Professor FitzGerald's teaching of modern and contemporary art draws on his training in the history of art and substantial experience in the art market and museums.  In addition to a Ph.D., he earned an M.B.A. from Columbia University. Before joining the Trinity faculty, he was a member of the Impressionist department at Christie's in New York, and in recent years has worked extensively with the Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, and Museu Picasso in Barcelona, among other museums. His courses intensively analyze works of art and expose students to the aesthetic issues of the modern and contemporary periods as well as to the institutions that shape the art world. Professor FitzGerald's courses involve students in his substantial scholarly activities in the fields of European and American art of the 20th century, particularly the work of Pablo Picasso, global contemporary art, and his affiliations with museums, galleries, and auction houses.

• Michael FitzGerald, Post-Picasso: Contemporary Reactions, Museu Picasso Barcelona, 2014 (catalogue of exhibition curated by Professor FitzGerald).
• Michael FitzGerald. Picasso and American Art. Whitney Museum of American Art and Yale University Press, 2006 (Book-length catalogue of exhibition curated by Professor FitzGerald for the Whitney Museum, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and Walker Art Center in Minneapolis).
• Michael FitzGerald. Picasso: The Artist's Studio. Yale University Press, 2001 (catalogue of exhibition curated by Professor FitzGerald for the Wadsworth Atheneum and Cleveland Museum of Art).
• Michael FitzGerald, editor. A Life of Collection: Victor and Sally Ganz. Christie's, 1997.
• Michael FitzGerald. Making Modernism: Picasso and the Creation of a Market for Twentieth-Century Art. Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1995.

• Terra Foundation, 2006
• National Endowment for the Arts, 2005, 1999
• National Endowment for the Humanities, 1994