2023 Gretchen Taylor Millson Lecture

The UCLA Department of Art History is pleased to announce Hollis Clayson’s “The Dark Side of the Eiffel Tower” as the 2023 Gretchen Taylor Millson Lecture.

The lecture will examine aspects of the famous Parisian Tower’s past that have been forgotten or erased including a stint as the prime focus of French industry anxiety, service as the tallest symbol on earth of triumphant French colonialism, and a proposed function as an instrument of brightly illuminated surveillance.

This year’s Millson Lecture will be held on Monday, May 15th at the UCLA Faculty Center.

Clayson was trained as an art historian at Wellesley College (B.A.) and UCLA (M.A. and Ph.D.). She is currently the 2022-23 R. Stanton Avery Distinguished Fellow at the Huntington Library, as well as the Professor Emerita of Art History and Bergen Evans Professor Emerita in the Humanities at Northwestern University. Clayson hopes that “The Dark Side of the Eiffel Tower”, a critical account of the inescapabilty of the world’s most visited (paid) tourist attraction, will historicize and lessen or at least problematize the gravitational pull of the modern anchor of the Lure of Paris.

The Gretchen Taylor Millson Distinguished Lectureship was established in memory of UCLA alumnus, Gretchen Millson, in December 2009 by her husband, Dr. John J. Millson. Gretchen graduated from UCLA with a BA from the Art Department in 1961. This endowed fund provides much-needed resources to the department to allow us to grow and continue our long-standing tradition of excellence.