Erika Doss is professor and chair in the Department of American Studies at the
University of Notre Dame, where she teaches courses in American, modern, and
contemporary art and cultural studies. Her wide-ranging interests in American art are
reflected in the breadth of her publications which include: Benton, Pollock, and the
Politics of Modernism: From Regionalism to Abstract Expressionism (1991), Spirit
Poles and Flying Pigs: Public Art and Cultural Democracy in American Communities
(1995), Elvis Culture: Fans, Faith, and Image (1999), Looking at Life Magazine (editor,
2001), Twentieth-Century American Art (2002), and Memorial Mania: Public Feeling
in America (2010). Recent monographs include The Emotional Life of Contemporary
Public Memorials: Towards a Theory of Temporary Memorials (2008). Doss is also co-
editor of the "Culture America" series at the University Press of Kansas, and is on the
editorial boards of Memory Studies, Public Art Dialogue, and Material Religion: The
Journal of Objects, Art, and Belief. Her current research project, "Spiritual Moderns:
Twentieth Century American Artists and Religion," explores the links between five
American modernists and issues of faith.