Individual Scholar Page

Personal Info

Photo

About Me

Laura A. Macaluso is a cultural heritage professional and grant writer specializing in public art and public history projects. Using museums, monuments, murals, and material culture, her work examines, centers and celebrates the value of art, culture, and history to community and humanity.

Recent Publications

LECTURER

“George Washington’s Mount Vernon” and “George Washington’s Places: Touring Alexandria and South Fairfax County,”  Smithsonian Associates, 2022

DIGITAL PROJECTS

“Revolutionary Houses, Revolutionary Narratives” with NCPH Working Group members, 2021-2027

“Street Scene: CETA Murals, New Haven and the Late 1970s,” co-curated with the Public Art Archive, 2022

“Objectify Benedict Arnold, Making Memory of America’s Traitor”, 2023

“William Lanson History Project” with Site Projects, Inc., http://siteprojects.org/lanson, 2020-2021

BOOKS

Book, Hartford’s Public Art, forthcoming 2023.

Book, A History Lover’s Guide to Alexandria and South Fairfax County, The History Press, 2022. 

Book, Historic Virginia: A Tour of More than 75 of the State’s National Landmarks, Globe Pequot Press, 2019.

Book, A Guide to Thomas Jefferson’s Virginia, The History Press, 2018. 

Book, The Public Artscape of New Haven: Themes in the Creation of a City Image, McFarland Publishing, 2018. 

EDITOR

Co-Editor, Nineteenth Century, the Journal of the Victorian Society in America, focus on monuments, memorials, and sculpture of the long nineteenth century (1785-1917). Also includes authoring essay on sculptor Paul Wayland Bartlett and Lafayette on Horseback Monument, Fall 2019.

Book Editor, Monument Culture: International Perspectives on the Future of Monuments in a Changing World, American Association for State and Local History/Rowman & Littlefield, 2019. 

ESSAYS

Essay, “Public History Play-Acting After All, Comments on a Confederate Battle Flag Exhibit in Virginia,” Special Issue on Public History, History, the Journal of the Historical Association, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1468-229X.13267,  February 2022.

Entry, “Washington Monument” for the Digital Encyclopedia of George Washington, December 2021 https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/washington-monument/

Essay, “Benedict Arnold’s House: The Making and Unmaking of an American,” Commonplace, http://commonplace.online/article/benedict-arnolds-house/, Fall 2021.

Opinion, “The Best Books on Monuments in the Era of Controversies and Removals,” Shepherd Books https://shepherd.com/best-books/monuments-in-the-era-of-controversies-and-removal

Blog Post, “Commemorative Intersections of Carceral History in Lorton, Virginia,” History@Work, National Council on Public Public History, https://ncph.org/history-at-work/commemorative-intersections-of-carceral-history-in-lorton-virginia/, Fall 2021.

Opinion, “Rethinking the Lotus Bowl at Auction,” The Arts Paper, https://www.newhavenarts.org/arts-paper/articles/rethinking-the-lotus-bowl-at-auction, April 2021.

Essay, “A Digital Reading of the Sengbe Pieh Portrait in the Covid-19 Era” The Muslim World Journal, Summer 2020.

Essay, “The Spirit of 1776/1917: Town and Gown Go to War,” Bulletin of the Auckland Museum (New Zealand), Fall 2020.

Essay, “Public Art Inside & Outside the Museum” (The Evolution of a Cultural Practice in Hartford, Connecticut) The State of Museums: Voices from the Field, MuseumsEtc Ltd., 2018. 

 

 

 

 

Media Coverage

Twitter

@MonumentCulture

Country Focus

United States

Expertise by Geography

United States

Expertise by Chronology

4, 5, 8

Expertise by Topic

American Revolution, Art & Architectural History, Book History, Local & Regional, Material Culture, Museums, Public History, World War I