She writes and teaches about the visual and material culture of Africa and Latin America with a special emphasis on the early modern period (ca 1500-1800) and on the Portuguese-speaking Atlantic World (in particular Kongo, Angola, and Brazil). Her first book, The Art of Conversion: Christian Visual Culture in the Kingdom of Kongo was published in December 2014 by the University of North Carolina Press for the Omohundro Institute for Early American History.