Verónica Tello: Redefining curiosity and connection in the classroom

From Melbourne to Morningside Heights, art historian Verónica Tello unites archives, art, and identity in a classroom community.

Photo provided by Verónica Tello

By Anna Sofia Martorella 

December 13, 2025

This year, Barnard College welcomed Professor Verónica Tello to its art history and archaeology departments. Tello moved to New York from New South Wales, where she taught at the University of Melbourne. While Tello has done fellowships in Chile, New York, and London, she was excited to move to New York because she “wanted a new challenge” and enjoys “the people, the scholars, and the new perspectives.”  

“I like teaching when everyone comes to the subject with a sense of vulnerability and curiosity,” said Tello. “I like that teachers facilitate the exploration of ideas in a productive space that is hard to find in another context, and it pushes my research in new directions.” Her research is centered around global and Latin American art history, with a focus on “diasporic and queer methodologies.”

Tello said that teaching the First-Year Seminar class “Art, Writing, and Archives” reminds her of her experience approaching an archive for the first time. “Reading my students’ assessments for the first time made me remember what it was like looking at an artwork and struggling,” she said. 

Teaching also offers Tello a dedicated space to share the books and artwork that have influenced her book, an expansion of her volume “Future Souths: Dialogues on Art, Place, and History,” bringing her new perspectives. She encourages students in “Art, Writing, and Archives” to relate readings such as Justin Torres’ queer historical novel “Blackouts” to their personal experiences and go beyond the texts’ academic contexts. “I don’t have those types of conversations with friends or colleagues, but I can with students,” Tello stated. 

Along with “Art, Writing, and the Archives,” Tello also teaches the art history seminar “Rewriting History: Queer-Feminist Art from the 1970s to Now,” a class of predominantly third-years. Comparing the two, she said, “First-years are 18 years old,” with a chuckle. “[Third-years] have figured out how to be themselves in class a bit more. First-years seem more stressed about the fact that they’re first-years and have moved outside of home, whereas third-years are more focused on their career.” 

Tello advises Barnard first-years, “Do not take yourself too seriously. College is about making friends and experimenting, and it’s just as important as or even more important than schoolwork.” When asked if she would give different advice to students at the University of Melbourne, she said, “The same advice applies to both but especially to Barnard. Focus less on the anxiety of being the best and more on enjoying who you are and what you have in the moment.” 

Outside of teaching, Tello enjoys seeing friends, eating delicious food, drinking good wine, and going to the beach — or hiking, in the absence of Melbourne’s easy-access beaches. Her favorite thing about Barnard is the students, who she describes as “so smart, committed, and delightful conversationalists.” She noted, however, that the poke in Australia is significantly better than that served in the Milstein Center.