Joanna S. Smith specializes in the art and archaeology of the Eastern Mediterranean and Near East in the Bronze and Iron Ages. Her research interests address how archaeological sources of information illuminate the ways in which artistic ideas were communicated among people, across time, and among culture areas. Her archaeological fieldwork centers on the island of Cyprus. She has also worked with archaeological projects in England, France, Israel, Jordan, and Turkey. Currently she is coordinating the publication of the Department of Art and Archaeology’s excavations at Polis Chrysochous (ancient Marion and later Arsinoe), a project begun and directed by William Childs. She joined that project in 1988 and is completing the publication of excavations in the Iron Age sanctuary of Polis-Peristeries. She is also contributing to the organization and research for an exhibition, City of Gold: Archaeological Excavations at Polis Chrysochous, Cyprus, for the Princeton University Art Museum.

She received her A.B. summa cum laude (1987) in Art and Archaeology at Princeton University and her M.A. (1989) and Ph.D. (1994) in Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology at Bryn Mawr College. The grants and fellowships she has received most recently were awarded by the Council of American Overseas Research Centers, Cyprus American Archaeological Research Institute Research Fellowship (2011), Institute for Aegean Prehistory (2009), the Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton) (2008-2009), the Institute for Advanced Studies (Jerusalem) (2008), and the National Endowment for the Humanities (2005). She has traveled as the Norma and Rueben Kershaw (2004) and the Cesnola (2009) lecturer for the Archaeological Institute of America.

RECENT PUBLICATIONS:

Her books include Art and Society in Cyprus from the Bronze Age into the Iron Age, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press (2009); Views from Phlamoudhi, Cyprus, Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research 63, Boston, American Schools of Oriental Research (2008); and Script and Seal Use on Cyprus in the Bronze and Iron Ages, Archaeological Institute of America Colloquia and Conference Papers Series 4, Boston, Archaeological Institute of America (2002); among her recent and in press articles are “Bringing Old Excavations to Life,” Near Eastern Archaeology 71 (2008) 30-40; “Cyprus, the Phoenicians, and Kition,” in C. Sagona ed., Beyond the Homeland: Markers in Phoenician Chronology, Ancient Near Eastern Studies 28, Louvain, Peeters (2008) 261-303; “Theme and Style in Cypriot Wooden Roller Impressions,” Cahier du Centre d’Études chypriotes 37 (2007) 339-366; “Layered Images and the Contributions of Recycling to Histories of Art,” in Proceedings of the 7th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East: 12th to 16th April 2010, The British Museum and University College London (in press); “Tapestries in the Bronze and early Iron Ages of the Ancient Near East,” in E. Andersson Strand and M.-L. Nosch eds., Textile Production and Consumption in the Ancient Near East, Copenhagen: Centre for Textile Research (in press); “Tapestries in the Mediterranean Late Bronze Age,” in R. Laffineur and M.-L. Nosch eds., KOSMOS: Jewellery, Adornment and Textiles in the Aegean Bronze Age Copenhagen, 19-23 April 2010, Aegaeum. Liège, Université de Liège (in press).