The Warburg Institute is the premier institute in the world for the study of cultural history and the role of images in culture. It is cross-disciplinary and global. It is concerned with the histories of art and science, and their relationship with superstition, magic, and popular beliefs. Its researches are historical, philological and anthropological. It is dedicated to the study of the survival and transmission of cultural forms – whether in literature, art, music or science – across borders and from the earliest times to the present. In setting out the historical, psychological, anthropological and political dimensions of art and culture, the work of Aby Warburg underlines the continuing relevance of the humanities today.
Each year the Institute offers a number of short-term Fellowships of two, three or four months duration.
Brian Hewson Crawford Fellowship
A Research Fellowship has been endowed from the estate of, and in memory of, Dr Brian Hewson Crawford, who graduated from the University of London in 1926. A two-month Fellowship is available for the study of any aspect of the classical tradition. Under the terms of the deed, the Fellowship is open to European scholars other than of British nationality.
Henri Frankfort Fellowship
The late Enriqueta Frankfort endowed a Research Fellowship in memory of her husband Henri Frankfort, who was Director of the Institute from 1949 to 1954. The Fellowship, which will be for two months, may be held in any of the areas in which Professor Frankfort made his distinguished contributions to scholarship: the intellectual and cultural history of the ancient Near East, with particular reference to society, art, architecture, religion, philosophy and science; the relations between the cultures of Mesopotamia, Egypt and the Aegean, and their influence on later civilizations. The Fellowship is not intended to support archaeological excavation.
Albin Salton Fellowship
The late Albin Salton generously endowed an annual Research Fellowship to enable a career scholar to spend two months at the Warburg Institute pursuing research into cultural contacts between Europe, the East, and the New World in the late medieval, Renaissance and early modern periods. The Fellowship is intended to promote the understanding of those elements of cultural and intellectual history which led to the formation of a new world-view, understood in the broadest cultural, political and socio-economic terms, as Europe began to develop contacts with the world outside Europe, and that world came into contact with Europe.
Grete Sondheimer Fellowship
A Fellowship has generously been endowed by Professor Ernst Sondheimer in memory of his aunt, Grete Sondheimer, who worked in the Kulturwissenschaftliche Bibliothek Warburg in Hamburg and in the Library of the Warburg Institute in London from 1944 to 1947. The two month Fellowship, may be held in any of the areas of interest of the Institute.
Frances A. Yates Fellowships
Dame Frances Yates, who died in 1981, generously bequeathed her residuary estate to found research Fellowships in her name at the Institute. Fellows’ interests may lie in any aspect of cultural and intellectual history but, other things being equal, preference will be given to those whose work is concerned with those areas of the medieval and Renaissance encyclopedia of knowledge to which Dame Frances herself made such distinguished contributions. A number of two-, three- and four-month Fellowships are available. Candidates domiciled in the U.K. may apply for three- or four-month Fellowships only.