Rachel Kline

Rachel Kline specializes in the art and culture of the Italian Renaissance. Prior to attending BU, Rachel earned a dual B.A. in the history of art and anthropology with a minor in Italian from Haverford College. Rachel’s primary area of research is the female nude and its relationship to Renaissance ideologies of gender, sexuality, and the body. Rachel is especially interested in the secular domestic arts of fifteenth-century Italy and the role of the female viewer in determining their meaning.

Rachel’s dissertation, entitled “Undressing the Renaissance Woman: The Female Nude in Fifteenth-Century Italy,” centers female viewership by exploring representations of the female nude inside marriage chests and on objects of domestic material culture from Florence to Venice. Originally from New Jersey, Rachel has held internships in the curatorial department of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the public programs/summer camp department of the Penn Museum.

Dissertation in Progress:
“Undressing the Renaissance Woman: The Female Nude in Fifteenth-Century Italy”

M.A. Paper:
“Bravura in Blue: Ultramarine in the Works of Artemisia Gentileschi”

Research Interests:

• Fourteenth and Fifteenth Century Italian Renaissance
• Gender, Sexuality, and the Nude
• Artistic Exchange between Italy and Northern Europe

2024-2025:
Guest Lecture Series Co-Coordinator, Graduate Student History of Art & Architecture Association
Senior Editor, SEQUITUR

2022-2023:
Symposium co-Coordinator, Graduate Student History of Art & Architecture Association

2020-2021:
Social co-Coordinator, Graduate Student History of Art & Architecture Association