Sarah Russell

Sarah studies the art, literature, and intellectual culture of early modern Spain. She earned a B.A. in Art History and Spanish from the University of Virginia, where her Distinguished Majors Program thesis, “Velázquez and the Demystification of Myth” won the Lindner Center Prize for the Best Undergraduate Thesis in Art History. Before coming to Columbia, she taught English in Spain with a Fulbright grant. Sarah was a student coordinator for the New York Renaissance Consortium and the Bettman Lecture Series (2020–2022), taught Art Humanities as a GSAS Teaching Fellow (2022–2023), and currently works as an advisor in the Office for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships. Supported by a Fulbright Award and based at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid (2024–2025), she is writing a dissertation on the concepts of deception and undeception in early modern Spanish painting.