John B Onians, FSA[1] (born 1942) is Professor Emeritus of World Art at the University of East Anglia, Norwich and specialised in architecture, especially the architectural theory of the Italian Renaissance; painting, sculpture and architecture in Ancient Greece and Rome; Byzantine art, material culture, metaphor and thought; perception and cognition, and the biological basis of art.
In 1997–1999, he established the division of Research and Academic Programs at the Clark Art Institute, Williamstown Mass.
He has been a fellow of the Centre for Advanced Study in the History of Art at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. and at the Wissenschaftskolleg, Berlin, the William Evans Fellow at the University of Otago, New Zealand, and a Scholar at the Getty Research Institute.
Onians has been discussed in books such as Art History and its Methods (1995)[14] and Raising the Eyebrow (2002).
[15] His photographic work also features in the Conway Library, whose archive of primarily architectural images is being digitised under the wider Courtauld Connects project.