‘A place that allowed me to be curious’: Elyse Nelson's Barstow Foundation

“I just knew there was an opportunity there that I was eager to have,” Nelson recalled. 

The next year, Nelson entered Barstow as an eighth grader. Now, the 2005 alumna is an assistant curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. In March, she led Barstow students on a tour of the museum, and this May, she will deliver the commencement address to graduating seniors.

At Barstow, Nelson participated in dance and cross country, theater, art classes and choir, among other interests. Outside of school, she focused on classical piano. 

“My interest in art came through both art and music,” Nelson said. “My piano teacher started showing me paintings and works of art that would correspond with whatever piece I was playing. For instance, if I was playing Debussy, they would show me impressionism.” 

This interest spurred Nelson to inquire about taking an art history class at Barstow. Although there was no art history class at the time, Mark Luce said he would be happy to teach it. 

“I was obsessed with [the class]. From the beginning. It was the thing I was the most eager to open the book and learn,” Nelson said. She and classmate Stephanie Denzer “stayed up until the wee hours of the night” studying before the AP exam, and it paid off with her score of a five, the exam’s highest mark. 

Luce recalls, “That first art history class, put together by students, was an absolute treat. Five strong young women who were dedicated to learning about something new, something different. They will always have a place in my heart. 

“Elyse's love of art history was readily apparent. And to watch what she has accomplished in such a short time makes me proud to have been a part of her intellectual journey."

After Barstow, Nelson attended Yale University, where she majored in art history and worked at the Yale University Art Gallery. She received a master’s degree from The Courtauld Institute of Art in London. She is currently completing her doctorate at The Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, where her doctoral thesis focuses on Antonio Canova’s British patronage. 

Nelson also works full-time as an assistant curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She oversees the 18th and 19th century European sculpture collection and has thousands of objects under her remit. In July, she will become an associate curator.

Nelson’s interest in 18th and 19th century European sculpture comes from the significant movements of the period — such as industrialism, capitalism, and social reform —  that continue to shape society today. 

“And all of that you can study and understand in art, and see the changes manifest through art,” Nelson said. “So I find it a very dense, rich, fascinating and complex period to study.” 

Sculpture, Nelson noted, has a way of embodying politics and ideas “quite literally.” Because it is an expensive art form, it often requires patronage and “provides a lens into understanding public discourse and social attitudes of any given time.” 

Nelson co-curated the exhibition “Fictions of Emancipation: Carpeaux Recast” at the Met in 2022-2023. That exhibition and the one she is currently working on are both about French artists. Nelson took French at Barstow with Anne Hyvrard. 

“I’m so grateful to her because I use my French on a daily basis,” Nelson said. “My foundations were all built at Barstow.” 

Nelson noted that the personal attention paid to her by Barstow teachers and administrators “completely transformed my path forward.” Nelson was not even planning on applying to Yale until then-Head of School Carl Pelofsky encouraged her to. She said that Barstow’s rigorous curriculum gave her the confidence to succeed in her future academic settings. 

“It was a place that allowed me to be curious and to dream up what I wanted to be, and I had support for that,” Nelson said.