Following a worldwide search, Matthew P. Canepa, an award-winning historian of art, archaeology and religions of Persia and wider Iranian world, has joined the faculty of the University of California, Irvine as the Elahé Omidyar Mir-Djalali Presidential Chair in Art History & Archaeology of Ancient Iran. 

Canepa’s appointment is within the UCI School of Humanities’ Department of Art History and Ph.D. Program in Visual Studies, and affiliated with the UCI Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies.