Marissa Vigneault

College of the Arts

Art and Design

Marissa Vigneault’s research focuses on the role of performance and performativity in modern and contemporary art, with particular attention on the construction of identity in visual culture (fashion, burlesque, and films).

Dr. Vigneault’s current research examines pioneering feminist artist Hannah Wilke (1940-1993), whose body-oriented performances and video art in the 1970s contributed to the art world’s re-visioning of the female nude. The study emphasizes Wilke’s art’s connections with New York City’s avant-garde fashion industry, department stores, burlesque clubs, cinema and television, and other “low culture” displays of female nudity and feminine spectacle in order to demonstrate the intersection between her feminist tactics and those of mass-market consumerism.

Dr. Vigneault’s publications include essays in Women’s Studies and the anthology Contemporary Art and Classical Myth, as well as numerous essays for museum catalogues. She has presented her research at the College Art Association conference; Popular Culture Association conference; Feminist Art History conference; University of Johannesburg; Columbia University; Association of Art Historians conference; SECAC; and Association of Historians of American Art conference. She is currently lead book reviews editor for Panorama, the online peer-review journal of the Association of Historians of American Art.