Christopher Johns explores Napoleon and Josephine's interest in neoclassical art, their collaborations with the designers Percier and Fontaine, and the impact of important archaeological discoveries such as Herculaneum and Pompeii on the taste of their time. Jeffrey Collins discusses the popularity of the French Empire style, its importance in the Western world, and its influence on American furniture design.
Professor Jeffrey Collins received BA, MA, and PhD degrees from Yale, and a BA and MA from the University of Cambridge. Before arriving at the Bard Graduate Center in 2003, he was associate professor of art history at the University of Washington, Seattle. A scholar of 17th- and 18th-century Italian art, he is a Fellow of the American Academy in Rome and recipient of Andrew W. Mellon, Fulbright, and American Philosophical Society Fellowships. He is the author of *Papacy and Politics in Eighteenth-Century Rome: Pius VI and the Arts *(Cambridge, 2004) and has contributed to publications including the *Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians*, *Eighteenth-Century Studies*, *The Burlington Magazine*, and *Ricerche di Storia dell Arte*.