Louisa Penfold

Louisa Penfold is a lecturer and faculty co-chair of Arts and Learning at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Her research and practice focus on contemporary art, early childhood, and play across schools, museums, and public spaces.

Penfold is the project director of Project Zero’s Art/Play, a NEA funded study looking at the integration of modern and contemporary art practices into public schools. Run as a partnership between the Department of Early Childhood at Boston Public Schools, the Smithsonian Learning Lab, MoMA, and the Harvard Art Museums, Art/Play is exploring how contemporary art practices can be used to support children’s and teachers’ learning through curriculum design and professional development.

Penfold’s doctoral research, which was run as a partnership between Tate and the University of Nottingham (UK), investigated the design of children’s play spaces in modern art museums. She also runs Art. Play. Children. Learning., a blog for parents on cultivating children’s creativity through art.

She has been awarded fellowships and grants from the Smithsonian Institute, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Ian Potter Foundation. Penfold’s writing can be found in publications including MIT’s Journal of Design and Science, The Journal of Childhood Studies, Curator: The Museum Journal, and The Australian. She is represented by the Curtis Brown Literary Agency.