CRSBI lecture at Cardiff Archaeological Society, 19 October 2017 | CRSBI Training Session, Llandlaff Cathedral, 20 October 2017

Lecture: The Corpus of Romanesque Sculpture in Britain and Ireland: Achievements and Aspirations, Dr Ron Baxter FSA and Dr David Robinson FSA, Main Building, Cardiff University, Park Place, Cardiff CF10 3AT, Thursday 19 October 2017, 7.15pm

This lecture will review CRSBI’s achievements to date, and outline aspirations for Wales, looking at Romanesque sculpture from across the country.

Training Session: The following Friday, 20 October, Ron Baxter and David Robinson will be running a training session at Llandlaff Cathedral, from 10.00am to 3.00pm. The day is open to all who may be interested in becoming a fieldworker for the Corpus, or in simply finding out more about our work.

Dr Ron Baxter is the Research Director of CRSBI

Dr David Robinson is an independent historian and writer

 

Conference: Art and Economy in France and Italy in the 14th century: new research, Université de Lausanne, 19-20 October 2017

Conference: Art et économie en France et en Italie au XIVe siècle. Nouvelles enquêtes,Art et économie en France et en Italie au XIVe siècle. Nouvelles enquêtes, Université de Lausanne, 19-20 October 2017

Programme:

Jeudi 19 octobre 2017

Nicolas Bock, Michele Tomasi
Introduction

14h30 L’Italie au Trecento et au Quattrocento : da Giotto alla morte !

Damien Cerutti
Giotto & Cie. Réflexions sur le marché pictural florentin dans le deuxième quart du Trecento

Katalin Prajda
Finanze e attività imprenditoriale nelle industrie pittoriche, orafe e di carpenteria nella Firenze del primo Rinascimento. Come la seta divenne una specialità fiorentina

Fabio Marcelli
Arte, civiltà comunale ed economia nell’Appennino umbro-marchigiano

Giampaolo Ermini
Il cantiere del coro trecentesco del duomo di Orvieto: manovalanza, materiali, costi e finanziamenti

Paola Vitolo
Spese della morte: investimenti per l’aldilà (e per l’al di qua) e pratica artistica (Italia, XIII-XIV secolo)

Vendredi 20 octobre 2017

9h00 Les arts de luxe

Chiara Maggioni
Orfèvreries à Mantoue au XIVe siècle : frais, évaluations, valeurs de marché

Andrea Cravero
Vetri dorati e graffiti del basso medioevo: economia di una bottega assisiate e mercato fiorentino

Giampaolo Distefano
Le occasioni del mercato artistico parigino del Trecento e la carriera dell’orafo Jean le Braelier

11h30  Entre l’Italie et la France

Teodoro De Giorgio
La riorganizzazione del sistema fiscale della corte pontificia avignonese sotto Giovanni XXII (1316-1334) e il nuovo volto del mecenatismo artistico papale

Alain Salamagne
L’usage du bois précieux dans le château en France et en Bourgogne (1350-1450)

14h00 Perspectives méditerranéennes

Doron Bauer
Economic Fluctuations and Artistic Production in The Kingdom of Majorca

Francesco Ruvolo
Prima di Antonello. Nuovi culti, spazio sacro e potere economico, nella Messina tra Due e Trecento

15h00  En ouvrant encore les horizons

Étienne Anheim
L’économie du travail artistique au XIVe siècle en France et en Italie

Wim Blockmans
La spécificité du secteur de l’art dans l’économie du bas Moyen Âge
Conclusions

Conference: Intertwined Worlds: 10th Annual Lawrence J. Schoenberg Symposium on Manuscript Studies in the Digital Age

Conference: Intertwined Worlds: 10th Annual Lawrence J. Schoenberg Symposium on Manuscript Studies in the Digital Age, Free Library of Philadelphia/University of Pennsylvania Libraries, November 2-4, 2017

In partnership with the Rare Book Department of the Free Library of Philadelphia, the Schoenberg Institute of Manuscript Studies (SIMS) at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries is pleased to announce the 10th Annual Lawrence J. Schoenberg Symposium on Manuscript Studies in the Digital Age.

Despite the linguistic and cultural complexity of many regions of the premodern world, religion supplies the basis of a strong material and textual cohesion that both crosses and intertwines boundaries between communities. This symposium will highlight the confluence of expressions of belief, ritual, and social engagement emerging in technologies and traditions of the world’s manuscript cultures, often beyond a single religious context. It will consider common themes and practices of textual, artistic, literary, and iconographic production in religious life across time and geography, from ancient precedents to modern reception and dissemination in the digital age.

The program will begin Thursday evening at 5:00 pm on November 2nd, 2017, at the Free Library of Philadelphia, Parkway Central Library, with a keynote lecture by Phyllis Granoff, Yale University. The symposium will continue November 3rd-4th at the Kislak Center of Special Collections, Rare Books, and Manuscripts at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries.

Speakers include:

  • Iqbal Akhtar, Florida International University
  • Paul Dilley, University of Iowa
  • Ellen Gough, Emory University
  • Thibaud d’Hubert, University of Chicago
  • Zsuzsanna Gulácsi, Northern Arizona University
  • Ayesha Irani, University of Massachusetts, Boston
  • Shazia Jagot, University of Surrey
  • Samantha Kelly, Rutgers University
  • Jinah Kim, Harvard University
  • Gila Prebor, Bar-Ilan University
  • Michael Pregill, Boston University
  • Michael Stanley-Baker, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science
  • Columba Stewart, Hill Museum & Monastic Library and Saint John’s University
  • Justine Walden, University of Toronto
  • Tyler Williams, University of Chicago
  • Saymon Zakaria, Bangla Academy, Dhaka
  • Maayan Zhitomirsky-Geffet, Bar-Ilan University

Click here for program and abstracts.


Registration fee will be $35 ($10 for students with valid student ID). Registration open now until Nov 3, 2017. Click here to register. Walk-in registrations will be accepted for a fee of $45 ($15 for students with valid student ID) to be paid in cash.

The symposium is made possible with the generous support of the Center for Ancient Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

For more information on the Schoenberg Symposium Series, click here.

Research Group: Rede de Estudios Medievales Interdisciplinares – Research Network of Interdisciplinary Medieval Studies

The Rede de Estudios Medievales Interdisciplinares is the result of a collaboration between scholars researching Medieval Art at various departments of the University of Compostela, other Galician and Portuguese universities and the Instituto de Estudos Gallegos “Padre Sarmiento” del CSIC (Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas).

The group welcomes scholars in Spain and abroad, and runs various research activities, for example: cultural and formative site visits, training courses, events leading to multidisciplinary publications, website articles, European research projects.

To learn more and get involved in their research activities, visit their website. 

CFP: ‘The Italian South: Transcultural Perspectives 400-1500,’ CONVIVIUM journal

Call for Contributions: ‘The Italian South: Transcultural Perspectives 400-1500,’ CONVIVIUM. Exchanges and Interactions in the Arts of Medieval Europe, Byzantium, and the Mediterranean, special issue edited by Elisabetta Scirocco (Bibliotheca Hertziana – MPI) and Gerhard Wolf (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – MPI), published March 2018
Deadline for proposals: 20 September 2017
Deadline for article submission: 30 November 2017

tavola_strozzi_-_napoli
This thematic issue of the journal Convivium is dedicated to the Italian South from the 5th to the 15th century. It seeks papers that engage with the specific transcultural dynamics of a geographical and historical area containing highly diverse political, social, and religious entities, as well as with the multi-layered connectivities that can be traced in the Italian South, across the Mediterranean, and beyond.

We invite contributions from Art History, Archaeology, History, Anthropology, Paleography, and related disciplines that deal with the cultural diversity of Late Antique and medieval Southern Italy with special attention to sites, monuments, landscapes, images, and objects, as well as to the visual and aesthetic spheres in general. We are primarily interested in exploring horizontal and vertical dynamics, in terms of time (synchronicity/diachronicity) and space (global/Mediterranean/local scales). Papers with a theoretical and historiographical approach are particularly welcome.

Main topics to be addressed might include:

-Artistic contacts and interactions in the Italian South, in a transregional and global perspective
-Centripetal and centrifugal paths of exchange, transmission, and appropriation
-Cross-cultural migration of objects, images, and techniques among spaces, contexts, and media: practices of reuse, appropriation, and interpretation
-Sites, places, and spaces of cultural interactions, such as cities and courts
-Religious interactions in sacred space and rituals
-Local persistence and reinterpretation of the (antique) past in different political and/or cultural scenarios
-The fascination of the (medieval) Italian South, from the 18th century to the present day
-The notion of “Southern Italian”, as it relates to the study of medieval art, and its historiographical consequences

Proposals of max. 1 page should be sent by 20​ ​September 2017 to the editors: escirocco@gmail.com and dirwolf@khi.fi.it. The deadline for the submission of articles is 30 November 2017.

Convivium V/1 will be published in March 2018.

Articles Submission:
Contributions (30,000-40,000 characters including spaces, and up to 15 full-color illustrations) must be sent by 30 November 2017 to Karolina Foletti, executive editor of the journal: karolina.foletti@gmail.com.
Languages accepted: English, French, German, Italian.
Each article will be evaluated through a double-blind peer-review process.

For the Style Guide, please see: http://www.earlymedievalstudies.com/convivium.html

CFP: Rethinking the Medieval Frontier (University of Leeds, 10 April 2018), deadline 1 February 2018

Call for Papers: Rethinking the Medieval Frontier, University of Leeds, 10 April 2018
Deadline: 1 February 2018

Few topics in medieval studies have as much current relevance and activity as frontiers and borders. Yet approaches to their study in the Middle Ages are often untheorised, and compare, if at all, only to often outdated studies of the ancient or modern world. Yet medievalists are well placed, given the richness of their material and the complexity of medieval politics and society, to challenge such ‘classical’ ideas of The Frontier, whose weaknesses are now being exposed by current events. A fully comparative approach to the possibilities of what it meant to establish, live in or contest a frontier or border zone shown by the societies of late Antiquity and the Middle Ages can power the development of a new shared understanding of the processes at work where borders are laid down or transgressed.

The project Rethinking the Medieval Frontier has been exploring such ideas since 2015. Its first one-day conference, made possible by a British Academy/Leverhulme Trust Small Research Grant, will take place on 10th April 2018. Scholars at all levels working on frontiers and borders within the period 100-1500 CE, in any geographical area, are invited to offer papers addressing questions such as these:

  • Who defines or defined a frontier, and with what effect?
  • How did the medieval understanding of the world envisage or describe frontiers?
  • How was a frontier physically constituted?
  • Did military frontiers differ from other sorts of border, and if so how?
  • How do archaeologists’ views of medieval frontiers compare to those of historians?
  • What persons or groups crossed medieval borders, and why? Who was prevented from doing so, and how effectively?
  • What persons or groups lived in border zones, for what reasons?
  • How far did frontiers and borders create or inform medieval identities?
  • How do the insights of other disciplines studying frontiers apply to medieval societies, and how do medievalist disciplines differ in their study of frontiers?

Papers should be up to 15 minutes long and may be exploratory or experimental.

Comparison of more than one medieval society is encouraged. Titles and abstracts should be received by 1st February 2018. It may not be possible to accept all submissions. Some travel bursaries are available to allow attendance which might otherwise not be possible, including from outside the UK.

Submissions, as well as any other queries, should be sent to Jonathan Jarrett, School of History, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT, j.jarrett@leeds.ac.uk.

CFP: ‘Enchanted Environs: Architecture, Automata, and the Art of Mechanical Performance’, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, 10-13 May 2018

Call for Papers: Enchanted Environs: Architecture, Automata, and the Art of Mechanical Performance, International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, 10-13 May, 2018.
Deadline: 15 September 2017.

Sponsored by AVISTA (The Association Villard de Honnecourt for the Interdisciplinary Study of Technology, Science, and Art).

Organized by Zachary Stewart (Texas A&M University) and Amy Gillette (The Barnes Foundation).

Medieval spaces were often sites of spectacular performances animated by various kinds of mechanical installations—the most complex of which featured automata or self-operating devices. Some items survive in material form; the most notable examples are the famous mechanical clocks of Central Europe. Other items survive in textual form; examples range from the singing birds in the palace of Caliph al-Muqtadir, the dancing monkeys in the garden of Count Robert II of Artois, and the bowing angel in the coronation pavilion of King Richard II of England to the Throne of Solomon of Middle Byzantine Constantinople, the ritual statues of late medieval Spain, and the liturgical set-pieces of late medieval Italy. This session, enriched by the work of scholars such as Jean Gimpel and, more recently, Scott Lightsey and Elly Truitt, seeks to revisit the issue of mechanical installations as it relates to the history of the built environment—an area of academic research in which studies of human performance are many but studies of non-human performance are few. The working conceit of the session will be that of the Wunderkammer. Participants will deliver a series of shorter papers in order to facilitate a wide-ranging exploration of mechanical invention in the medieval world: Latin, Byzantine, and Islamic. Possible topics of inquiry may include individual case studies, modes of production and/or reception, and larger questions of historical evidence (physical, textual, and visual) and/or historical significance (political, social, and economic). Especially desirable are contributions involving technical reconstructions (analog or digital), theoretical speculations (phenomenological or ontological), and, in keeping with the mission of AVISTA, investigations of famous polymaths such as Ismail al-Jazari, Villard d’Honnecourt, and Leonardo da Vinci.

Please send an abstract (500 words max) and a Participant Information Form to Zachary Stewart (zstewart@arch.tamu.edu) and Amy Gillette (agillette@barnesfoundation.org) by 15 September 2017.

AVISTA is pleased to offer the annual, merit-based Villard de Honnecourt Award for the outstanding paper by a graduate student in an AVISTA session at the ICMS at Kalamazoo. It is based on evaluation of the candidate’s abstract and CV. This award, which comes with a $500 honorarium, is intended to further young talent in the study of medieval technology, science, and art. The Society is also pleased to offer up to two $500 grants-in-aid to graduate students or independent scholars to defray costs of attending the ICMS at Kalamazoo. Application for one of these grants consists of a 300-word statement of need and CV, which should be submitted to the session organizer(s) by September 15, 2017, together with the paper abstract and PIF form.

CFP: Medieval Eurabia: Religious Crosspollinations in Architecture, Art and Material Culture during the High and Late Middle Ages (1000-1600) at Annual Conference of the Association for Art History, UK, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London, UK, 5th-7th April, 2018

800px-french_ciborium_with_rim_engraved_with_arabic_script_and_islamic_inspired_diamond_shaped_pattern_limoges_france_1215_1230Call for Papers: Session on Medieval Eurabia: Religious Crosspollinations in Architecture, Art and Material Culture during the High and Late Middle Ages (1000-1600) at Annual Conference of the Association for Art History, UK, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London, UK, 5th-7th April, 2018
Deadline: 1st November, 2017

Panel organised by Sami De Giosa, Oxford University and Nikolaos Vryzidis, British
School at Athens
Email: aahchristianmuslimpanel2018@gmail.com
The coexistence of Christianity and Islam in the Medieval Mediterranean led to a
transfer of knowledge in architecture and material culture which went well beyond
religious and geographical boundaries. The use of Islamic objects in Christian
contexts, the conversion of churches into mosques and the mobility of craftsmen are
manifestations of this process. Although studies beginning with Avinoam Shalem’s
Islam Christianized (1996), have dealt extensively with Islamic influence in the West
and European influence in the Islamic Mediterranean, sacred objects, and material
culture more generally, have been relatively neglected. From crosses found in
Mosques, to European-Christian coins with pseudo/-shahada inscriptions, medieval
material culture is rife with visual evidence of the two faiths co-existing in both
individual objects and monuments.
This panel invites papers from scholars working on intercultural exchange in art,
architecture and material culture. We particularly welcome contributions that focus
on sacred objects that have been diverted or ‘converted’ to a new purpose, whether
inside or outside an explicitly religious context.
Papers should present original research, which expands the boundaries of
knowledge and which the scholars would like to be considered for publication.
Abstract should be no more than 250 words long.
 

 

CFP: Graduate and Early Career Workshop: Armenia and Byzantium without Byzantium without Borders, University of Vienna, 20-22 April 2018

5276587-schallaburg_castle-0Call for Papers: Graduate and Early Career Workshop: ‘Armenia & Byzantium
without Borders,’ University of Vienna, 20–22 April 2018
Deadline: 31 October 2017
Within the framework of ‘Moving Byzantium: Mobility, Microstructure and Personal
Agency,’ a five-year project begun at the University of Vienna in 2016 and funded through the Wittgenstein-Prize (http://rapp.univie.ac.at), ‘Armenia & Byzantium without Borders’ is a three-day workshop focussing on social and cultural mobility between Armenia and Byzantium in the Middle Ages. This workshop continues a scholarly conversation initiated in March 2017 at the University of Uppsala where a study-day dedicated to ‘Narrative Exchanges between Byzantium and Armenia’ was organized by Anna Linden Weller withinthe Uppsala/Paris ‘Text and Narrative in Byzantium’ project.
We invite advanced PhD candidates and early career scholars working in the fields of Late Antique, Armenian, Byzantine, and Middle Eastern Studies to submit proposals for 20 min. papers connected with the main topics of ‘Moving Byzantium’, with a focus on aspects of social and cultural mobility of persons, objects, and/or ideas between Armenia and Byzantium throughout the Middle Ages. We are particularly interested in new research showing interaction and communication on both literary and material grounds between the Byzantine world and the Armenians.
Each paper presented at the workshop will be accompanied by a senior scholar’s 10 min. response, followed by a general discussion.
The workshop will be inaugurated with the lecture of our keynote speaker, Prof. Bernard Coulie (Catholic University of Louvain), and will include a visit to the Mekhitarist Monastery of Vienna and a guided tour of the exhibition on ‘Byzantium and the West’ at the Schallaburg Castle.
Travel and accommodation expenses of scholars selected for presentation at the workshop will be covered by a generous grant of the ‘Moving Byzantium’ project.
Paper proposals should be sent by the 31st of October 2017 to Emilio Bonfiglio: emilio.bonfiglio@univie.ac.at. Applications will include:
a) university affiliation;
b) graduate level;
c) title of the paper;
d) abstract (max 250 words);
e) CV.
Convenors: Dr. Emilio Bonfiglio and Prof. Claudia Rapp

CFP: Venice, Materiality, and the Byzantine World, Sponsored by the Italian Art Society, 53rd International Congress on Medieval Studies, May 10-13, 2018, Western Michigan University

imgp4428CFP: Venice, Materiality, and the Byzantine World, Sponsored by the Italian
Art Society, 53rd International Congress on Medieval Studies, May 10-13,
2018, Western Michigan University
Deadline: 15 September 2017
The Dumbarton Oaks Byzantine Symposium leading to the 2010 publication of San
Marco, Byzantium, and the Myths of Venice introduced new perspectives on
Byzantine and Venetian visual and material culture that extended Otto Demus’s
survey of Saint Mark’s basilica. The authors’ application of more recent approaches—
such as the social function of spolia, the act of display, the construction of identity,
and cultural hybridity—brought fresh analyses to a complex and richly decorated
monument. This panel seeks to expand this methodological discourse by taking into
account questions related to materials, materiality, and intermediality between
Venice and Byzantium. The arrival of material culture from the Byzantine world to
Venice as gifts, spoils, or ephemera during the centuries surrounding the Fourth
Crusade allowed for both appropriation and conceptual transformation of material
culture. In light of the renewal in interest of Venice’s Byzantine heritage, this panel
seeks to reflect on the interaction of material culture between la Serenissima and the
Byzantine world, especially during the eleventh through fifteenth centuries. Topics
may be wide-ranging, including, but not limited to: issues of reception and cultural
translation; changing concepts of preciousness; different valuation of materials
between Venice and Byzantium; the fluctuating simulation of material visual effects;
the transformation of Byzantine objects incorporated into Venetian frames;
intermedial dialogue between Byzantine and Venetian art; and the process and
technique of manufacture of works between Byzantium and Venice. Some points of
departure may include: the building of San Marco itself; Byzantine objects in the
Treasury; Byzantine manuscripts included as part of the Cardinal Bessarion gift to
the Republic; the monuments on Torcello; or issues raised as a result of recent
conservation projects. New cross-cultural methodologies from art historical,
anthropological, or sociological fields are welcome.
Please submit a 300-word abstract and a completed Participant Information Form
(http://www.wmich.edu/medievalcongress/submissions) by September 15 to the
session organizers: Brad Hostetler, Kenyon College, hostetler1@kenyon.edu Joseph
Kopta, Pratt Institute, jkopta@pratt.edu
In addition to the travel awards available to all Congress participants (http://www.wmich.edu/medievalcongress/awards), the
Italian Art Society offers competitive travel grants:
http://italianartsociety.org/grants-opportunities/travel-grant-information