This one day conference brings together the next generation of art history scholars to present and discuss their ongoing research. Papers will predominately focus on Italian and Northern Renaissance Art (c. 1400–1600) and will encompass diverse media including tapestry, painting, engraving and stained glass. The conference will comprise five sessions. In the first four, two PhD students (or recent graduates) will present on topics that are united by common themes such as patronage, attribution and materiality. The final session, entitled ‘Opening New Dialogues’, will feature a paper by Professor Michelle O’Malley (Deputy Director and former PhD student at The Warburg). In order to foster the intellectual exchange central to ‘New Dialogues in Art History’ , the key paper(s) of each session will be followed by 20 minutes discussion.
Organised by Genevieve Verdigel & Lydia Goodson. Please direct any enquiries to the organisers at: NewArtDialogues@gmail.com
Programme
10:00–10:15: Registration
10:15–10:30: Introduction: Lydia Goodson and Genevieve Verdigel
10:30–11:30: Session 1: Making and Materiality
Chair: Alexander Röstel (Courtauld Institute / The National Gallery)
– Ang Li (University of Oxford): ‘The Revival of Gold Ground in Late Fifteenth-Century Italian Paintings.’
– Benedetta Pacini (University of Warwick/ The National Gallery): ‘Making and Moving Venetian Renaissance Paintings: my interviews with chief restorers in Venice and London, and archival records about Tintoretto’s transport strategy.’
11:30–11:45: Break (Tea and Coffee Provided)
11:45–12:45: Session 2: Attribution and Authorship
Chair: Dr Olenka Horbatsch (British Museum; PhD 2017, University of Toronto)
– James Wehn (Case Western Reserve University/ The Cleveland Museum of Art): ‘The Maker’s Image: Israhel van Meckenem, His Name, and His Copies.’
– Catherine Spirit (University of York): ‘Weaving Light: Untangling Authorship in the Windows of All Saints Church, Earsham.’
12:45–13:45: Lunch (Provided for Speakers and Chairs)
13:45–14:45: Session 3: Prestige and Patronage
Chair: Adriana Concin (Courtauld Institute)
– Dr Ilaria Taddeo (PhD 2017, IMT School for Advanced Studies, Lucca): ‘Artistic Patronage, Family Prestige and Religious Politics. The case of the Guidiccioni between Lucca and Rome (c. 1530-1550).’
– Anne-Sophie Laruelle (University of Liège): ‘Reconsidering Tapestry Patronage and Trade in the Renaissance.’
14:45–15:00: Break (Tea and Coffee Provided)
15:00–16:00: Session 4: Itinerancy and Interchange
Chair: Lois Haines (Warburg Institute / The National Gallery)
– Giulio Dalvit (Courtauld Institute): ‘Circulation of Drawings in Castiglione Olona: Masolino, Paolo Schiavo, Vecchietta, Domenico Veneziano and Cyriacus of Ancona.’
– Matthew Whyte (University College, Cork): ‘Stylistic Exchange and Civic Identity in Michelangelo’s work on the Arca di San Domenico in Bologna.’
16:05–16:55: Session 5: Opening New Dialogues
– Professor Michelle O’Malley (Deputy Director, Warburg Institute): ‘The Specifics of Authorship: Attributing Production.’
16:55–17:00: Concluding Remarks
17:00–18:00: Reception
Free and Open to all. Advanced booking required via Eventbrite.
For centuries, objects from Islamic lands were unquestioned parts of the material and visual culture of pre-modern Latinate Europe. A textile from Fatimid Egypt, for instance, the so-called “Veil of Sainte Anne”, was kept in the cathedral treasury of Apt and venerated as a Christian relic.
The Greek term kairós expresses an idea of ‘grasping the right moment’, which travelled through art, literature, and philosophy. And even today, it is central to debates over, for example, time management. Combining perspectives from classical reception studies and iconology, this ongoing project at KU Leuven (2017-2021) is about the reception of kairós in the visual medium from antiquity to the Renaissance. How was the notion of kairós visualized in images throughout time, from antiquity to the early modern era? And more specifically, how did text and image work together to transform the notion of kairós in various contexts?
Chiaromonte—known as Steri—began in September 2017. The ceiling was crafted between 1377 and 1380, as attested by the inscription that runs along two sides of the ceiling between beams and lacunars, in which the name of the patron is also mentioned: the powerful and noble ruler of Palermo—Manfredi Chiaromonte (d. November 1391). The surface area of the wooden ceiling measures 23 x 8 meters. The iconography is displayed uninterrupted on the three sides of the 24 beams and on the 100 coffered lacunars. After the fall of the Chiaromonte family, the palace was first occupied by King Martin I, the Humane (29 July 1356 – 31 May 1410), then by the Viceroys of Aragon, and the House of Bourbon. Between 1601 and 1782 it became the Palace of the Inquisition and later the halls of the palace were used as the Court of Appeal. Today the building is home to the rectorate of the University of Palermo. The three linked sessions seek to be a fruitful occasion to study the ceiling of the Sala Magna in Palazzo Chiaromonte-Steri and medieval painted ceilings in the Mediterranean in general, in terms of conservation as well as visual culture through a multidisciplinary perspective.
historical and art historical studies might seem hazardous, or even paradoxical and provocative at best. Very few other labels have the power to evoke both the glories, achievements and limitations of traditional ‘Western’, and namely Eurocentric, art history. As a matter of fact, using the Italian word Trecento to mean the ‘Fourteenth Century’ in the visual arts, music and potentially any area of human endeavour adumbrates a clear hierarchy–with Italy at its top. It is meaningful, and perhaps no coincidence, that the term Trecento came into use in English in the same years that mark the tumultuous expansion of the new discipline of art history in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and its usage has grown exponentially ever since. While much has been done in recent decades to broaden our understanding of the period both geographically and philosophically, the Trecento remains primarily the century of Giotto and of the great Tuscan painters and sculptors. At this time of building national ‘walls’, it seems particularly appropriate to think that the seminal and transformative character of the Trecento owes much to artistic and cultural exchanges, movement of artists and patrons, circulation of models and ideas across Italy, Europe, the Mediterranean and beyond. Our aim is to bring into conversation recent research on these issues.
witnessed the birth of Christian monastic life among saints who came to be known as the Desert Fathers. The heroic self-discipline and devoted ascetic endeavors of St Antony the Abbot, St Paul of Thebes and St Macarius, among others, became emblematic of an original and authentic form of the religious life. This eremitic tradition, transmitted to the west through hagiography and ascetic literature, exerted a profound influence over the formation of western monastic life in the fifth and sixth centuries, and continued to function as an ideological authority well into the late medieval period and beyond.
Medieval Art Research 