Robert C. Morgan received his M.F.A. in Sculpture from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst in 1975 and his Ph.D. in contemporary art history from New York University in 1978. Professor Morgan has had an extensive academic career. He has taught at New York University, Wichita State University, the University of Rochester, the School of Visual Arts, Barnard College, and Columbia University. From 1981- 2001, he was Professor of the History and Theory of Art at the Rochester Institute of Technology. He is currently an Adjunct Professor of Fine Arts in the Graduate School of Fine Arts at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York.
Robert Morgan has worked extensively as an independent curator. He has organized museum retrospectives of Allan Kaprow (1979) and Komar and Melamid (1980), both at the Ulrich Museum of Art in Kansas. In 1990, he curated “Concept -- Decoratif” in conjunction with the Holly Solomon Gallery in New York. From 1989-90, he directed a gallery in SoHo (New York) where he curated a dozen exhibitions of both emerging and established artists, including Carolee Schneemann, Nancy Grossman, Hung Liu, Robert Barry, Douglas Huebler, Mel Bochner, Muntadas, and Max Ernst. In 1994, he organized “Logo Non Logo“ with French critic Pierre Restany at the Thread Waxing Space in New York, which later traveled to the Art Museum of the University of South Florida in Tampa.
Robert Morgan has authored numerous books, catalogs and monographs on contemporary artists in various countries. His book on the American conceptualist Robert Barry was published by Karl Kerber Press in Bielefeld, Germany (1986). Haim Steinbach was published by the Musee d’Art Contemporain, Bordeaux (1988). Duchamp, Androgyny, Etc, (on Marcel Duchamp) was published by Editions Antoine Candau in Paris (1990). A Hans Bellmer Miscellany was published by Baum/Malmburg in Malmo (Sweden) in 1993.
His books published in the United States include Commentaries on the New Media Arts (Umbrella Associates, 1992); After the Deluge: Essays on the Art of the Nineties, (Red Bass Publications, 1993), Conceptual Art: An American Perspective (McFarland, 1994); Art into Ideas: Essays on Conceptual Art (Cambridge University Press, 1996), Between Modernism and Conceptual Art (McFarland, 1997): and The End of the Art World (Allworth Press, 1998).
His critical anthologies on Gary Hill (2000) and Bruce Nauman (2002) were published by Johns Hopkins University Press. An edited volume of the late writings by the critic Clement Greenberg was published by the University of Minnesota Press, 2003.
"Asparagus and Chrysanthemums = Sentimentality and Power," in Muntadas and D'Agostino, eds., The Un/Necessary Image, New York: Tanam Press and Cambridge, Committee on the Visual Arts, MIT, 1983
"The Delta of Modernism" Re-Dact, Edited by Peter Frank. New York: Willis, Locker, and Owens, 1984. Revised and reprinted in Kostelanetz, ed., Esthetics Contemporary, 2nd Edition, (Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books, 1989 ( Spanish Translation appeared in Revista Esthetica (CAYC, Buenos Aires), Fall 1991. Revised in The End of the Art World, New York: Allworth Press, 1998.
"Systemic Books by Artists" in Joan Lyons, ed., Artists' Books: A Critical Anthology and Sourcebook, Peregrine Smith Books and Visual Studies Workshop Press, Rochester, N.Y., 1985.
Haim Steinbach: Monograph of an Exhibition, Bordeaux: capc Musee d'art contemporain,1990 (French)
Joseph Nechvatal: Laminations of the Soul in Joseph Nechvatal. Paris: Antoine Candau Editions, 1990 (English and French) [1]
"La Situacion del Arte Conceptual Desde "January Show" Hasta Nuestros Dias" in Juan Vicente Aliaga and Jose Miguel Cortes, editors, Arte Conceptual Revisado, Universidad Poletechnica de Valencia, 1990 (Spanish and English
"Entretien avec Robert C. Morgan" en Richard Serra: Ecrits et Entretiens, 1970-89 (Daniel Lelong Editeur, 1990). English Edition, Chicago University Press, 1993
Colin Naylor, ed .Contemporary Masterworks (London: St. James Press,1992) Entries include critical discussions of works by Isamu Noguchi, Gordon Bunschaft, and Josep Renau.
Oscar de Mejo:The Naive Surrealist, Essay by Robert C. Morgan. New York: Abrams, 1992
Marcel Delmotte. Essay by Robert C. Morgan. Nahan Galleries (in collaboration with Galerie Isy Brachot, Bruxelles), 1991
"The Miralda Honeymoon Celebration in Las Vegas", Nevada State Council on the Arts, 1992
"Hans Bellmer:The Infestation of Eros" in A Hans Bellmer Miscellany, Anders Malmburg, Malmo and Timothy Baum, New York, 1993
"Dorothea Tanning's Sculptural Interlude" in Dorothea Tanning (New York: George Braziller, 1995)
"Philip Glass: The Photographer" (1984, revised 1996), Writings on Glass: Essays, Interviews, Criticism. Edited by Richard Kostelanetz and Robert Flemming. (New York: Schirmer Books, 1997)
"The Language of Eros" in Noritoshi Hirakawa, Matters, 1988-1997. New York: Deitch Projects and Antwerp: Zeno X Gallery, 1998
"A Sign of Beauty" in Bill Beckley and David Shapiro, Uncontrollable Beauty. New York: Allworth Press, 1998.
"Touch Sanitation: Mierle Laderman Ukeles" in Linda Frye Burnham and Steven Durland, editors. The Citizen Artist: 20 Years of Art in the Public Arena. Critical Press. The Gunk Foundation, 1998
"The End of the Art World" (excerpt) in Patricia Hills, Modern Art in the USA: Issues and Controversies of the 20th Centuries" Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 2000
