Malcolm Campbell, RAAR'98 died on 27 January, 2013 at the age of 78. A memorial service will be held Saturday, 20 April at 3 pm in the Penn Museum’s Lower Egyptian Gallery.
Dr. Malcolm Campbell, faculty member in the history of art department of the School of Arts & Sciences from 1961 until his retirement in 1996, died on January 27, at his home in Portland, Maine at the age of 78.
Born on May 12, 1934, Dr. Campbell studied at Princeton University where he earned his BA (magna cum laude 1956) and MFA (1959) as well as his PhD. His 1962 dissertation in the department of art and archaeology was devoted to the baroque painter and architect Pietro da Cortona. He joined the history of art department at Penn as an instructor in 1961 and was promoted successively, attaining the rank of full professor in 1978. At the time of his retirement, he was the Class of 1965 Professor.
During his 35 years of teaching he trained more than 30 graduate students, many of whom now hold faculty and curatorial positions in leading universities and museums in the United States and Europe. In addition to serving as the department chair, Dr. Campbell was a dedicated leader of the School of Arts & Sciences, holding the positions of assistant dean and vice dean of the College and associate dean for the humanities (1985-1988). He was also interim dean for the School of Fine Arts (now School of Design) from 1994 to 1996.
Dr. Campbell was one of the leaders of the shift in art history scholarship from a singular focus on great artists to a broader consideration of cultural forces, most especially the role of patrons. The center of his research was renaissance and baroque art and architecture in Tuscany and Rome, where he studied Medici art patronage during the ducal and grand ducal eras and the making of major public works of art.
Dr. Campbell published many articles and reviews, and his Pietro da Cortona at the Pitti Palace (Princeton University Press, 1977) is one of the foundation stones of modern baroque scholarship. He served as book review editor of The Art Bulletin and was an active member of the international committee for the Pietro da Cortona exhibition which opened in 1997 in Rome, and of the organizing team for The Splendor of 18th-Century Rome exhibition in 2000 at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. He curated several exhibitions in Penn’s Arthur Ross Gallery, including The Eye of Piranesi, Views of Ancient and Modern Rome in the Late Eighteenth Century in 1988.
During his long and productive career, he received many awards and fellowships, including a Fulbright Fellowship for research in Italy, a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship.
Dr. Campbell is survived by his wife, Joan Campbell, who for nineteen years was an assistant dean in the College of General Studies (now LPS); daughter, Cathy; son, Christopher and his wife, Lisa; and son, Colin and his wife, Gail; and grandchildren, Ruby and Hart.
Memorial contributions can be sent to the John McCoubrey and Malcolm Campbell Student Travel Fund, History of Art Department, University of Pennsylvania, 3405 Woodland Walk, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6208. R
eprinted with permission from Almanac, University of Pennsylvania, Volume 59, # 23, February 26, 2013. Photo courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania.