Before joining the University of Bern (Switzerland) in 2017, Beate Fricke was Professor for Medieval Art at the University of California, Berkeley. Her research focuses on the history of cultural heritage, sculpture, image theories, and objects as archives of a history of applied arts, materiality, knowledge transfer and trade in the global "Middle Ages". Together with Finbarr Barry Flood she co-authored the monograph Tales things Tell. Material Histories of Early Globalisms, 2023. She was Principal investigator of the research project Global Horizons in Pre-Modern Art (ERC) and is leading the project The Inheritance of Looting. Medieval Trophies to Modern Museums (SNF). She is founder and Editor-in-chief of the journal 21: Inquiries into Art, History, and the Visual. Beiträge zur Kunstgeschichte und Visuellen Kultur (link: https://21-inquiries.eu/en)