PCA Appoints Inaugural Provost Dr Michael Meere

Paris College of Art is pleased to announce the appointment of our inaugural Provost, Dr Michael Meere.

In his role as Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs, to begin in summer 2023, Michael Meere will ensure the academic rigor and excellence of all degree-granting and certificate programs, oversee the summer and study abroad programs, promote academic pluralism, equity, and inclusion initiatives, manage all academic budgets, provide leadership on accreditation with the National Association of Schools of Art and Design (NASAD) and the New England Commission of Higher Education (NECHE), and liaise with faculty and students to achieve the goals set out in Paris College of Art’s mission: “to prepare the next generation of creative professionals to be globally aware, engaged, and open-minded citizens with the critical thinking and creative skills required to tackle complex problems.” Meere will work closely with the President, the Trustees, and the close-knit community of faculty, staff, and students on planning and implementing strategies for growth while maintaining PCA’s core values and shaping the college’s identity as a multi-national hub of creative expression within the global, contemporary marketplace of art and design.

 Meere has dedicated his professional life to higher education. He is currently the Resident Director of the Vassar-Wesleyan Program in Paris and Associate Professor of French and Medieval Studies at Wesleyan University, a top-tier liberal arts university based in Connecticut, USA. At Wesleyan, he has acted as Head of the French Section of the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, served on the advisory boards of the Wesleyan Programs Abroad Committee and the Fries Center for Global Studies, co-founded the Queer Studies Research Collective, and spent several years as Chair of the Board of the Friends of the Wesleyan Library. Prior to Wesleyan, Meere worked at King’s College London, Columbia University, Princeton University, SUNY-FIT, LIM College, and Fordham University.

 Meere’s academic research focuses primarily on the performing arts, and he has published nearly four dozen books, edited collections, journal articles, book chapters, translations, critical editions, and book reviews on early modern and contemporary francophone theater and performance. Notably, Meere is the author of Onstage Violence in Sixteenth-Century Tragedy (Oxford UP, 2021) and the co-editor of Replaying the Francophone Early Modern in the Twenty-First Century (L’Esprit Créateur, 2022, with Annelle Curulla) and Staging Justice in Early Modern France (Early Modern French Studies, 2020, with Valérie M. Dionne). His other publications have appeared in venues such as Exemplaria: Medieval/Early Modern/Theory, The Romanic Review, The French Review, French Studies, Renaissance Quarterly, and the Journal of the African Literature Association. Meere has also received numerous fellowships, including a Fulbright to France, a Chateaubriand fellowship, two “visiting scientist” research grants at the Università di Padova, and a fellowship to participate in the Mellon School for Theater and Performance Research at Harvard University. 

 Meere received his BA in French and Comparative Literary Studies from Northwestern University, a maîtrise in lettres modernes from Université Lumière Lyon 2, a Master 2 in littératures française et comparée from Université Sorbonne Paris 4, and an MA and PhD in French language and literature, with a focus on theater and performance studies, from the University of Virginia.

 

“I am excited to bring my international background in education and administration to Paris College of Art. I aim to foster a collaborative, innovative, and supportive environment that allows our student-artists to make a meaningful impact on our increasingly interconnected world through their art and design. I look forward to supporting the faculty and students as we strive together to maximize the student experience and to enhance the reputation of the school on the global stage.”