Christopher Johns in 2019
The Department of Art History has received a generous endowment from the estate of alumnus Dr. Christopher Johns (BA ’77) to support international study opportunities for Art History undergraduate and graduate students. Christopher (Mike) Johns was among the first generation of students to participate in the FSU Florence Program. The experience ignited his lifelong passion for art history, as well as his devotion to Florida State University.
Johns went on to build an illustrious career as a scholar of eighteenth-century art, serving since 2003 as a named professor and department chair at Vanderbilt University. On his death in 2022, his family honored his lifelong loyalty to his alma mater by creating the Dr. Christopher M.S. Johns Art History Award for International Study. In November, Dr. Johns’s brother and sister-in-law, also FSU alumni, visited the Department of Art History to meet graduate students and discuss the endowment and the donation of a portion of his book collection to the Rose Library. They shared photographs from his time on the Florence Program and a little of his life history.