Sarah Horowitz

Sarah Horowitz is a PhD candidate in the history of art and architecture at Boston University specializing in modern architecture. Her dissertation research focuses on the intertwined art, architectural, and urban histories of postwar American performing arts centers. By examining performing arts center sites, buildings, and associated archival collections across regional spheres in North America, Sarah’s dissertation advances scholarship on how these building projects both contributed to metropolitan growth, by expanding downtown cultural districts, and also heightened class and social divisions during the mid-20th century. Considering five case studies—Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, New York, Los Angeles Music Center, Jesse H. Jones Hall for the Performing Arts, Houston, TX, Milwaukee Center for the Performing Arts, and the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Washington, DC—her project explores how variations in the architectural and urban form of these centers reflect different metropolitan aims and challenges over the course of more than a decade.

Prior to pursuing her doctoral studies, she was the curatorial assistant at the Picker Art Gallery and the Longyear Museum of Anthropology at Colgate University where she organized a number of permanent collection and special exhibitions. She has also held curatorial and collections research positions at the MIT Museum, Yale University Art Gallery, and the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art. Sarah has taught art, architectural history, and writing courses at Boston University, the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and Wellesley College. She previously served as the Editorial Assistant for the Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians from 2020 until 2023. An essay adapted from her dissertation chapter on the architectural history and development of the Jones Hall for the Performing Arts in Houston, Texas will be included in the forthcoming edited volume, Modernism Below the Mason-Dixon Line: Architecture in the American South, 1920s–1980s (University of Virginia Press, 2026). Sarah received her M.A. in Art History from the University of Massachusetts–Amherst and B.A. in Art History and Museum Studies from Marlboro College.

Dissertation in Progress:
“Designing Postwar American Performing Arts Centers, 1955-1971”

2023-2024:
Travel Grant Committee Member, Graduate Student History of Art & Architecture Association

2021-2022: Junior Editor; SEQUITUR

2019- 2020: Guest Scholar Lecture Series Coordinator, Graduate Student History of Art & Architecture Association

Research Interests:

• Modern Architecture
• Postwar American Urban Design
• 20th Century Art