Matthew Johnston

Matthew Johnston is an Associate Professor of Art History at Lewis & Clark College, located in Portland, OR. His research focuses on modern visual culture, particularly 19th-century print media, photography, and landscape imagery's role in shaping US expansion narratives. He explores how pre-cinematic visual strategies in print publications influenced ideological messaging before film's emergence. His work also examines intersections between 'high art' and popular media, and visual representation in sciences like geology and ethnology. Johnston teaches courses on modern European art, pre-Columbian art, and 19th-century print culture. He serves on the Maryhill Museum of Art’s board of trustees.

Education:

• PhD 2004, University of Chicago
• MA 1994, University of Chicago
• BA 1992, Yale University

Research Interests: Johnston’s scholarship centers on visual文化传播 and its socio-political impacts. He analyzes how 19th-century print media constructed narratives of national identity through landscape depictions, investigating themes like pre-Columbian cultural patrimony, archaeological nationalism, and the interplay between popular media and scientific disciplines. His work bridges art history with cultural studies, emphasizing the material and ideological layers of visual representation.

Teaching: Courses include Core 106/107 (Exploration and Discovery), Art 100 (Key Monuments in Art History), Art 303 (Realism, Photography, and Print Culture), and Art 401 (Art After 1945). These courses reflect his expertise in visual culture’s historical and theoretical dimensions.

Labs/Teams: Collaborates with institutions like the Maryhill Museum of Art to contextualize historical visual practices within contemporary cultural frameworks.