Chelsea Connelly is a Ph.D. Candidate in the History of Art department, specializing in Late Antique and Early Byzantine art. Her research explores the average Christian’s experience of gospel books in late antiquity with a broad survey of artistic representations of books, literary evidence, and surviving codices from the fourth to tenth centuries in the Mediterranean. Her other academic interests include Roman imperial art, Islamic art, studies of word and image, cultural exchange in the early medieval Mediterranean, and the reception of ancient art in contemporary politics. 

Chelsea has also worked as a conservation technician for rare books, manuscripts, and works of art on paper at the Harold B. Lee Library, a graduate research assistant at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, and a teaching assistant at Rare Book School. She is the co-editor for Teaching Antiracist Art History, a website dedicated to student-driven, antiracist pedagogy in art history. http://dev.teaching-antiracist-art-history.yale.edu