Japan, Mexico, and the U.S. and taught art, design, and photography in K-12 schools in Japan, Mexico, and the U.S., as well as in community and museum settings, and in higher education at the University of Arizona, Tucson, Ariz. 

Heidi A. Strobel

Heidi Strobel holds a Ph.D. (2000) and M.A. in art history from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and a B.A. in European history from Kalamazoo College, Kalamazoo, Mich. She is a specialist in 18th-century gender and material culture and co-editor of Materializing Gender in 18th-century Europe (2016, with Jennifer Germann) and the author of The Artistic Matronage of Queen Charlotte (1744-1818): How a Queen Promoted Both Art and Female Artists in English Society (2011).

In the course of her research, Strobel has gained expertise in the field of textile studies, a key part of her upcoming book on Leicester textile artist Mary Linwood (1755-1845). The Art of Mary Linwood: Embroidery, Installation, and the Popular Picturesque will be the first book on Linwood and a catalog of her work, which is scheduled to be published by Bloomsbury in late 2021 as part of the publisher's Material Culture of Art and Design series. Strobel's research on Linwood has been generously supported by recent grants from the Yale Center for British Art, the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, the American Philosophical Society, the Pasold Textile Research Fund Grant, and the University of Evansville. She is an active member of the American Society for 18th-Century Studies, Historians of 18th-Century Art and Architecture, the Textile Society of America, and the American Alliance of Museums.

At the University of Evansville, Evansville, Ind., Strobel taught art history in the Department of Archaeology and Art History and served as associate dean of the William L. Ridgway College of Arts and Sciences since 2015. She also is the curator of the Peters-Margedant House, a Usonian home that was built by Indiana native William Wesley Peters, chief engineer and apprentice to Frank Lloyd Wright. As the curator, she helped raise $225,000 for the physical move of this house to campus and recently acquired three grants from Indiana Landmarks and the Evansville Preservation Alliance for the upkeep and maintenance of this historical home.