Sandra Neugärtner (Dr. habil.) is an art historian whose scholarship examines the intersections of cross-cultural dynamics, labor, technology, and artistic knowledge from a longue durée perspective. In 2021, she published her monograph Statt Farbe: Licht (Instead of Color: Light), which explores the formation of artistic knowledge through technical media, grounded in an analysis of László Moholy-Nagy’s photogram pedagogy.
In February 2026, she completed her habilitation at Leuphana University Lüneburg. The underlying research on the reorganization of artistic production during the transition from industrial to information societies was supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG). Taking the work of Bauhaus artist Léna Meyer-Bergner as a case study, the study repositions Meyer-Bergner’s work within the history of constructivism and abstraction as they navigated shifting political spheres—from the Weimar Republic and Stalinism to Mexican exile during WWII and Cold War cultural policy. Ultimately, this approach opens a new perspective on the structural changes inherent in modern art production (monograph forthcoming 2026).
Another focus is on the examination of institutional structures. The volume she edited, Institutional Criticism in Art Education from 1900 to Today (2026), offers the first comprehensive study of this field at art academies and traces its path from radical beginnings to institutional affirmation.
Sandra Neugärtner studied design, economics, art history, and cultural studies in Dessau, Berlin, Munich, and Zurich. She held postdoctoral research positions at Leuphana University Lüneburg (2022–2025) and the University of Erfurt (2021–2022). Her research has been conducted through international fellowships at Harvard University’s Department of History of Art and Architecture (2017–2018) and the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut (2024–2025). She is an associate member of CRC 1512 “Intervening Arts” and a member of the German Association for Art History, the Working Group for Digital Art History, and the German Photographic Society (DGPh).
Dr. habil. Sandra Neugärtner 