Profile

Claire Sabitt is a graduate student studying early modern art with Professor Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann. She received a B.A. in art history with honors from the University of Iowa, and an M.A. in the history of art from the University of Oregon. Her dissertation explores the decorative scissors in the early modern world, particularly in terms of their place in princely collections, metalworking and the decorative arts, gift-giving practices, and gender. Claire’s dissertation will be the first in-depth exploration of the history of scissors, and the first to examine scissors as works of art. Her other research interests include early modern print, costume, cross-cultural artistic exchange between Europe and the Ottoman Empire, and early modern collecting practices. She has held internships at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.