Welcome, Dr. Erhardt

Your tireless moderator will be on vacation for the next four weeks. First, visiting family back home in the midwest, then doing research and seeing art exhibits in Paris, and ending up at the Eleventh Biennial International Conference on Baroque Music in Manchester, England, where I will be participating in a round table. This is a presentation of research by a team of scholars from France, New Zealand, and the United States, with whom I am collaborating on a book of essays on a ballet de cour from early in the reign of Louis XIII.

So, Ionarts welcomes new contributor Michelle Erhardt, a newly minted Ph.D. in art history, specializing in the Italian Renaissance, and an old friend from the Michigan State days. If you're counting, that brings to a critical mass of three the number of Ionartians hailing from the great state of Michigan, home of this gritty basketball team. In addition to her normal role of keeping Ionarts rooted in art-historical fact, Michelle has kindly agreed to take over the day-to-day management of this blog during my absence. Fear not, I will still be posting during my travels, with some interesting things from Europe, I hope, so enjoy yourselves.

Over to you, Michelle!