Medieval Art Research

Murray Seminars on Medieval and Renaissance Art at Birkbeck: Spring 2018

All this term’s seminars take place in the History of Art Department at Birkbeck (43, Gordon Sq., London WC1H 0PD) in Room 114 (The Keynes Library) at 5pm. Talks finish by 5.50pm (allowing those with other commitments to leave) and are then followed by discussion and refreshments. This term’s papers are as follows :

17 January: Carol Richardson

Britons and Anglo-Saxons in Sixteenth-Century Rome: the 1580s fresco cycle at the English College

William Allen referred to Bede’s Ecclesiastical History as a seminarian’s reader because it proved that Christianity in Britain derived directly from the Catholic church in Rome from its very origins. This was an important argument in the context of Tudor persecution of Catholics because of the Protestant assertion that British Christianity had taken root long before the missions of Augustine of Canterbury introduced the corrupted Roman version of Christianity. This paper will consider the earliest part of the fresco cycle in the English College, which survives as printed images, in light of this deliberate historiographical choice.

13 February: Emmanuele Lugli

Chasing Absence: The Body of Christ and the Measures to Enter in Touch with it

This talk focuses on the singular devotion for the ‘mensura Christi,’ or the act of praying with objects that reproduced the height of Christ. It explores the reasons for its phenomenal success, from its diffusion in the twelfth century up to its ban in the seventeenth, and the motives for its marginalization in historical accounts today. The talk asks questions about what turns an orthodox veneration into a mere superstition, an inversion that is all the more puzzling given that the ‘mensura Christi’ relies on measuring, one of the methods to fight credulity. The lecture thus reconsiders the relationships of measuring practices, visual belief, and religious orders, thus contributing to discussions on representations, faith, and material studies.

14 March: Luca Palozzi

‘And the great lion walks through his innocent grove’. A cross-disciplinary study of lion paw prints in Giovanni Pisano’s Pisa pulpit

Giovanni Pisano carved animal tracks on the base of one of two lions bearing columns in his pulpit for Pisa Cathedral (1302-1310). Overlooked for more than seven centuries, these are the first naturalistic paw prints carved in marble in post-Classical Western art. This paper presents the initial results of a joint art historical and anatomical study of the Pisa paw prints conducted by Dr Luca Palozzi and Dr Gurå Bergkvist. In so doing, it tackles the much-debated issue of Medieval ‘naturalism’ (and its means) from an unusual perspective. A cross-disciplinary approach, that is, may help us find new answers to long-standing questions.

Poster portrait Spring 2018

Exhibition: The Medieval World at our Fingertips: Manuscript Illuminations from the Collection of Sandra Hindman, Art Institute of Chicago (27 Jan – 28 May 2018)

The Art Institute of Chicago, Allerton Galleries, January 27^th to May 28^th

The Art Institute of Chicago will exhibit this impressive and broad-ranging collection of approximately thirty exquisite fragments, which was assembled over a lifetime by medieval manuscript scholar and long-time Chicagoan, Sandra Hindman.

Continue reading “Exhibition: The Medieval World at our Fingertips: Manuscript Illuminations from the Collection of Sandra Hindman, Art Institute of Chicago (27 Jan – 28 May 2018)”

CFP: 12th Conference of Iconographic Studies: Iconography of Pain, Rijeka (Croatia), May 31 – June 01, 2018

Call for Papers: 12th Conference of Iconographic Studies: Iconography of Pain, Rijeka (Croatia), May 31 – June 01, 2018
Deadline: 20 January 2018

The conference seeks to explore and discuss recent development in the dialogue between art history, history, theology, philosophy, cultural theory and other relevant disciplines concerning the representation and perception of pain (both physical and emotional) in history. Pain represents not only one of the very used subjects in art but also the strong creative force for many artists. It has been recently discussed as being a transformative force in cultural production but also beyond the cultural and temporal boundaries. It can be also perceived within specific methodological paradigm of the Warburg’s Pathosformel as well as within the broader theoretical contexts. We welcome academic papers that will approach these subjects in interdisciplinary and methodologically diverse angles. The themes and subjects include, but are not limited to the following:

pain as art form
torture, punishment and penal iconography
spectacle(s) of pain
violence in visual culture
martyrs and martyrdoms
passion iconography
dealing with pain – images of medical and other treatments in history
pain as creative impulse in art
(in)expressibility of physical pain

Paper proposals should be submitted electronically to cis@ffri.hr

A paper proposal should contain:

full name, institution, affiliation, address, phone number(s), e-mail address
title
abstract (maximum 2 pages – 500 words)

Deadline: January 20, 2018

Invitations to participate will be sent out by email before February 20, 2018

There is NO registration fee

Administration and organizational costs, working materials, lunch and coffee breaks during conference, closing dinner as well as all organized visits are covered by the organizers.

All presented papers will be published in the thematic issue of the IKON journal in May 2019.

CFP: SAH Annual Conference, Providence, Rhode Island, USA, 24-28 April 2019

Call for Session Proposals: SAH Annual Conference, Providence, Rhode Island, USA, 24-28 April 2019

Deadline: Tuesday, January 16, 2018, at 5:00 pm CST

Conference Chair: Victoria Young, University of St. Thomas
Local Co-Chairs: Dietrich Neumann, Brown University, and Itohan Osayimwese, Brown University

The Society of Architectural Historians will offer a total of 36 paper sessions at its 2019 Annual International Conference in Providence, Rhode Island. The Society invites its members, including graduate students and independent scholars, representatives of SAH chapters and partner organisations, to chair a session at the conference. As SAH membership is required to chair or present research at the annual conference, non-members who wish to chair a session will be required to join SAH next August 2018 when conference registration opens for Session Chairs and Speakers.

Since the principal purpose of the SAH annual conference is to inform attendees of the general state of research in architectural history and related disciplines, session proposals covering every time period and all aspects of the built environment, including landscape and urban history, are encouraged.

Sessions may be theoretical, methodological, thematic, interdisciplinary, pedagogical, revisionist or documentary in premise and ambition and have broadly conceived or more narrowly focused subjects. Sessions that embrace cross-cultural, transnational and/or non-Western topics are particularly welcome. In every case, the subject should be clearly defined in critical and historical terms.

Proposals will be selected on the basis of merit and the need to create a well-balanced program. Topics exploring the architecture of Providence and the greater region are encouraged.

Since late submissions cannot be considered, it is recommended that proposals be submitted well before the deadline. Last-minute submissions that fail posting in the online portal or are sent in error via email cannot be considered.

Click here for more information.

Conference: Collecting Medieval Art: Past, Present and Future, Sam Fogg and Luhring Augustine at the SVA Theatre, New York, 27 January 2018

Sam Fogg and Luhring Augustine at the SVA Theatre, New York. 27 January 2018

Collecting Medieval Art: Past, Present and Future

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A symposium on the history of collecting medieval art, to be held in celebration of the exhibition ‘Of Earth and Heaven: Art from the Middle Ages’ [January 29 –March 10, 2018] at Luhring Augustine in conjunction with Sam Fogg, the world’s leading dealer in medieval art.

Every surviving art treasure of the Middle Ages has a unique material history spanning centuries. These precious objects have been traded, preserved, restored, lent and loved. Some passed through many hands, others remained untouched and forgotten for generations before returning to the spotlight. These histories of collections and collectors yield valuable insights into the medieval jewels that brighten the private and public art collections of today.

This symposium will consider practices of collecting medieval art in a unique setting, within galleries displaying many of the finest masterpieces of Medieval and Renaissance art still in private hands. Surrounded by monumental works like sections of Canterbury Cathedral’s south transept window and miniature treasures like a thirteenth-century Limoges reliquary chasse, speakers will explore attitudes to collecting medieval art in the past, present and future.

The symposium is free to attend, but guests should RSVP to rsvp@luhringaugustine.com before Wednesday, December 20, 2017 to reserve a place. Email Imogen.Tedbury@courtauld.ac.uk for more information.

9.30 am Doors open for registration and coffee

9.45am Welcome from Sam Fogg

10.00am Session 1: collecting and display chaired by Dr Sarah Guérin

Dr Paul Williamson – ‘Showing collections of medieval art: strategies of display, from private to public’

Dr Timothy B. Husband – ‘Collecting Medieval Art for The Cloisters: the three that got away’

11.30am coffee

11.45pm Session 2: collecting, cultural heritage and the art market chaired by Dr Nicholas A. Herman

Dr Martina Bagnoli – ‘Dealers, Collectors and Curators: a productive relationship in 19th century Italy’

Dr Jack Hinton and Dr Amy Gillette – ‘“A study close at hand of these fine examples of Gothic decoration”: the collecting, interpretation and display of the Taylor collection of English medieval woodcarvings’

13.15 lunch and chance to view the exhibition at Luhring Augustine

2.30pm Session 3: collecting medieval art, past and present

Professor Susie Nash – ‘Collecting art at the Courts of France in the late-fourteenth century’

Sir Paul Ruddock and Dr C. Griffith Mann – ‘In Conversation: Collecting Medieval Art Today’

3.45pm closing remarks from Dr C. Griffith Mann

4pm chance to view the exhibition at Luhring Augustine

CFP: ‘Excess,’ 34th Annual Boston University Graduate Symposium in the History of Art and Architecture, Boston University, Boston, MA, 2-3 March 2018

Call for Papers: Excess, 34th Annual Boston University Graduate Symposium in the History of Art and Architecture, Boston University, 2-3 March 2018
Deadline: December 1, 2017

Excess conjures the idea of the extractable, left over, too much, or “extra.” Looking closely at perceptions of the extraneous reveals excess to be a historically constructed category that marks shifting notions of cultural values. Deemed peripheral, abject, deviant, and tertiary due to factors such as geographic relationships or conceptions of power at a particular moment, excess is the focal point of the 34th Annual Boston University Graduate Symposium in the History of Art & Architecture.

We invite submissions that explore themes of excess. Topics may include but are not limited to the following: opulence; decoration; the grotesque; the carnivalesque; caricature; exuberance; indulgence; exaggeration; extremes of religious or social practice and ritual; extravagant lifestyle; expressions and critiques of abundance; so-called “luxury arts”; the overbuilt.

Papers must be original and previously unpublished. Please send an abstract (300 words or less), a paper title, and a CV to bugraduatesymposiumhaa@gmail.com. The deadline for submissions is December 1, 2017. Selected speakers will be notified by December 23, 2017, and are expected to accept or decline the offer within a week of notification. Papers should be 20 minutes in length and will be followed by a question and answer session.

The Symposium will be held Friday, March 2 – Saturday, March 3, 2018, with a keynote lecture (TBD) on Friday evening at the Boston University Art Gallery at the Stone Gallery and graduate presentations on Saturday at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

This event is generously sponsored by the Boston University Center for the Humanities; the Boston University Department of History of Art & Architecture; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Boston University Graduate Student History of Art & Architecture Association; and the Boston University Art Gallery at the Stone Gallery.

For additional information, please visit:
http://www.bu.edu/ah/students/graduate-student-history-of-art-architecture-association/the-symposium/

CFP: International conference: ‘Multiplied and Modified. Reception of the Printed Image in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries,’ University of Warsaw and the National Museum in Warsaw, June 28 – 29, 2018

Call for Papers: International conference: Multiplied and Modified. Reception of the Printed Image in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries, University of Warsaw and the National Museum in Warsaw, June 28 – 29, 2018
Deadline: 15 January 2018

Keynote speakers:
Jean Michel Massing (University of Cambridge)
Suzanne Karr Schmidt (The Newberry, Chicago)

The production of printed image consists of a multiplication of a particular design, whereas the consumption and reception of single impressions often involve various modifications. Multiple, but virtually identical woodcuts or engravings reproduce and thus disseminate the original composition, while at the same time they have lives of their own. They have been placed in various contexts, coloured, trimmed, framed, pasted into books and onto other objects. The place of prints in both visual and material culture of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries is a continuously growing field in recent scholarship. However, these studies usually focus on the most prominent centres of production situated in Italy, the Low Countries, France and the Empire. The principal aim of the conference Multiplied and Modified. Reception of the Printed Image in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries is to contribute to the research on the beginning and early development of the graphic arts from the perspective of the beholder, while broadening geographically the field of inquiry, i.e. by shifting the emphasis to the regions of Central Europe, the British Isles, the Iberian Peninsula, Dalmatia, as well as considering the reception of the European prints on other continents.
Possible topics include but are not limited to:
– Practices of consumption of printed images (owners and beholders, reasons for their interest in printed images; collecting and connoisseurship; printed images in public spaces and in households)
– Printed images in the early modern iconography and contemporary written sources
– Print market, copyright and censorship; printed images in confessional disputes
– Reproductive function of printed images and modifications, adaptations and transformations of original designs, matrices and single impressions
– Printmaking and bookmaking (role of illustrations in printed books as compared with handwritten illuminated codices; illustrated books and broadsheets, written commentaries to woodcuts and engravings)
We invite proposals from scholars of all disciplines working on the history of print culture.

Papers should be twenty minutes in length and will be followed by a ten-minute Q&A session.
Please e-mail an abstract of no more than 300 words to Magdalena Herman (multipliedandmodified@uw.edu.pl) by January 15, 2018.

Along with your abstract please include your name, institution, paper title and a brief biography of no more than 200 words. Successful applicants will be notified by February 19, 2018. Please indicate whether you would be interested in further developing your paper for a publication.

Reference / Quellennachweis:
CFP: Multiplied and Modified (Warsaw, 28-29 Jun 18). In: ArtHist.net, Oct 31, 2017. <https://arthist.net/archive/16627>.

CFP: Force, Resistance, and Mercy: Medieval Violence and Nonviolence, 30th Annual Medieval Studies Symposium, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, April 6-7, 2018

CFP: Force, Resistance, and Mercy: Medieval Violence and Nonviolence, 30th Annual Medieval Studies Symposium, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, April 6-7, 2018
Deadline: 24 November 2017.

Keynote: Elizabeth Allen, University of California, Irvine

The Medieval Studies Institute of Indiana University invites proposals for its 30th Annual Medieval Studies Symposium, April 6-7, 2018, in Bloomington, Indiana

Iron maidens, the Inquisition, the Crusades, witch burnings: these images of violence, both fact and fiction, are profoundly connected to the Middle Ages. Yet if in many popular conceptions, the medieval world is associated with brutality and suffering, the period also offers unique formulations of mercy, compassion, and the power of resistance. In exploring both medieval violence or nonviolence, this symposium seeks to examine specific structures of power and brutality but also to complicate the narrative of the violent Middle Ages.

We invite papers on any medieval discipline or region that engage issues of medieval violence and nonviolence: What functions did violence serve in the Middle Ages? How might acts of physical and rhetorical violence against othered groups (gendered, religious, cultural, racial, nonhuman) reflect larger concerns or anxieties within medieval culture? Is there a medieval aesthetic of violence? How does medieval music, art, theology, and literature glorify or critique brutality and/or suffering? How do medieval texts understand the uses and effects of verbal violence? How might medieval violence operate in a metaphorical sense, as violence done to texts or to the material past? What does nonviolence look like in the Middle Ages? Given the functions and pervasiveness of violence, what are some ways in which it is resisted and negotiated? What alternatives do medieval people or institutions offer to violence? How might medieval understandings of mercy or love act as a counter to violence? We also encourage papers on modern representations of the Middle Ages that consider to what extent and to what ends these medievalisms employ violence and nonviolence.

We are also excited to announce that graduate students whose papers have been accepted for the symposium are invited to submit their papers by March 2, 2018 to be considered for the IU Medieval Studies Symposium Paper Prize. Papers will be evaluated by a panel of IU medieval faculty. The prize of $250 will be awarded before the symposium to help defray the cost of travel, and the winner will be noted in the program.

Please submit 200 word abstracts or complete sessions proposals to IUMestSymposium@gmail.com by November 24, 2017.

Conference: Dialogues in Late Medieval Mediterranean, Granada, 13-14 November 2017

Conference: Dialogues in Late Medieval Mediterranean, Palacio de Carlos V – Alhambra, Granada, 13-14 November 2017
Registration deadline: Nov 8, 2017

Dialogues in Late Medieval Mediterranean: between East and West
2nd International Workshop of the ArtMedGIS Project

Free registration open until 8th November 2017 at: mmcobaleda@ugr.es; mmcobaleda@fcsh.unl.pt; iem.geral@fcsh.unl.pt

The aim of this International Workshop is to establish an exchange opportunity to analyse the cultural legacy of the Western Islamic societies from different and complementary perspectives.
To achieve this aim, a double objective has been proposed: to create a space for dialogue in order to share recent research results, as well as to establish new research networks integrated by experienced and young researchers thus allowing for the development of interdisciplinary research lines on the late Middle Ages.
Within this general framework, the main goal will be to analyse the Islamic cultural legacy in a comprehensive approach, from the multidisciplinary fields of History of Art, Architecture, History, Archaeology, Philosophy, Music and History of Religions.

PROGRAMME

Monday, 13th November 2017

9:45 Registration

10:00 Opening Session

10:15 Lecture
La Alhambra en el contexto del arte islámico
Juan Carlos RUIZ SOUZA (Universidad Complutense, Madrid)

Session 1: The Western Islamic Legacy

11:15
El legado Omeya: Córdoba y el Imperio Almohade
Rafael BLANCO GUZMÁN (LAAC-EEA-CSIC – Universidad de Córdoba)

11:45 Coffee break

12:15
El viaje de la Sebka almohade a través del Mediterráneo Medieval
Dolores VILLALBA SOLA (IEM – FCSH/UNL, Lisbon)

12:45
La culture matérielle des élites mérinides : vêtements et regalia comme emblèmes politiques (XIIIe-XVe s.)
Yassir BENHIMA (Université Paris III – Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris)

13:15
Aportaciones desde el Reino Nazarí de Granada a la configuración de la cuentística mediterránea del s. XV
Desirée LÓPEZ BERNAL (UGR, Granada)

13:45 Lunch

17:00 Lecture
La Zoraya como mecenas: el programa ornamental del palacio de “Daralhorra”. Nuevas propuestas
Cynthia ROBINSON (Cornell University)

18:00 Coffee break

18:15
Los bienes habices en la Granada del siglo XVI: pervivencia de una institución islámica en el Occidente cristiano
Ana María CARBALLEIRA DEBASA (EEA – CSIC, Granada)

Session 2: The Arts between East and West

18:45
Arte y ciencia en al-Andalus y el Mediterráneo bajomedieval: astrolabios almohades, nazaríes y ayyubíes en contexto
Azucena HERNÁNDEZ (Universidad Complutense, Madrid)

19:15
Modelos orientales en la producción textil andalusí
Laura RODRÍGUEZ PEINADO (Universidad Complutense, Madrid)

Tuesday, 14th November 2017

10:00 Lecture
Los ‘best-sellers’ de al-Andalus: recepción y valoración en el pasado y el presente
Maribel FIERRO (CCHS – CSIC, Madrid)

11:00
Spolia y revivals clásicos en los discursos de legitimidad: de Córdoba a las mezquitas mamelucas de El Cairo
Susana CALVO CAPILLA (Universidad Complutense, Madrid)

11:30
Eboraria sículo-normanda, andalusí y fatimí: transferencias iconográficas y propaganda visual
Noelia SILVA SANTA-CRUZ (Universidad Complutense, Madrid)

12:00 Coffee break

Session 3: Jews, Muslims and Christians: Three Religions and One Culture

12:30
Hacia una lectura global de los fenómenos epigráficos mediterráneos al final de la Edad Media
Vincent DEBIAIS (CESCM – CNRS, Poitiers)
Morgan UBERTI (Université Bordeaux Montaigne)

13:00
Rex Tyrannus or a self-aware Monarch? The fatimids influences on Roger II’s culture of power
Francesco Paolo TOCCO (University of Messina)

13:30
Dance, Music and Clothes: Distinctive Signs and Intercultural Relationships between East and West in Italian and Spanish Paintings during the first half of the 14th century
Maria PORTMANN (Conservator of the Historic Monuments in the Canton of the Valais, Switzerland)

14:00 Lunch

17:00
The impact of Sufism on Jewish Mysticim and its possible influence on Kabbalah
Dora ZSOM (Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest)

17:30
Jews and rabbis at the court of Mehmet the Conqueror according to Eliyyahu Capsali’s Seder Eliyyahu Zuta
Francesca Valentina DIANA (University of Bologna)

18:00 Coffee break

18:20 Closing lecture:
Relaciones artísticas entre Oriente y Occidente: el Proyecto ArtMedGIS
María MARCOS COBALEDA (IEM – FCSH/UNL, Lisbon)

Scientific direction and coordination:
María MARCOS COBALEDA (IEM – FCSH/UNL, Lisbon)

Organization:
ArtMedGIS Project (MSCA – H2020, No 699818)
Instituto de Estudos Medievais (IEM – FCSH/UNL, Lisbon)
In collaboration with:
Patronato de la Alhambra y Generalife
Universidad de Granada (UGR, Granada)

CFP: Force, Resistance, and Mercy: Medieval Violence and Nonviolence, 30th Annual Medieval Studies Symposium, Indiana University (6-7 April 2018) deadline 24 November 2017

Call for Papers: Force, Resistance, and Mercy: Medieval Violence and Nonviolence, 30th Annual Medieval Studies Symposium, Indiana University, April 6-7, 2018,

Keynote: Elizabeth Allen, University of California, Irvine

The Medieval Studies Institute of Indiana University invites proposals for its 30th Annual Medieval Studies Symposium, April 6-7, 2018, in Bloomington, Indiana

Please submit 200 word abstracts or complete sessions proposals to IUMestSymposium@gmail.com by November 24, 2017.