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Carrie Lambert-Beatty (at Harvard) would be a good fit for a dissertation on minimalism -- and with Jennifer Roberts, you're half-way to a committee.

whoops, Krauss (of course) not Kruass.

In terms of what to read: Start with James Meyer's Minimalism book. Make sure to read "Art and Objecthood" and Donald Judd's writings, especially "Specific Objects" (they're collected in a big yellow book). Read Briony Fer, Anne Wagner, Rosalind Kruass on Eva Hesse, Julia Wilson-Bryan's Art Workers book, Jennifer Roberts' book on Robert Smithson (Mirror Travels), and also Anne Reynold's book on Smithson, the book Robert Morris: Mind Body (collection of essays), the collection of Robert Morris's writing's (Continuous Project Altered Daily) and the collection of Robert Smithson's writings. Start plugging into jstor and google scholar names of artists who pique your interest... see what's out there. In terms of people out there to work with: Anne Reynolds is at UT Austin and Julia Bryan-Wilson is at Berkeley -- they'd be near the top of my list. Happy reading.

Not quite "represented," totally problematic....but... Marina Abramovic's "An Artist's life Manifesto" for the MOCA gala (wrap-up of fallout here: http://www.blouinartinfo.com/news/story/750513/marina-abramovics-divisive-moca-gala-left-heads-spinning-as-will-ferrell-and-dasha-zhukova-looked-on)

I also say go with the top-ranked ivy -- this makes all the difference: "but also note that school Y--being much more well endowed--will be able to support me in whatever line of research I would like to persue...." No matter how great your advisor, if you're constantly having to stop your dissertation research & writing to cobble together adjunct teaching appointments / apply for every external funding opportunity possible, then your work/time-to-degree will suffer as a result. Of course, no matter what, you'll be applying for pre-doc grants, BUT if you have the opportunity to go to a place that will be able to fund you guaranteed for 5/6 years and has some research-travel money to throw your way, then I'd say take it. Also, at many schools, its not uncommon to have one reader on your dissertation from another institution. Just because you turn down institution X doesn't mean you can't still forge a relationship with the potential advisor at school X. Also, if the potential advisor at school X is young, ambitious, and recently tenured -- there's a decent change he/she might be looking to move/ get wooed away.

For a summer sublet in DC, I'd recommend looking at the message boards at GW and American University... both to find students/gradstudents who are leaving their apartments for the summer and are looking to find a summer sublet, or to see if either of those schools rents out dorm-rooms for the summer to area interns (if my memory serves me correctly, I remember that being the case...) GW would probably be preferable, since it's walking distance from the National Gallery. Good luck.

I agree, but... I would put Eve Sedgwick's Touching Feeling near the tippy-top of a must-read theory list.

yipes. cleisthenes's "tiny sampling" is exhausting. all of marx, freud, brecht, frankfurt school, foucault in german/french... that alone would be awesome to accomplish in one's whole lifetime (but good on you if you can swing it). better off, in my opinion, to read fewer texts closely and strategically -- the Verso Aesthetics & Politics compilation is a good place to start to get a sense of how ideas were circulating among the key Frankfurt School(ish) thinkers. The newer translation of Benjamin's Work of Art in the Age of Its Mechanical Reproducibility and Other Writings on Media is also excellent.

i would just leave that part blank -- or write something vague like "flexible"

brazilianbuddy - I think you get to the heart of the matter with this last, bet-hedging question -- and I think your bet-hedging at the end is the most productive and generous part of your post. To think in terms of a right/wrong binary rules out and obfuscates a whole host of complicated and rich experiences that people have in close proximity to artworks. Rather than disparaging "sightseeing, picture-taking, been-there-done-that-bragging-rights sort of reasons" as wrong sorts of reasons, and subsequently asking whether or not/how museums can accomodate these wrong reasons, it's more productive, perhaps, to start with generative questions -- what sorts of experiences do people have in close proximity to artworks? why do museums engender certain types of experiences/expectations/responses? why do people photograph/document themselves near actual artworks? how might this phenomenon help to think through the affective power of art? of museums?

Look at Hillary Chute at UChicago -- http://english.uchicago.edu/faculty/chute Between her and WJT Mitchell... etc, the English department is quite concerned with the visual -- and you're able to build a lot of relations with the Art History department.

I'll disagree with "bamafan" to say that a low quant score (even an abysmal one) won't automatically keep you out of phd programs in art history (perhaps this is the case for bioinformatics, which is his/her stated area). It might send up the most minor of red-flags -- so it's of course worth doing as well as possible on the GREs -- but don't let a low score psych you out of applying for top programs. I don't know of any art history program that automatically screens anyone out for low GRE scores, particularly low quant scores. Focus on doing as well on the verbal and writing sections as you can, but really concentrate your energy on writing sample, statement of purpose, fostering relationships with your current professors to elicit substantial rec letters, and your gpa.

(as someone who did this particular interview successfully some years back)... be prepared to talk about the art you find most compelling (and why... we're talking specifics... artist, artwork, etc.), the art history you find most compelling and why (again, particular books, articles, authors, etc.), and relatedly, the type of methodological approach you find most compelling and why. also, be prepared to talk about your ambitions both in regard to the near future at williams -- specific museum work, coursework, interaction with research fellows, art conservation, etc. (read the website) -- and the far away future after williams. come prepared with good questions.

my two cents... just be honest and keep it short and sweet -- I wouldn't go into the details of performing during the summer, etc. Something to the effect of: "... indeed, that's me... and I want to take this opportunity to reiterate my commitment to full-time graduate study...." good luck (and indeed, that is an unusual situation)

I'd say wait until after the holidays -- if faculty are checking their emails over break, they're likely just scanning through for really important or time sensitive correspondence -- your message is likely to get lost in the shuffle. The best time to reach out is the end of the first week/beginning of the second week back.