Reading academics awarded for excellence

Tuesday, 14 December 2010

Clockwise from top left ÔÇô Professor Clare Robertson, Dr Cathy Creswell, Dr Andre Cobb and Professor Richard Bradley

Four of the University's academics have recently received awards, each recognising their outstanding achievements in their separate fields.

Professor Clare Robertson, Department of Art (pictured top left) - Professor Clare Robertson has been awarded the 2010 Salimbeni Prize for her book, The Invention of Annibale Carracci, Studi della Bibliotheca Hertziana, 4 (Silvana Editoriale, 2008).

The prize is awarded annually by the Fondazione Salimbeni per la Storia e la Critica d'Arte for the best book on Italian art from early Christian times to the nineteenth century. The prize, which is open to scholars of any nationality, is held under the auspices of the President of the Italian Republic, the Ministro per I Beni Culturali and the Ministro degli Affari Esteri.

The award was presented in a ceremony held at the Teatro Feronia in Sanseverino Marche on 21 November 2010 by the president of the jury, Professor Carlo Bertelli, who commented on the book's attention to invenzione (invention) as a fundamental concept for sixteenth-century aesthetics and culture. The jury consisted of Professors Enrico Castelnuovo, Caroline Elam, Mina Gregori, Antonio Pinelli, Pierre Rosenberg and Mattias Winner. The prize was jointly shared with Nicole Hegener's book, "Divi Iacobi Eques" on the sculptor Baccio Bandinelli.

Dr Cathy Creswell, School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences (pictured top right) - Dr Cathy Creswell has been awarded the May Davidson Award for her outstanding contribution to clinical psychology. She was presented with the award at the Division of Clinical Psychology Annual Conference.

Dr Creswell is a clinical psychologist and MRC-funded research fellow at the Winnicott Research Unit within the School of Psychology and Clinical Language Studies at the University. The Unit researches mother-infant interactions and postnatal depression.

Since her clinical training, Dr Creswell has worked with children and families in a range of mental health settings such as GP practices, hospitals and a child and adolescent mental health team. Her PhD was on the development of anxious thinking styles in children and adolescents. She has been based at the University of Reading for seven years, where she conducts research and provides treatment for children with anxiety problems and their families.

Dr Creswell said: "It is a great honour to receive this award. I feel extremely lucky to be working at the University of Reading where we have an excellent group of researchers doing groundbreaking work to develop understanding of childhood emotional difficulties."

Dr Andre Cobb, School of Chemistry, Food and Pharmacy (pictured bottom left) - Dr Andre Cobb has been awarded the Thieme Chemistry Journal Award 2011. Every year the editorial board members of Synthesis, Synlett and Synfacts select young academics who are still at the beginning of their independent research career, who have either already made an impact to the research field they work in or show, in the opinion of the selecting professors, a high potential to have a very successful career. Thieme supports the day-to-day work of those young professors, by providing a one-year complimentary subscription to their three chemistry journals.

Dr Cobb said: "I am of course delighted that I have received this international award so soon after the University Research Endowment Trust Fund prize earlier this year. Both of these awards have given me great encouragement to continue investigating new ways of synthesising novel amino acids."

Professor Richard Bradley, Department of Archaeology (pictured bottom right) - Professor Richard Bradley's distinguished career as one of Reading's leading archaeologists has been recognised by an award from the British Academy. He was presented with the Grahame Clark Medal, which acknowledges outstanding achievements in the study of prehistoric archaeology.

Professor Bradley is one of the most active and prolific archaeologists working in Britain today. During his career he has combined fieldwork in many parts of Britain and Europe with interpretive and contextual discussions of prehistoric archaeology that have influenced and inspired scholars throughout Europe.

He has made major contributions to the study of the metal hoards of the Bronze Age, the rock art of later prehistoric Europe, and the ritual and burial monuments of Bronze Age Scotland. Professor Bradley has studied the Bronze Age ship settings on the Baltic island of Gotland, and together with colleagues at Leicester University, is preparing a new account of the Continental background to British and Irish prehistory.

The award recognised Professor Bradley's work for its winning combination of wide reading, a deep knowledge of the material, and an ability to stimulate and inspire by interpreting the archaeological record in entirely new ways.

If you or your colleagues have recently received awards or accreditations we would love to hear from you - please email us at communications@reading.ac.uk.