Lindsay S. Cook (she/her/hers) is an architectural historian, medievalist, digital humanist, translator, and digital preservation advocate. A specialist in medieval European architecture, Dr. Cook’s current research addresses architectural and artistic responses to the Gothic cathedral Notre-Dame of Paris and medievalism in African American architecture.
Notre-Dame Cathedral: Nine Centuries of History, her English translation of the French-language monograph co-authored by Dany Sandron and Andrew Tallon, was published by Penn State University Press in 2020, and her article “Technology to Freeze Time at Lassus and Viollet-le-Duc’s Notre-Dame of Paris” recently appeared in a special issue of the critical historic preservation journal Future Anterior. Forthcoming peer-reviewed publications shed light on medieval practices of architectural citation and architectural portraiture and representations of the working class in the context of cathedrals and parish churches in medieval France.
Deeply committed to the digital humanities, Dr. Cook has contributed to the projects Mapping Gothic, Life of a Cathedral: Notre-Dame of Amiens, and Musiconis, and she chairs the Digital Resources Committee of the International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA).
She is a board member of the scholarly association Scientifiques de Notre-Dame, a member of the advisory board of the non-profit educational organization Handshouse Studio, and editor of The Notre-Dame Translation Project, which makes reliable information about the history, conservation, and restoration following the catastrophic 2019 fire of the cathedral of Paris accessible to students and the general public.
Dr. Cook teaches upper-level courses about the architectural history of the medieval world, as well as broader architectural history surveys.
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Education
- PhD, MPhil, and MA in Art History from Columbia University
- BA in Art History and French & Francophone Studies from Vassar College
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Courses Taught
ARTH 201; ARTH 202; ARTH 412
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Publications + Presentations
Select Publications
- Translator (from French), Barbara Franzé, “The Façade of Saint-Gilles-du-Gard: The Visual Strategies of a Political Agenda,” Gesta 61, no. 1 (Spring 2022): 1-26.
- “Musical Imagery in the Global Middle Ages,” Smarthistory, September 15, 2020.
- “Technology to Freeze Time at Lassus and Viollet-le-Duc’s Notre-Dame of Paris,” Future Anterior 17, no. 1 (Summer 2020): 46-59.
- Translator (from French), Dany Sandron and Andrew Tallon, Notre Dame Cathedral: Nine Centuries of History (University Park: Penn State University Press, 2020).
- “Religious Freedom and Architectural Ambition at Vassar College, 1945-54,” in Modernism and American Mid-20th Century Sacred Architecture, ed. Anat Geva (New York and London: Routledge, 2019), pp. 31-50.
Select Presentations
- “Reimagining Notre-Dame,” Toronto Public Library, May 2022.
- “A Clean Slate: Iconoclasm and the Image of Notre-Dame of Paris,” Architecture and Iconoclasm, Society of Architectural Historians Annual International Conference, Pittsburgh, PA, April 2022
- “A Harlem Middle Ages,” ICMA Sponsored Session, College Art Association Annual Conference, February 2022
- “Notre-Dame of Paris Through Time,” Notre-Dame de Paris Truss Project, School of Architecture and Planning, Catholic University of America, June 2021
- “Notre-Dame of Paris: In the Light of the Fire,” Sheppy Dog Fund Lecture, Flint Institute of Arts, June 2021
- “The Image of Notre-Dame of Paris,” AVISTA Sponsored Session, International Congress on Medieval Studies, May 2021
- “A Lacelike Fortress: Tandy & Foster Design a Permanent Home in Harlem for St. Philip’s Church,” College Art Association Annual Conference, February 2021
- “Notre-Dame of Paris: Past and Present,” ICMA Friends Lecture, presented with Dany Sandron, International Center of Medieval Art, February 2021
- “Rebuilding Notre-Dame,” Howard E. Wooden Lecture, Wichita Art Museum, October 2020
- “The Ethics of Reconstruction: The Case of Notre-Dame,” Liebling Haus—The White City Center, October 2020
- Contributor, International Perspectives on Disaster Response Webinar, Association of Art Museum Curators, April 2020
- “What is (not) Classical about Gothic Architecture?” Fordham University/Institute for Classical Art and Architecture, New York, NY, October 2019
- “Restoring Notre-Dame: A Look at the Digital Scans That Could Help,” The Digital Art History Lab Lectures, The Frick Collection, New York, NY, September 2019
- “Musical Instruments of the Passion,” Maison Française d’Oxford, Oxford, UK, June 2019
- “A Prehistory of the Paris Banlieue,” Marginal Landscapes, Society of Architectural Historians Annual Conference, Providence, RI, April 2019
- “Technology to Freeze Time at Lassus and Viollet-le-Duc’s Notre-Dame of Paris,” Medieval Academy of America Annual Meeting, Atlanta, GA, March 2018
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Service + Affiliations
- Chair, Digital Resources Committee, International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA)
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Expertise
- Architecture of the Medieval World, Gothic Architecture, Medievalism in African American Art and Architecture, Medieval Musical Imagery, Medieval Architecture and Sound
Collected Works
