Gerda Soergel Panofsky is an art historian. Born in Germany, she received her doctoral degree from the University of Cologne and worked in several European institutions before coming to the United States to serve as an assistant to Millard Meiss of the Institute for Advanced Study in 1965-1966. She was a long-time member of the faculty at Temple University, and also held teaching positions at New York University and Freie Universität in Germany. She married Erwin Panofsky in 1966.

Erwin Panofsky (1892-1968) was a German art historian specializing in Gothic and Renaissance art. He was both a prolific writer and a highly influential and beloved teacher. He received his Ph.D. in 1914 from the University of Freiburg. He taught in several European universities, including the University of Hamburg. He first came to the United States in 1931 to teach at New York University, and subsequently decided to stay in the United States when he was forced out of his position at the University of Hamburg when the Nazis came to power. By 1934 he was teaching concurrently at New York University and Princeton University. He joined the Faculty of the Institute for Advanced Study in 1935, where he became its first art historian and one of its first humanists. He retired from the active faculty in 1962, but continued teaching, lecturing, and writing almost until the end of his life.