Dr. Brian E. Hack was born and raised in Huntingdon, a small but well-meaning town nestled in the hills of Central Pennsylvania. By all accounts a peculiar and annoyingly gregarious child, he baffled and confounded the majority of adults he encountered who were, and in many ways still are, unsure how to take him. In high school he was voted “Most Likely to be Least Likely,” the superlative that spurred him on to find various and mildly rewarding jobs bagging groceries, mowing lawns, and changing the holes on golf course greens. When he eventually ran out of places to put the holes, he decided college was where someone of his temperament belonged, and he has been studying in, or working for, colleges ever since. With little outward but much inward aplomb he bravely ventured from that tiny hamlet into the wicked world of wolves and wonderment that is Manhattan. Despite being somewhat out of sync with city life and possessing little ambition other than a few misdirected enthusiasms, he miraculously received his doctorate from The Graduate Center of the City University of New York in 2007. His dissertation, “American Acropolis: George Grey Barnard’s Monument to Democracy, 1918-1938,” examined a mammoth but uncompleted peace memorial envisioned by one of the nation’s most imaginative sculptors.  For while he cared not a whit for the bustle-and-hustle of the urban existence into which he had haphazardly thrust himself, he did develop a keen interest in sculpture—of bronze and marble monuments of people from the past  whose well-appreciated silence spoke volumes. In addition to his study of sculpture and public monuments of the late nineteenth- and early twentieth-centuries, he is interested in the impact of Darwinism and eugenics on American art, in nineteenth century stereoscopic images, and in various other forms of ephemera from this period. Since 1999 he has taught at Kingsborough Community College, where he is fueled by substantial amounts of coffee and by the desire to instill in his students a sense of purpose and an appreciation for art and ideas.

Courses

Art 47: American Art

Art 35: Modern Art I:  1880 to 1945

Art 95: Modern Architecture and the Environment

Education

Ph.D., The Graduate Center, City University of New York (2007)

Certificate in American Studies, The Graduate Center, City University of New York (2007)

B.A., Juniata College, Huntingdon, PA (1994)

College Teaching

 

Kingsborough Community College (1999-Present)

 

Selected Publications and/or Other Resources

 

• “Weakness is a Crime: Captain America and the Eugenic Ideal in Early Twentieth-Century America,” in Robert G. Weiner, Ed., Captain America and the Struggle of the Superhero, McFarland & Co. [2009]
  

• Maidens, Moons and Monsters: The Imagined Worlds of Alex Niño [Exhibition Catalogue], Art Gallery of Kingsborough Community College, CUNY (2009)
  
  
• Seeing Double: The Art of the Stereoview in Nineteenth-Century America [Exhibition Catalogue], Art Gallery of Kingsborough Community College, CUNY (2008)
  
  
• “The Souls of Sons and Lovers: George Grey Barnard’s Monument to Democracy and Other Casualties of War,” Published proceedings from the conference, Constructions of Death, Mourning and Memory Conference, October 2006.
  
  
• “Andrew Wilton and Tim Barringer’s American Sublime: Landscape Painting in the United States, 1820-1880” [Book Review].  PART (online journal of the Graduate Center of the City University of New York).
  
  
•  “Public Sculpture in New York State;” “Mary Nimmo Moran;”“John Quincy Adams Ward;” Entries, Encyclopedia of New York State, Syracuse University Press, 2005.
  
  
• “Spartan Desires: Eugenics and the Sculpture Program of the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition”, PART (online journal of the Graduate Center of the City University of New York).
  

 

Events and/or Key Dates

 2009  
Curator, “Maidens, Moons and Monsters: The Imagined Worlds of Alex Niño,”
Art Gallery of Kingsborough Community College, CUNY (2009) 

2008
Curator, “Seeing Double: The Art of the Stereoview in Nineteenth-Century America,”
Art Gallery of Kingsborough Community College, CUNY (2008)

 

Research Interests

American Sculpture and Public Monuments

The impact of Darwinism and Eugenics on American Art

George Grey Barnard (1863-1938), American Sculptor

Personal Interests

Rockabilly; Blues; Hillbilly Music and their variants

Playing Guitar 30+ years

Photography; Drawing; Writing