Leili Adibfar
PhD, 2026: Modern and Contemporary Art with an Emphasis on Iran
About
Leili Adibfar received her PhD in Art History from UIC in 2026, completing a dissertation titled "Embodiment and Oil: The Art of Behjat Sadr and Late Pahlavi Iran." Her primary research is on Iranian modern art after 1945. She is interested in the role that modernist aesthetic theories, in conversation with local art historical and cultural legacies, played in the historical period that culminated in the Iranian revolution of 1979. She has been awarded a History of Art and Visual Culture Fellowship from the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the 2026–27 academic year.