Nora Heimann is an art historian with a specialization in modern and contemporary art and critical theory at the intersection of culture, religion, identity, and politics. She trained at Harvard University (AB), Williams College Graduate Program in the History of Art (MA), the Université de Paris, and the CUNY Graduate Center (PhD). A tenured professor of art history at the Catholic University of America (currently on leave), she is also an independent curator, and museum educator with a focus on accessibility.
She has presented her research at national and international fora, including the National Gallery of Art (Washington, DC); the Musée de l’Armée (Paris), the Musée du Louvre (Paris), and the Fashion Institute of America (New York City). Her publications include two books: Joan of Arc in French Art and Culture (1700-1855) (Ashgate Press, 2005), and (with L. Coyle), Joan of Arc: Her Image in France and America (Giles, 2006); as well as numerous chapters and articles, including “Spirits, Specters, Saints in the Art of the Great War,” in Artistic Expressions and the Great War: A Hundred Years On (Peter Lang Publishing, 2021); “Spinner or Saint: Context and Meaning in Gauguin’s First Fresco,” in Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide: A Journal of Nineteenth-Century, vol. 11, Issue 2, Summer 2012; and “The Princess and the Maid of Orléans,” in Joan of Arc and Spirituality (Palgrave, 2003). Her current book projects are centered on the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises and the Meditative Gaze.
While at the ISM and YDS, Heimann hopes expand her focus to include theological and pastoral training as tools for deepening her lifelong interest in the intersection of art and faith.