Academic CV

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Postdoctoral Researcher, PROSPERA PROJECT, European Research Council (University of Vigo), 2021–Present
 

• Post-growth futures in the context of innovation, science and technology studies

• Imaginaries of future cities, utopianism

• Countering technological determinism 

• The role of urban planning in opening up the possibility for alternative economies and practices

• Artistic methods for encouraging public participation in urban planning and creating different imaginaries 

• Art as a tool in science policy methodology (SciARt)

• The myths we construct and tell ourselves, cultures of sustainability

 

PhD, University of Cambridge, ‘Impact of the Ancient City Project’. European Research Council, 2017 – 2021
 

• “Ideal cities: ‘the Ancient City’ and ‘the Modern City’, in Liberal Italy 1860-1914.": Examination of how nineteenth-century public health movement produced a new image of the past. Conceptions of purity, cleanliness, and understandings of hygiene reshaped the memory and material fabric of cities.

• Extensive international archival research skills and quantitative analysis

• Urban planning theory, policy and plan analysis in the context of cultural history

• Case studies Naples, Rome, Barcelona, Paris, London

• Fluent English and Italian, Spanish 

• Reading French, Spanish, Italian
   

• Phd Summary

• Very broadly this thesis looked at the overlaps between urban planning, Modernism, utopianism and archaeology. I investigated how the nineteenth-century public health movement produced a new image of the past. Conceptions of purity, cleanliness, and understandings of hygiene reshaped the memory and material fabric of cities. The cities of the past were read through the lens of the present and its obsession with cleansing and whiteness, such that the Greek and Roman civilisations emerged as paradigms for Western urban modernity. In cities, the process of modernisation was justified, underwritten and motivated by the argument that they should emulate the ancient Greco-Roman example - which enabled policies from straight street planning, slum clearance, and expropriation to the rationalisation of water systems and 'capitalisation' of the city space. Meanwhile, the very study of the past was affected by these same value judgments. Archaeologists and restorers were also influenced by public health discourses which determined how they conceptualised their practice and what they valued. Seeing themselves as surgeons they cut away what was ‘degenerate’ to reveal the healthy clean structure they perceived to lie beneath. Restoration was conceptualised as a process of purification in the positivist pursuit of a clean 'original' (which had never existed). They produced a picture of the past which was shaped by nineteenth-century thinking on cleanliness. Hence both modernisation and restoration practice devalorised and destroyed other pasts, which were considered 'dirty': particularly the medieval remains. As a consequence, the version of the past we have today - at the level of its memory and its material fabric, is highly sanitised and idealised. This thesis reflected on the influence which perceptions of good health can exert upon how we speak about the past, see the past and walk within it at a time when the Covid-19 epidemic has highlighted the power of such cultural currents within society. This thesis was produced through extensive archival research conducted in Naples and Rome.

Publications

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• Greaves, S. Ideal Cities. The Ancient City and the Modern City in Italy. Cambridge University Press. Forthcoming monograph. Thesis doi: https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.78646 

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• Greaves, S. June 6, 2022. Taxis Verticales. Merece la pena privatizar el cielo? The Conversation. España. https://theconversation.com/taxis-verticales-merece-la-pena-privatizar-el-cielo-182559. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.35381.14560
   

• Greaves, S. February 24, 2023. LA SOSTENIBILIDAD NO ES UN PROBLEMA TECNOLÓGICO. Una perspectiva post-crecimiento. TELOS Revista. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.18603.92962
   

• Greaves, S. 2022. Roman planning as a model for urban modernity in Liberal Naples. In Ottewill-Soulsby, S. and J. Martínez-Jiménez (eds.), Remembering and Forgetting the Ancient City, 137–164. https://doi.org/10.2307/J.CTV2GVDNNZ.13

 

• Greaves, S. 2022. Ildefonso Cerdà and the Eixample grid plan (1859). To be or not to be Rome? In Greaves, S., and A. Wallace-Hadrill (eds.), Rome and the Colonial City, 327–352. https://doi.org/10.2307/J.CTV2GVDNPG.22

 

• Greaves, S. and Wallace-Hadrill, A. 2022. Introduction. De-colonising the Roman Grid.  In Greaves, S., and A. Wallace-Hadrill (eds.), Rome and the Colonial City, 1-24. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv2gvdnpg.7 

 

• Greaves, S. 2021. Cholera and the Ancient City in Naples (1860-1914). In Morgan, C., and M. Gharipour (eds.), Epidemic Urbanism. How Contagious Diseases have Shaped Global Cities, 53-61.

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Papers

 

• "Ideal cities, ancient cities and post-growth futures". University of Cambridge Classical Archaeology Seminars. November 2022
   

• ”Circles, sustainability and myth making”. European Society for Ecological Economics, June 2022
   

• "Doughnut Cities within an History of Urban Design". Doughnut Economics Action Lab, March 2022. Participatory Workshop with over 100 participants. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMVxuh-Fmlk&t=2476s 

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• “The Sanitation Campaign against Cholera in Naples (1860-1910).” Epidemic Urbanism: Reflections on History (What Insights…might Inform our Understanding of COVID-19?) Columbia University/Morgan State University, Online Symposium, May 2020. Available online: https://youtu.be/jCx_bQ2aA30?t=2943
   

• "Re-imagining the Grid in the Nineteenth Century. To be, or not to be Rome.” Rome & the Colonial City, The British School at Rome, Rome, January 2020.
   

• "Città Ideali: le Convergenze tra Obiettivi dell’Urbanistica e Motivazioni Archeologici a Roma, 1870-1914.” Reconstruire Rome, École Française, Rome, October 2019.
   

• "Subversive Classicism. Giorgio de Chirico and the British Modernists.” Classical Reception Seminar Series, Cambridge University, March 2019.
   

• "Ideals of the Ancient City. Urban planning in Paris, Barcelona, and Naples." Faculty of Classics, Cambridge University, March 2019.
   

• "Futurism and the Ancient City." Graduate Interdisciplinary Seminar, Cambridge University, March 2019.

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Select Webinars, Interventions and Podcasts

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• 'Environmental citizen sensing: social participation, arts and technology." With Dr Anna Berti Suman and Stefania Oikonomou. Web2Learn. 
   

• "Art and Postgrowth Urban Planning." With Fulvio Fagani, Gianni Tartari, Giovanni Zenga and Gregorio Pulcher. 4th Public Participation and Deliberative Democracy Festival. Joint Research Centre, Ispra. European Commission.
   

• Postgrowth Podcast. Coordinating and chairing Postgrowth Podcast  Available on Spotify, Google & Apple 

Academic Activities
 

• “Illustrating Ancient History Exhibition.” Cambridge Archaeological Museum, https://www.museums.cam.ac.uk/story/illustrating-ancient-history/

• Conference Organisation. ‘Rome and the Colonial City’, British School at Rome, 2020

• Copyediting and Book Design, Rome and the Colonial City volume

• Co-Convenor and Chair, Cambridge Classical Reception Seminar Series

• Chair, Cambridge Graduate Interdisciplinary Seminar Series

• Undergraduate Lecturer, “Italian Fascism.” Faculty of Classics, University of Cambridge

• Undergraduate supervision (25 Students) “Rome, the Very Idea.” Faculty of Classics, University of Cambridge

• Undergraduate thesis supervision, “Mussolini and Fascist Mosaics in the Foro Italico”.

• Website Design: ImpAncCit Project and Topica Cambridge Graduate Website (https://classicstopica.wixsite.com/topica)

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Teaching Testimonials. Lecture and supervisions, Italian Fascism

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• “Thank you so much for supervising this term. I have spent the last two years of this degree not really feeling like I belonged in it, or really even believing in it as a worthwhile pursuit, but found your supervisions and lectures really really inspirational in terms of what 'classics' can actually look like and what material is 'worth studying'(and also very important in making me feel like I could write my dissertation the way that I have). THANK YOU!!!”
   

• “I just wanted to say that it was the best lecture I've had all term (by far) and it made me for the first time consider pursuing an area of Classics beyond Undergrad level, so thank you so much for such a great introduction to the Fascist remaking of Rome.”
   

• "I just wanted to email to say a huge thank you for your supervision on Mussolini’s Rome this year. It was my favourite part of the paper and I really enjoyed your lecture on the topic, and the supervision."
   

• "I attach my essay for today’s supervision. Thank you very much for your patience and for the wonderful supervision you had with us today. Hoping not to sound too much like an adulator, I found it remarkably interesting, well organized, and enjoyable."
   

• "Thank you for your comments on the essay, and the supervision yesterday! I have really enjoyed this topic:))"
  
   

Other Academic Qualifications and Awards

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Sotheby’s Institute        MA: Modern, Fine Art & Decorative Design. (Distinction)             2016-2017
 

• Gordon Laing full Scholarship

• Highest MA result in year

• Dissertation: ‘Being Modern and British: Cities and Classicism in Giorgio de Chirico, Edward Wadsworth and John Armstrong’.

• The commercial workings of an auction house: law, ethics, and business

• Art history: Old Masters, Decorative Arts, Modern Art and Design

• The market for antiquities: provenance, ethical issues, and restoration

• Art and authenticity: Attributions, valuations, scientific methods
   

University of Durham     BA (Hons): Classics (First)                                                                 2012-2015
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• Maltby Exhibition Prize for Best Final Year Thesis in Year, Durham University, 2015

• Maltby Exhibition Prize for Examination Results, Durham University, 2015

• Maltby Exhibition Prize for Examination Results, Durham University, 2014

• Dissertation: ‘Romanità: new identity in the aesthetics of urban space for Mussolini’s Roma resurgens’

• Roman art and buildings, maps and the urban development of Rome, Census of Antique Works of Art and Architecture, and Stanford Forma Urbis Romae

• Latin language and literature

 

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Alleyn’s School, London                                                                                                   2005-2012
2012: A2 Level: A*A*A* (Fine Art, Latin, History); 2011: AS Level: AAAA (Maths); 2010: GCSE: 10 A*

 

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Artist CV

Freelance Artist      

• “Illustrating Ancient History Exhibition.” Cambridge Archaeological Museum, 2021

• Book Cover Design for Cambridge University Press (three volumes)

• Mural, Childrens' Ward, King's Hospital, London

• Winner, Franco Manca Restaurant Design Competition. Commissioned to produce designs across UK restaurants, Cambridge branch artwork and hoarding

• International Women’s Day Group Exhibition, ‘Be Bold for Change,’ Adam & Eve DDB, 2017

• Resident artist: London Mozart Players, Covent Garden Chamber Orchestra, University of London Symphony Orchestra

• Glyndebourne Tour Art Award 2015                  
   

White Cube Gallery, London. Digital Archive Intern, March-June 2016

• Communicated with alpha galleries, sourcing and preparing material for publication

• Researched artist information packs for Tracey Emin, Georg Baselitz, Damien Hirst and Dora Maurer for internal distribution

• Record management for White Cube artists, using in house archiving system and Inventory database

• Photoshop image editing for publications

• Produced Trafalgar Square Fourth Plinth and ‘Sculpture in the City’ display with archival material

• Editions department: condition checks, purchase and packaging of editions for Georg Baselitz
   

Cooper Studios. Co-founder and Assistant Manager, 2013 – 2016

• Set up the first art studio and gallery for students in Durham City (NGO)

• Found, gutted and rebuilt studio space within existing building

• Fundraised £4000 to meet setup costs and held collaborative exhibition of members’ work

• Art installations at Shambala Festival (2015, 2016) involving viewing platforms, art sessions, and an obelisk with interactive light and sound sensors (https://vimeo.com/user24999397)

 

Apolline Project. Restoration Team, 2014

• In an international team of French, Spanish, Italian and American students recuperating and restoring three fallen frescoes in 5th Century baths

• Identified, classified, and catalogued excavated ancient pottery

• Drawing pottery, and trench layout
   

Music

• Violin Grade 8 ABRSM Dist., Viola, Piano. Ensembles including Covent Garden Chamber Orchestra and Cambridge University Orchestra
   

Charity
 

• Half marathons, 2016 (St. Christopher’s Hospice), 2017, 2018 (Red Cross), 2019 (St. Christopher’s Hospice), 2020 (Centre 33, Mental Health).