Michael J. Lewis

Professor of American Art and Architecture, Williams College

Popular Williams professor Michael J. Lewis has taught at the College since 1993, exploring architectural theory, utopian and communal societies, and the nature of creativity. Lewis is known for his engaging lectures at Williams - even receiving standing ovations. And, as one student notes, he will learn your name.

After receiving his B.A. from Haverford College in 1980, and two years at the University of Hannover Germany, he received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1989.   He has taught at Bryn Mawr College; McGill University, Montreal; and the University of Natal, South Africa.  A critic of architecture, he writes for a wide variety of publications. In addition to several scholarly articles and books, Prof. Lewis is the author of Frank Furness: Architecture and the Violent Mind (2001), The Gothic Revival (2002), American Art and Architecture (2006), and the prize-winning August Reichensperger: The Politics of the German Gothic Revival (1993). 

In 2008 he received a Guggenheim Fellowship to support the completion of City of Refuge: the Other Utopia, a study of millennial town planning.  Lewis was named Faison-Pierson-Stoddard Professor of Art in 2008.