Medieval Art Research

Call for Papers: Illuminating the Dark Ages: Manuscript art and knowledge in the Early Medieval World (c. 600-1100), University of Edinburgh, 28-29/06/2018, Deadline 15/03/2018

CfP Edinburgh image.jpg

“Illuminating the Dark Ages” has been conceived as an international conference that aims to bring together researchers of all levels, including postgraduate students, working on the wider Early Middle Ages and the decorated manuscript as a cultural medium. From a variety of perspectives, this conference intends to shed light on how and why manuscripts were decorated in the early medieval period, from lavishly illuminated religious cycles to illustrations of works of Classical literature. Even though the geographical focus is put on the Latin West, comparative approaches to manuscript visual cultures and knowledge transmission in other cultural areas (roughly in the same chronological period), such as Byzantium or the Islamic world, are naturally welcomed.The keynote lectures will be delivered by Prof. Michele Bacci (Fribourg) and Dr. Felicity Harley-McGowan (Yale).Continue reading “Call for Papers: Illuminating the Dark Ages: Manuscript art and knowledge in the Early Medieval World (c. 600-1100), University of Edinburgh, 28-29/06/2018, Deadline 15/03/2018”

Conference: “Bells and Smells: Sensory Experiences of the Medieval Liturgy”, Senate House, University of London, 24/02/2018

Bells and Smells

The five senses occupied an ambiguous place in medieval religious life. For generations of theologians and pastoral writers, the senses were gateways for sin to enter body and soul. And yet, in the rarefied environment of liturgical performance, they became the means by which mortals could apprehend the Almighty. Imagery, music, incense, touch and even taste played a role in shaping medieval worshippers’ encounters with the sacred. The papers in this conference consider how the senses were employed and how they were a source of both religious solidarity and controversy.

Continue reading “Conference: “Bells and Smells: Sensory Experiences of the Medieval Liturgy”, Senate House, University of London, 24/02/2018″

CFP: ‘Art of The Invisible’, Courtauld Institute of Art (19 October 2018), deadline 14 May 2018

An interdisciplinary conference at The Courtauld Institute of Art exploring art’s relationship with the invisible.

‘He even painted things that cannot be represented …’, Pliny eulogized Apelles in his Naturalis historia. ‘How can we with mortal eyes contemplate this image whose celestial splendour the host of heaven presumes not to behold?’, asks a Byzantine hymn dedicated to the celebrated Image of Edessa. Cennino Cennini, in the first chapter of his Libro dell’arte, writes that painting ‘…calls for imagination, and skill of hand, in order to discover things not seen, hiding themselves under the shadow of natural objects, and to fix them with the hand, presenting to plain sight what does not actually exist.’ In her 1949 essay Some memories of Pre-dada: Picabia and Duchamp, Gabrielle Buffet-Picabia tried to summarise the art of her era: ‘It would seem … that in every field, the principal direction of the 20th century was the attempt to capture the “nonperceptible”.’

Art has been preoccupied with the invisible before, between, and beyond these disparate yet kindred statements. One of artists’ greatest challenges is and has been representing the invisible subject, in its many guises. Artists working in media based on perception, such as painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, and installation, must devise strategies to visualise the invisible: It is a foundational paradox of art.

Continue reading “CFP: ‘Art of The Invisible’, Courtauld Institute of Art (19 October 2018), deadline 14 May 2018”

Conference: Mediterranean Artistic Interaction, University of Malta (9 March 2018), Registration Deadline 7 March 2018

The Dynamics of Mediterranean Artistic Interaction in the Late Medieval and Renaissance Periods
International Conference – Department of Art and Art History, University of Malta

Convener: Dr Charlene Vella

13:30 – 14:00
Registration

14:00
Welcome

First session (14:15 – 16:00) — chaired by Keith Sciberras

14:15 – 14:45
Mario Buhagiar (University of Malta): The Siculo-Byzantinesque ‘Virgin of St Luke’ at Mdina Cathedral, Malta

14:45 – 15:15
Kayoko Ichikawa (Universitè de Fribourg): The thirteenth-century Coronation of the Virgin in the context of Mediterranean artistic interaction

15:15 – 15:45
Keith Buhagiar (University of Malta): The Central Mediterranean dimension of Maltese Medieval cave-churches and their artistic relevance

15:45 – 16:00 question time

16:00 – 16:30 break

Second session (16:30 18:30) — chaired by Mario Buhagiar

16:30 – 17:00
Michele Bacci (Universitè de Fribourg): Dynamics of Cultural and Artistic Exchange in Hospitaller Rhodes (1310-1522)

17:00 – 17:30
Charlene Vella (University of Malta): The Madonna del Soccorso triptych at the Mdina Cathedral Museum: attribution and new considerations

17:30 – 18:00
Peter Humfrey (University of St Andrews): Venice, Cyprus and Venus

18:00 : 18:30 question time

18:30 Reception

Registration form: https://www.um.edu.mt/arts/historyart/form

For more information, contact the convener, Dr Charlene Vella on charlene.vella@um.edu.mt

Venue: Auditorium, University of Malta Valletta Campus, St Paul Street, Valletta

Lecture Series: British Archaeological Association, Spring 2018

The British Archaeological Association is delighted to announce our upcoming lectures:

7 March – ‘Awake thou that sleepest: The Resurrection of Mary Magdalene in Central Europe’ by Dr Zoe Opacic
4 April – ‘Bridgwater Friary: A provincial town and the Franciscan friars in late medieval Somerset’ by Dr Hannah Wesyt
2 May – ‘ Inventing Vaults in the Twelfth Century: Salamanca, Al-Andalus and France’ by Dr Tom Nickson

All lectures take place at the Society of Antiquaries, Burlington House (Piccadilly) at 5.00 pm. Tea is available from 4.30 pm.

Further information about the BAA, the lectures and past events can be found on our website https://thebaa.org/

Conference L’architecture gothique, entre réception et invention. Impact, continuité et réinterprétation (xiie – xxe siècle) Journée doctorale du Centre Chastel 10/03/2018

Cette journée doctorale du Centre André Chastel est consacrée à une réflexion sur la réception de l’architecture gothique comme langage flexible, à même de créer de nouvelles formes artistiques.
L’ objectif de la rencontre est de faire dialoguer des jeunes chercheurs de formations et de pays divers autour de la portée et de l’influence de ce phénomène dans des contextes différents de celui d’origine, et de partager leurs réflexions méthodologiques, les problématiques et les résultats de leurs recherches.

La journée est organisée par Camilla Ceccotti et Emanuele Gallotta, doctorants en cotutelle de la Faculté des Lettres de Sorbonne Université, Paris (Centre André Chastel) et de l’Université de Rome « La Sapienza » (Dipartimento di Storia, Disegno e Restauro dell’Architettura), avec le soutien d’Antonella Fenech Kroke (chargée de recherche, CNRS) et de Thierry Laugée (maître de conférences, Faculté des Lettres de Sorbonne Université, Paris).

Continue reading “Conference L’architecture gothique, entre réception et invention. Impact, continuité et réinterprétation (xiie – xxe siècle) Journée doctorale du Centre Chastel 10/03/2018”

Call for Papers Metropolenbilder. Inszenierungen von Metropolität in Spätmittelalter und Renaissance (1200-1600) 26-27/11/2018 Deadline 15/05/2018

Notre-Dame-Cathedral-Paris

Der Aufstieg von Paris zur größten europäischen Stadt, zum Sitz der französischen Monarchie und zur führenden Universität des Abendlandes spiegelt sich in der zunehmenden Intensität der Diskurse über die Bedeutung der Seine-Stadt wider. In der Blütezeit des 16. Jahrhunderts schreiben sich Topoi wie diejenigen vom unvergleichlichen Paris („Paris sans Pair“) oder von der Weltstadt Paris („Lutetia non urbs, sed orbis“) in zahllose historiographische Texte, Briefe, Tagebücher, Karten und Bilder ein. Der Prozess der Bedeutungszuschreibung oder ‚Metropolisierung‘ beginnt aber schon im 12. Jahrhundert, und damit vor dem enormen Urbanisierungsschub des Spätmittelalters. Das Pariser Selbstbewusstsein, einem besonderen Gemeinwesen anzugehören, ist also nicht bloße Folge des demographischen, wirtschaftlichen und politischen Erfolges der Stadt. Die Diskurse über die Bedeutung moderieren vielmehr die Identitätsbildung als Metropole, aus deren Größe, Macht und Geschichte sich aktuelle politische oder kulturelle Ansprüche ableiten lassen. Ein solcher Prozess findet statt in Fremdzuschreibungen wie in Selbststilisierungen, Vergleichen mit historischen oder aktuellen Metropolen (Athen, Rom) und in der Multimedialität der Inszenierung. Entsprechende Selbstäußerungen können in fundierenden Stadtgeschichten (Gründungsmythen) und im Städtelob (Laus urbium) genauso verortet werden wie in Rechtstexten und Ego-Dokumenten, Ikonographie, Architektur oder herrschaftlichem Handeln.

Continue reading “Call for Papers Metropolenbilder. Inszenierungen von Metropolität in Spätmittelalter und Renaissance (1200-1600) 26-27/11/2018 Deadline 15/05/2018”

Call for Papers/Participation Interdisziplinärer Workshop: Verkörperte Konzepte – Personifikationen als Träger religiösen Wissens in Kunst und Literatur der Vormoderne 22-23/11/2018 Deadline 30/06/2018

Abstrakten Begriffen durch Personifikation eine körperliche Gestalt und eine Stimme zu geben, ist ein seit der Antike bekanntes ästhetisches Verfahren in Kunst und Literatur. Dieses diente nicht nur der Verlebendigung und der Überzeugung des Hörers bzw. Betrachters, wie es in Rhetoriktraktaten von der Antike bis in die Frühe Neuzeit formuliert wird. Die Übertragung eines abstrakten Begriffs in eine konkrete körperliche Gestalt leistete auch eine Veranschaulichung und Ordnung des jeweiligen Konzepts und der damit verbundenen Wissensbestände. Dieses Verfahren konnte damit zugleich zur Aktualisierung, Erzeugung und Transformation von Wissen beitragen. Grundlage des Workshops ist demnach ein Personifikationsbegriff, der dieses ästhetische Verfahren nicht einfach als Wiederholung der immer gleichen Gestaltungsmittel und Attribute versteht, sondern ihm ein eigenes epistemisches Potential beimisst.

Call for Papers 4th Conference of the International Bridges Group in Regensburg (August 25 – 26, 2018) Deadline 28/02/2018

Regensburg

After three successful conferences in London, Prague and Salisbury, the International Bridges Group will meet next in Regensburg on August 25 & 26, 2018. This year, we will cooperate with the “Gesellschaft für Stadtgeschichte und Urbanisierungsforschung” (https://gsu-stadtgeschichte.com/), the Chair of European History at Regensburg University and the Research Training Group KRITIS at Technische Universität Darmstadt. The conference willbring together historians, art historians, linguists and literary scholars, archaeologists and engineers in order to present and discuss new ideas on medieval bridges and the cities in which these bridges reside. Topics may include the construction and maintenance of medieval bridges, the evolution and growth of medieval cities with stone bridges, the iconography of statues on bridges, the functions (practical and symbolic) of stone bridges, and the types of institutions connected with medieval bridges. Bridges as a cultural heritage could be another topic: How are medieval bridges in cities today perceived, preserved, staged and marketed?

Continue reading “Call for Papers 4th Conference of the International Bridges Group in Regensburg (August 25 – 26, 2018) Deadline 28/02/2018”

Lecture Emmanuele Lugli “Chasing Absence: The Body of Christ and the Measures to Enter in Touch with it” 17:00 13/02/2018 Birkbeck

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.

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. We hope to see you there.