Medieval Art Research

Publication News: New Issue of Journal of Art Historiography

Number 9 of the Journal of Art Historiography is online! Of particular interest to the medieval art researcher is this issue’s focus on Travelling Artists in Medieval and Renaissance Europe, as well as a review of the 2012 publication Reassessing the Roles of Women as ‘Makers’ of Medieval Art and Architecture, edited by Therese Martin. See below for links to these contributions. In order to access all content of the journal’s new issue, please click here.

Travelling Artists in Medieval and Renaissance Europe:
Sandra Cardarelli, ‘Travelling Artists in Medieval and Renaissance Europe: An Introduction’ (PDF)
Sandra Cardarelli, ‘Antonio Ghini and Andrea di Francesco Guardi: Two 15^th-century Tuscan Artists in the Service of Local Governments’ (PDF)
Katja Fält, ‘Locality, nation and the ‘primitive’ – notions about the identities of late medieval non-professional wall painters in Finnish historiography from 1880 to 1940’ (PDF)
Michelle Moseley-Christian, ‘Confluence of Costume, Cartography and Early Modern European Chorography’ (PDF)
Cinzia Maria Sicca, ‘Vasari’s Vite and Italian artists in sixteenth-century England’ (PDF)

Review:

Kathryn A. Smith, ‘Medieval women are “good to think’ with”. Review of: Therese Martin, ed., Reassessing the Roles of Women as ‘Makers’ of Medieval Art and Architecture, Visualising the Middle Ages, volume 7, 2 vols, Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2012, 1, 280 pp., 287 b&w illustrations, 32 colour plates, ISBN: 978-90-04-18555-5 (hardback), E-ISBN: 978-90-04-22832-0, Euro 215.00 / US$ 299.00. (PDF)

Forthcoming Exhibition: Charlemagne. Power, Art and Treasure (Aachen 2014)

Forthcoming Exhibition:
Charlemagne. Power, Art and Treasure
Aachen, 20 June – 21 September 2014

Charlemagne died in Aachen on 28 January 814. 1200 years later, the City of Aachen will be putting on three special exhibitions on the life and works of this legendary Emperor of the Francs. Under the title “Charlemagne. Power, Art and Treasure”, the three exhibitions will run from 20 June to 21 September 2014 as part of the “Year of Charlemagne” celebrations. At three different locations within the boundaries of the former imperial palace, they will offer visitors the chance to see artistic masterpieces from Charlemagne’s court workshops, medieval church treasure, and a cultural history presentation on Charlemagne’s seats of power.

In the former King’s Hall, today’s Town Hall, the focus will be on Charlemagne’s palaces. Visitors will learn about courtly life in Carolingian times. The exhibition will portray how the king and military leader Charlemagne travelled from palace to palace and will display archaeological and cultural-historical evidence to outline the basis of his reign. It will illustrate what power meant in those days, and will trace the boundaries between historical fact and the myth of Charlemagne, a myth to which Aachen owes its status as the birthplace of modern Europe.

In the Centre Charlemagne, a new museum located at the heart of his original palace and due to open its doors in early 2014, visitors will be able to marvel at works of art from Charlemagne’s “Palatine School of Aachen”. Here, choice exhibits will offer an insight into the golden age of Carolingian culture. After centuries of being scattered all over Europe, priceless manuscripts, ivory carvings and goldsmith’s works originating from Charlemagne’s workshops in Aachen will once more be reunited in the Centre Charlemagne.

The Cathedral Treasury will not only be exhibiting the most important pieces from its own church treasure. For the exhibition, curator Georg Minkenberg will be bringing back to Aachen precious objects from the church treasures of Carolingian and medieval times, objects which originally belonged to the Aachen Cathedral Treasury but which fell into other hands in the course of history. The selection of sacred works of art will even feature objects said to be from Charlemagne’s grave.

Information and contact: http://www.charlemagne2014.eu

Call for Papers: Embodied Identities: Figural and Symbolic Representation of the Self in Anatolia (Istanbul 2014)

Call for Papers:
Embodied Identities: Figural and Symbolic Representation of the Self in Anatolia
Istanbul, 7-8 June 2014
Deadline: Feb 10 2014

This two-day workshop will be hosted at the Research Center for Anatolian Civilizations, Koç University, in Taksim. The organizers invite the submission of abstracts presenting excavation data relating to identity, territoriality and artistic expression of Anatolian personalities or groups, as well as investigations into the creation and manipulation of identity through material culture. The focus of the first day will be on theoretical and methodological approaches to identity in prehistoric Anatolia, while the second day will be open to papers concerning identity and self at any time period in Anatolian studies.

The main objective of the workshop is to investigate the embodiment of identity markers in literal and representative media; such as mortuary practices, personalization of tools, location of petroglyphs, and changing contexts of settlement planning. The archaeological focus of this workshop will enhance our perspectives on the relations between the self-determination of ancient Anatolians and their material context in Anatolia.

Abstracts of 300 words or fewer should be sent to ehughes@ku.edu.tr no later than midnight on February 10, 2014.

Call for Journal Submissions: “Cultural Heritage” (Middle East – Topics & Arguments)

Call for Journal Submissions: “Cultural Heritage”
Journal: Middle East – Topics & Arguments
Deadline: January 15 2014

The peer-reviewed online journal “Middle East – Topics & Arguments” is calling for papers for its next issue to appear in November 2014.

In order to bridge the gap between ancient and modern Near Eastern studies, the issue will deal with the tangible and intangible “cultural heritage” of the Near and Middle East, and its treatment from the invention of writing (or even before) until the modern era.

We are happy to accept articles from a broad array of disciplines which involve the Near and Middle East, including cultural studies, archeology, history, philology, anthropology, literature studies, sociology, political science, and economics. With regard to the interdisciplinary and debate-oriented culture of META, innovative approaches and controversial hypotheses are particularly welcome.

For more detailed information on the topic see http://www.meta-journal.net/announcement
Aims and scope of the journal are explained on http://meta-journal.net/about

Call for Papers: Galloping History (Ankara, 2014)

Call for Papers: Galloping History
Ankara, 16-19 April 2014
Deadline: Dec 20, 2013

There would hardly be any exaggeration in assuming that horses have been one of the most important companions to humankind since the development of civilized societies. Horses and equine culture have played great many roles in almost all historical epochs. Thus, historical inquiry has encountered this phenomenon in a diverse spectrum of fields, including but not limited to military, social, economic, cultural, and literary aspects of human life and its historical evolution. However, since the Industrial Revolution and the technological progress it brought about, especially in transportation, horses and equine culture gradually digressed from the realm of everyday life. The perception of horses and the culture associated with an interest in horses in the contemporary world, as being distinctive of a certain socio-economic class, undermines the true significance of humankind’s relationship with these animals.

For the purpose of elucidating this point, I. D. Bilkent University Department of History and Bilkent Historical Society, are jointly organizing a symposium entitled “Galloping History,” whose scholarly framework utilizes “horses” and “equine culture”. The panels to take place on the 17th and 18th of April, will specifically focus on “horses” and “equine culture” in Ottoman, European and American History. Researchers in the field, graduate students of all levels and history
enthusiasts are welcome to submit abstracts, to be evaluated by a board comprising of the Department of History faculty.

Galloping History Symposium welcomes abstracts that relate to the history of horses and equine culture, irrespective of any topic and field of study, so long as they have an Ottoman, European and/or American focus. The organisation committee welcomes history papers borrowing from various fields, related but not limited to:

– Socio-economic, military, diplomatic, cultural history
– Sociology
– Literature
– Art History
– Anthropology
– Philosophy
– Psychology
– Media, Modern Art
– Social and daily life

Abstract submissions are accepted either in Turkish or English. There
will be no simultaneous translation service. Abstracts of no more than
350 words should be sent to gallopinghistory@gmail.com, accompanied by
a short biographical note, no later than December 20, 2013.

During the course of the four-day-long event, all expenses at I.D. Bilkent University (accommodation and meals) will be covered but the participants are otherwise responsible for their own travel expenses. The finalized schedule of events and panels, will be shared with the
participants soon after the evaluation of abstracts is completed.

For further information and questions, please contact: gallopinghistory@gmail.com

Publications News: New Issue of RIHA Journal

Publications News: New Issue of RIHA Journal

A new issue of the RIHA journal is online now, including two articles of interest to medievalists: Iain Boyd Whyte on Nikolaus Pevsner (here) and Carla Varela Fernandes on medieval wooden sculpture from Portugal (here).

Publication News: New Issue of Al Masaq

Publication News: New Issue of Al Masaq. Islam and the Medieval Mediterranean

The latest issue of Al Masaq is now available online, including articles by Ermioni Karachaliou on the Island of Aegina, Florin Curta on markets in Tenth-Century al-Andalus, Ulisse Cecini on Mark of Toledo’s Latin Quran translation, and Ana Echevarria on Islamic confraternities and funerary practices.

Also reviewed in the journal are: Shipping, Trade and Crusade in the Medieval Mediterranean: Studies in Honour of John Pryor, The Legend of the Middle Ages: Philosophical Explorations of Medieval Christianity, Judaism and Islam, Byzantine Religious Culture: Studies in Honor of Alice-Mary Talbot, Coptic Christianity in Ottoman Egypt, and The Public Figure: Political Iconography in Medieval Mesopotamia.

See the journal online at Taylor and Francis Online: here.

Call For Papers: Art’s Productive Economies, Toronto

Call For Papers: Art’s Productive Economies
University of Toronto, March 20, 2014
Deadline: Jan 1, 2014

2014 Wollesen Memorial Graduate Symposium, a one-day graduate symposium hosted by the Graduate Union of Students of Art, University of Toronto.

Given the multivalent definitions “work” denotes (including, but not limited to: the product of labour; action involving effort directed toward a definite end; and the operation of a force in producing physical change), it is possible to understand the work of art – and noless, the art of work – through a wide range of critical perspectives. Whether in the process of making art, the products of art, and / or the overarching labour networks in which art exists, how can one think of work and art together in ways that do not unduly privilege one term over the other? How should one situate art as work within both creative and economic labour markets? And how – if at all – can one conceive work as art in light of the conditions those markets entail?
That is, how does work negotiate the material dimensions of labour, production, and capital vis-à-vis the aesthetic dimensions of practice, process, and products? Indeed, such questions only begin to scratch the surface of this relation that lays at the heart of aesthetic production. To these questions, we invite proposals for scholarly papers spanning all relevant fields and time periods that touch upon the relation between art and work within the aesthetic, social,
political, and cultural economies that encompass these terms.

Sample topics include, but are not limited to:
– Representations of work and/or workers throughout visual culture.
– The physical labour of artmaking processes and practices
– Distributions of labour within artist studios (e.g. those of
Rembrandt, Warhol, etc.)
– Disjunctions and correlations between conceptual and material labour
in artmaking and/or art institutions
– The practice of art history / curating / etc. as forms of “the work
of art”
– The aesthetic consequences of immaterial labour / post-Fordism /
economic globalization / etc.
– The unseen labour practices that support art institutions (e.g.
museum employees, art handlers, interns, etc.)
– The figure of the artist as worker
– The functional “work” of art objects.

Current graduate students may submit an abstract of 200-300 words (outlining 15-20 minute presentations) and a brief CV to gustasymposium@gmail.com by January 1, 2014.

Please see gustasymposium.wordpress.com for more information.

Call For Papers: Medworlds 6 “Symbols and Models of the Mediterranean”, Cosenza

Call For Papers: Medworlds 6 “Symbols and Models of the Mediterranean”
University of Calabria, Department of Humanities, September 9-11, 2014
Deadline: 1 March 2014

The Mediterranean Sea is a milieu in which it is possible to observe, through an interdisciplinary lens, the undertaking of elements defining an idea which conflicts with its immediate sensitive aspect; an idea that arises from life situations and the imaginary world of every man. Nevertheless, it remains a context in which is possible to observe the presence and the constant use of historical symbols, patterns and models of those people inhabiting its shores, as embedded in both the artistic and material production, as well as in the literary one.

The Mediterranean Sea could be investigated as a real geographical and historical referee, that has generated, and continues to generate symbols; but it can be also interpreted as the metaphor and allegory of the “encounters and clashes” between near and distant people. There are symbols and models by which is possible to perceive and understand convergences and contacts, and disclose common identities, even when considering specific differences of the people.

The theme of this interdisciplinary conference will focus on these issues:
– The symbols (signs, gestures, objects, animals, persons) capable of bringing to mind meanings deeply interconnected with the development of each of Mediterranean society.
– The importance of tangible and intangible models serving as examples to reproduce and imitate the evidence that have marked and conditioned the life of the Mediterranean people from a political, religious, economic, and social viewpoints.

We welcome the submission of 250-word abstracts for twenty-minute papers that broadly address the above themes, and that may address, but not be limited by, the following topics:
– Symbols and models disclosing common identities.
– Symbolical landmarks
– Symbols of the State and Political Power as institutional models
– Religious symbols
– Settlements patterns and historical-economic models
– Natural elements (living beings typical of the Mediterranean area bearing a symbolic value)
– Literary production as often recording the centrality of the Mediterranean as a complex and contradictory allegory.
– Redefining Mediterranean boundaries as precarious and mobile limits, but also as bridges between lands and shores
– The metaphor of the Mediterranean and the dialectic between the hegemonic power of the centers and the potential destabilizing peripheries.

Abstract Submissions:
Abstracts should be no more than 250 words and should include at least 3 descriptive keywords, the presenter’s name, email address, organization, and mailing address. The languages of the conference will be English and Italian.

Please send your abstract submissions to: m.salerno@unical.it; luca.zavagno@gmail.com

Notification of acceptance will be communicated by 1 April 2014

Call For Papers: Medieval Iberia and the Mediterranean, Modena

Call For Papers: Medieval Iberia and the Mediterranean, Modena
Modena, 26-29 June 2014
Deadline: 23 December

The Mediterranean Seminar/UCMRP seeks proposals for papers for a panel on Medieval Iberia and the Mediterranean to be proposed for the 45th Annual Meeting of the Association for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies, that will take place 26-29 June 2014 at the University of Modena e Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy.

Papers in any of the conference languages and from any relevant disciplines are welcome; graduate students are particularly encouraged to apply. Proposals should either situate Iberian historical phenomena in a Mediterranean or extra-peninsular frame, address the influence or movement of people, institutions, cultural trends, or engage in a inter-regional comparative analysis.

Please send a title, 250-word abstract and a 2-page CV, to brian.catlos@mediterraneanseminar.org with the subject heading “ASPHS proposal” no later than 23 December 2013. Please indicate if you will require audio-visual support. University of California faculty and graduate students may apply for travel assistance through the Mediterranean Seminar.