International Cultural Workshop: REDISCOVERING THE CULTURAL HERITAGE OF UPPER SVANETI, GEORGIA (26 July - 4 August 2024), Mestia, Svaneti, Due 15 March 2024

International Cultural Workshop

REDISCOVERING THE CULTURAL HERITAGE OF UPPER SVANETI, GEORGIA

26 July – 4 August 2024, Mestia, Svaneti

Due 15 March 2024

https://old.tsu.ge/en/

This project takes place in Upper Svaneti, the spectacular mountainous region of Western Georgia, which not only has an abundance and variety of cultural heritage, but also a unique way of life. Even today, the local population preserves various pre-Christian beliefs and rituals. In Upper Svaneti, medieval churches and residences with defense towers have been preserved in their original forms. Almost all these churches are decorated with paintings, and  original treasuries are kept in most of them: medieval painted and revetted icons, crosses, ecclesiastic vessels created in local workshops or many other regions of the Christian East and the West. Exposure to this extraordinary material will provide all students of medieval art with an entirely new perspective on their field.

The ten-day workshop will enable ten PhD and MA students to visit significant monuments of cultural heritage in Upper Svaneti, to take part in discussions on-site, and to engage in various field activities.

The workshop will be held in English.

The International Cultural Workshop is organized by the Institute of Art History and Theory at Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, in cooperation with the College of Arts & Sciences at Syracuse University and the Art History Department at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. The project partner is the Svaneti Museum of History and-Ethnography.

The International Cultural Workshop (RCHUS) is funded under the US Embassy Georgia Cultural Small Grants Program.\

Application period
22 January to 15 March 2024 (00:00/Georgian Time Zone: UTC + 4)
The selection results will be announced on 8 April.

Eligibility
Applicants of any nationality must currently be enrolled in an MA or PhD program in Medieval or Byzantine art history or a related field.

Documents to be submitted:

– Application form with other three documents:

– Curriculum vitae (with list of publications/presentations, maximum 3 pages)

– Cover letter outlining interest in the program (maximum 300 words)

– Recommendation letter

The application must be in English.

See here for Application form: https://forms.gle/GLAacswWY5VBHDrk7

Fees and Funding

The International Cultural Workshop (RCHUS) is free of charge: will cover travel from Tbilisi to Mestia, field trips, hotel accommodation and meals in Upper Svaneti.

The workshop participants must cover their own international flights to and from Georgia, and hotel accommodation in Tbilisi. However, there are limited funds for participating students in the project budget for partial covering the international transportation and accommodation in Tbilisi. Please clarify your need for funding on your Application form.

For further information, please contact: svaneti.workshop@gmail.com

Call for Applications: Summer Course for the Study of the Arts in Flanders 2024 ‘Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture’, 23 June - 3 July 2024, Due By 10 March 2024, 5PM CET

Call for Applications

Summer Course for the Study of the Arts in Flanders 2024 ‘Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture’

23 June 2014- 3 July 2024, BelGium

Due By 10 March 2024, 5 p.m. (Central European Time).


Annually, the Summer Course for the Study of the Arts in Flanders brings a select group of 18 highly qualified young researchers to Flanders. They are offered an intensive 11-day programme of lectures, discussions, and visits related to a specific art historical period of Flemish art. The Summer Course provides the participants with a clear insight into the Flemish art collections from the period at hand, as well as into the current state of research on the topic.

The 8th edition of the Summer Course will focus on ‘Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture’. It will be held from 23 June until 3 July 2024. Excursions will be made to Leuven, Antwerp, Brussels, Bruges, Mechelen, Breda, Rotterdam, Maastricht, Liège, Aachen, Geel, Zuurbemde, Zoutleeuw. The language of the Summer Course is English.

More information on the programme, grants, how to apply, ... on bit.ly/summercourse8

The Summer Course for the Study of the Arts in Flanders is a joint initiative of: M Leuven, KMSKA, MSK Gent, Musea Brugge, Mu.ZEE, Ghent University, KU Leuven, Rubenshuis/Rubenianum, Flemish Art Collection, meemoo.

Structural content partners for this edition are: Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage (KIK-IRPA), Royal Museums of Art and History Brussels.

This edition is coordinated by: Flemish Art Collection, meemoo and M Leuven.

DH Institute in Vercelli: Medieval Manuscripts in a Modern World, Museo del Tesoro del Duomo e Archivio Capitolare di Vercelli, Application Due 15 February 2024 (Rolling Until 1 March 2024)

DH Institute in Vercelli: Medieval Manuscripts in a Modern World

Museo del Tesoro del Duomo e Archivio Capitolare di Vercelli

First-round application deadline: February 15
Final application deadline: March 1

Before and After MSI processing on one of the Vercelli Scrolls

The Videntes Team and staff of the Museo del Tesoro del Duomo di Vercelli are excited to announce that registration is open for our Digital Humanities summer institute in Vercelli, Italy in June 2024.

The institute will begin with an optional welcome aperitivo the evening of June 16th. Workshops and lessons will begin the morning of June 17th and continue through the afternoon of Saturday, June 22nd.

To apply, please fill out the Google application form, which will include a current CV or resume and statement of interest. For first round consideration, the application deadline is February 15 (applicants will be notified by February 23, 2024). Rolling applications will continue to be accepted through March 1, 2024.

Please find attached the flyer for the institute. If you have further questions, please contact us via the website comment form or email us at videntesmsi@gmail.com.

For more information, see https://videntesmsi.com/medieval-manuscripts-in-a-modern-world/

Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture: Byzantium as Europe’s Black Mirror, Anthony Kaldellis, 16 February 2024 12:00 PM EST (ZOOM)

Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture

Byzantium as Europe’s Black Mirror

Anthony Kaldellis, University of Chicago

Friday, February 16, 2024 | 12:00 PM EST | Zoom

The Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture is pleased to announce the 2023–2024 edition of its annual lecture with the Harvard University Standing Committee on Medieval Studies.

In the course of its long self-fashioning, “the West” (later “Europe”) set itself off as a superior alternative to a number of imagined Others, including the infidel world of Islam, the primitive nature of the New World, and even its own regressive past, the Middle Ages. This lecture will explore the unique role that Byzantium played in this process. While it too was identified as the antithesis of an idealized Europe, this was done in a specific way with lasting consequences down to the present. Byzantium was constructed not to be fully an Other, but rather to function as an inversion of the Christian, Roman, and Hellenic ideals that Europe itself aspired to embody even as it appropriated those patrimonies from the eastern empire. It became Europe’s twin evil brother, its internal “Black Mirror.” Once we understand this dynamic, we can chart a new path forward for both scholarly and popular perceptions of the eastern empire that are no longer beholden to western anxieties.

Anthony Kaldellis is a Professor of Classics at the University of Chicago.

Advance registration required at https://maryjahariscenter.org/events/byzantium-as-europes-black-mirror.

This lecture is co-sponsored by the Harvard University Standing Committee on Medieval Studies.

Contact Brandie Ratliff (mjcbac@hchc.edu), Director, Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture with any questions.

Online Discussion: Now You See It, Now You Don’t: Sustainable Access in a Digital Age, Wednesday 7 Feb. 2024, 17:00-18:30 GMT/14:00-15:30 EST

Online Discussion

Now You See It, Now You Don’t: Sustainable Access in a Digital Age

Wednesday 7 February 2024, 17:00-18:30 GMT/14:00-15:30 EST

The interruption in digital services at the British Library has called into question our reliance on online systems to consult medieval manuscripts. in an unexpected twist, the cyber attack simultaneously put the physical manuscripts at the British Library out of reach also. This timely conversation will reflect on the current situation, offering perspectives on sustainability and how we might rethink our practices after this startling reminder of the ephemeral nature of the digital.

Speakers will include Benjamin Albritton, Stewart J. Brookes, Stephen G. Nichols, Suzanne Paul, Dot Porter, Andrew Prescott, and Elaine Treharne

Moderated by Laura Morreale

Organized by Digital Medievalsit and kindly hosted online by the Centre for the Study of Book, Bodleian Libraries

To register, visit this link.

Medieval Lecture and Seminar Series: Chivalry, justice and love: Royal architecture in fourteenth-century Castile, Elena Paulino-Montero, At The Courtauld, 6 Mar. 2024 17:30-19:00

Medieval Lecture and Seminar Series

Chivalry, justice and love: Royal architecture in fourteenth-century Castile

Dr. Elena Paulino-Montero, Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia

VERNON SQUARE CAMPUS, LECTURE THEATRE 2, THE COURTAULD

Wednesday 6 March 2024, 17:30 - 19:00

Crónica troyana (c. 1350). Biblioteca del Escorial. Ms. h-I-6, f. 13v.

14th-century Castile was characterized by great creativity in the field of architecture, culminating with the construction of the famous Alcazar of Seville and reforms to the Alcazar of Segovia. Those monuments were possible thanks to the previous decade’s artistic experimentation in which cross-cultural exchanges with al-Andalus and the Mamluks played a key role. During this time, the kingdom of Castile was marked by a profound political crisis and architecture, sculpture and literature were crucial in the construction of an ideal image of power, in which queens assumed a leading role.

This talk will analyze the process of codification of royal spaces in Castile in the 14th century. The objective is twofold. On the one hand, it will analyze the development of this architecture in parallel to the development of a courtly and chivalrous image of the Castilian monarchs in which Islamic models played a fundamental role. On the other hand, it will present the active role of the queens in the realm of architecture.

Elena Paulino-Montero is lecturer of Medieval Art at the Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia. Previously she was assistant professor at the Complutense and postdoctoral fellow at the UNED. Her research is devoted to patronage and transcultural artistic during the Late Middle Ages in the Iberian Peninsula. She is part of the Cost-Action 18129 “Islamic Legacy. Narratives East, West, South North of the Mediterranean (1350-1750)”. She is also the principal investigator of the project “Women and the Arts in Medieval Castile: Patronage, reception and agency”, funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation.

Organised by Dr Tom Nickson (The Courtauld) as part of the Medieval Lecture and Seminar Series. 

For more information and to book tickets, visit https://courtauld.ac.uk/whats-on/chivalry-justice-and-love-royal-architecture-in-fourteenth-century-castile/

Panel Discussion and Book Launch: Venetian Disegno: New Frontiers, The Courtauld, London, 8 Feb. 2024, 17:00-18:30

Panel Discussion and Book Launch

Venetian Disegno: New Frontiers

Vernon Square Campus, Lecture Theatre 2, The Courtauld, London

8 February 2024, 17:00 - 18:30

Vittore Carpaccio, Studies of a Seated Youth in Armor, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

The relationship between disegno (drawing or design) and Venetian art has historically been a problematic one. Giorgio Vasari’s notion that painters from Venice and the Veneto were mainly focused on colore and not trained in or accustomed to drawing became a commonplace in the literature on Venetian art. The title of this book, Venetian Disegno, would for him imply an unacceptable paradox. This view can no longer be sustained in light of modern scholarship, and it is clear that drawing played a crucial role in the education and the artistic practice of artists from Venice and the Veneto region. From the fifteenth onwards, drawing was a vital form of expression in Venice. With contributions by 23 leading scholars and curators, Venetian Disegno offers a fresh perspective on Venetian art, illustrating the importance of disegno and the study of drawings for artistic practices in the lagoon city.

Organised by Irene Brooke, Lecturer in Renaissance Art, The Courtauld; Ketty Gottardo, Martin Halusa Senior Curator of Drawings, The Courtauld; Guido Rebecchini, Professor of Sixteenth-Century Southern European Art, The Courtauld.

Dr. Maria Aresin is a specialist in the field of Venetian drawing. She earned a PhD from the University of Frankfurt. Since 2020-21 she has been assistant curator of the catalogue of Venetian drawings at the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung in Munich. In 2022 she was Head of Prints and Drawings at the Landesmuseum Mainz. Since May 2023 she has been curator for works on paper (15th to 18th centuries) at the Kupferstichkabinett of the Kunsthalle Bremen.

Dr. Paul Holberton has published extensively on the art of the Venetian Renaissance and runs Paul Holberton Publishing which is recognised internationally as one of the finest publishers of books on art. His most recent scholarly work, A History of Arcadia, is a long-awaited study of the pastoral genre in textual and visual sources from the classical though the early modern period.

For more information and to book tickets, visit https://courtauld.ac.uk/whats-on/venetian-disegno-new-frontiers/

Call for Applications: Grants for Research on Chartres Cathedral for PhD Candidates and Emerging Scholars, The American Friends of Chartres, Due 29 March 2023

Call for Applications

Grants for Research on Chartres Cathedral for PhD Candidates and Emerging Scholars

The American Friends of Chartres

Due 29 March 2023

https://www.friendsofchartres.org/

The American Friends of Chartres annually offers a stipend of  $2,500.00 to current graduate students and emerging scholars to carry out research projects that promise to advance knowledge and understanding of the cathedral of Notre-Dame de Chartres or its historical contexts in the medieval to early modern periods. The grants support projects requiring on-site research in Chartres. Topics in the fields of art history, history, or related disciplines might include architecture, stained glass, sculpture, urban development, economy, religious practices, manuscripts, or the cathedral treasury, among other topics. Following the research project, the grantee is asked to provide a synopsis of the research and conclusions, which will be publicized through the cultural activities and website of the American Friends of Chartres. 

The American Friends of Chartres facilitates lodging in Chartres for grant recipients, as well as access to the cathedral, the Centre International du Vitrail, the municipal library, archival collections and related resources.

Questions about the grant may be addressed to ChartresResearchGrant@gmail.com.

Applicants should currently be pursuing a Ph.D. or have received the degree within the last six years.

Applicants should supply:

• A description of up to 500 words of the proposed project, including:

  • questions to be researched and their importance to scholarship on the art, culture, or history of Chartres;

  • requirements for access to monuments, works of art, and archival resources;

  • projected length of time and tentative dates to be spent in Chartres;

  • expectations for publication of conclusions, whether alone or as part of a larger project, including a Ph.D. dissertation, article, or book.

• A current Curriculum Vitae

• Names and contact information of two references

Please send application materials as e-mail attachments in Word or PDF format to ChartresResearchGrant@ameliahyde

The deadline for applications is 29 March 2024.

To learn more about the application, visit https://sites.google.com/view/chartres-research-grants/home, and to learn more about the American Friends of Chartres, visit https://www.friendsofchartres.org/

The Servane de Layre-Mathéus Fund for Research on Chartres Cathedral
The American Friends of Chartres has established a special fund honoring the memory of Servane de Layre-Mathéus (1939-2020), co-founder of Chartres–Sanctuaire du Monde, of the Centre International du Vitrail, and of American Friends of Chartres. Servane dedicated much of her life to the preservation of Notre-Dame de Chartres Cathedral, and to the pursuit and transmission of knowledge of medieval art, culture, and spirituality. In recognition of her contributions, she was made chevalier of the Légion d’honneur, officier des Arts et des Lettres, and officier de l’ordre national du Mérite. The fund is intended to support research that furthers her work.

Lecture, The Murray Seminars at Birbeck: Faith, Race and the ‘Other’ in North Italian Sculpture, c.1480-1700, Andrew Horn, 6 Feb. 2024 12:00-13:30 GMT (7:00-8:30 ET) In-Person & Online

Lecture, The murray Seminars at Birbeck

Faith, Race and the ‘Other’ in North Italian Sculpture, c.1480-1700

Dr. Andrew Horn, Associate Lecturer, School of Art History, University of St Andrews

Tuesday, 6 February 2024 12:00 - 13:30 GMT

In-Person (Birkbeck, School of Historical Studies) & Online

Northwest Italy in the early modern period witnessed a flourishing of religious sculptural ensembles, rendered in polychrome terracotta and wood, representing scenes from Christ’s Passion and death. Works of this genre range from intimate scenes of the Deposition and Lamentation above altars in churches, to series of elaborate multimedial chapels situated on the ‘Sacri Monti’, pilgrimage sites at the foot of the Italian Alps. In addition to the main protagonists, the dramatic cast of these ensembles often feature characters whose skin colour, costume or physical characteristics identify as non-European, non-Christian or in some way set apart from European Christian society of the time. Examining a selection of these artworks in relation to devotional treatises, religious plays and historical records of public policy from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, this paper considers what the representation of these outsiders––these ‘others’––may reveal about faith and society in premodern Europe. What roles do such figures serve within the drama of Christian salvation history?

To register to attend online, click this link.

To register to attend in-person, click this link.

Call for Applications: Ochs Scholarship, British Archaeological Association, Due 1 February 2024

Call for Applications

British Archaeological Association

Ochs Scholarship

Due 1 February 2024

The Ochs Scholarship was established in 1994 from a bequest by Maud Lillian Ochs, and is awarded annually by the British Archaeological Association for research projects which fall within the Association’s fields of interest. These are defined as the study of archaeology, art and architecture from the Roman period until the nineteenth century, principally within Europe. The scholarships are intended to provide post-graduate students striving to write up theses with late stage funding. To be eligible  the thesis must be capable of completion within the period of the Scholarship, which is for one year from a nominated starting date by the end of the calendar year in which the scholarship is awarded. Thus, an application made in early 2024 might have a nominated starting date of October 2024 and result in the submission of a thesis by October, 2025. Applications where a substantial amount of fieldwork remains to be done are unlikely to succeed.

The next closing date for applications is 1 February, 2024.

For more information, https://thebaa.org/scholarships-awards/ochs-scholarship/

Exhibition Closing/Moving: Ethiopia at the Crossroads, The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, Until 3 March 2023

Exhibition Closing/Moving

Ethiopia at the Crossroads

Centre Street Building, Level 1

The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, Maryland

3 December 2023-3 March 2024

Folding Processional Icon in the Shape of a Fan (detail), Ethiopia, late 15th century. Museum purchase with funds provided by the W. Alton Jones Foundation Acquisition Fund, 1996.

The Walters Art Museum presents an extraordinary exhibition celebrating the artistic traditions of Ethiopia from their origins to the present day. Ethiopia at the Crossroads is the first major art exhibition in America to examine an array of Ethiopian cultural and artistic traditions from their origins to the present day and to chart the ways in which engaging with surrounding cultures manifested in Ethiopian artistic practices. Featuring more than 220 objects drawn from the Walters’ world-renowned collection of Ethiopian art and augmented with loans from American, European, and Ethiopian lenders, the exhibition spans 1,750 years of Ethiopia’s proud artistic, cultural, and religious history.

Seated in the Horn of Africa between Europe and the Middle East, Ethiopia is an intersection of diverse climates, religions, and cultures. Home to over 80 different ethnicities and religious groups, a large portion of the historic artistic production in Ethiopia supported one of the three Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), all of which have early roots in Ethiopia. As one of the oldest Christian kingdoms, Ethiopian artists produced icons, wall paintings, crosses of various scales, and illuminated manuscripts to support this religious tradition and its liturgy.

Ethiopia at the Crossroads examines Ethiopian art as representative of the nation’s notable history, including its status as an early adopter of Christianity and the only African nation that was never colonized, and demonstrates the enormous cultural significance of this often-overlooked African nation through the themes of cross-cultural exchange and the human role in the creation and movement of art objects. In particular, the exhibition traces the creation and movement of art objects, styles, and materials into and out of Ethiopia, whether across the Red Sea, the Arabian Sea, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Indian Ocean, or within the African continent, especially up the Nile River.

Visitors will see painted Christian icons, church wall paintings, healing scrolls, bronze processional crosses, colorful basketry, ancient stone and 20th-century wood sculpture, contemporary artworks, and more. Some of the earliest surviving illuminated manuscripts from Ethiopia are on view along with secular objects produced and utilized by Ethiopians, including coins minted by generations of Aksumite rulers and textiles used for manuscript bindings and garments.

Works by contemporary Ethiopian artists—such as Wax and Gold X (2014) by Wosene Worke Kosrof, a painting utilizing graphic, abstracted forms of Amharic script, the Semitic language widely spoken in Ethiopia and descended from Gəʿəz, an ancient written system indigenous to Africa, and All in One (2016) by Aïda Muluneh, featuring a woman wearing body paint inspired by traditions of African body art and a composition reminiscent of Ethiopian church paintings of the Virgin Mary—are juxtaposed with the historic works to help visitors comprehend and connect with the multiplicity of cultures and histories presented.

Tsedaye Makonnen, guest curator of contemporary art for the exhibition and an Ethiopian American multidisciplinary artist in her own right, will share in-gallery insights about the tangible effect the historic artworks have on these artists, who frequently incorporate their themes, motifs, and stylistic features in varying degrees.

This exhibition is co-organized by the Walters Art Museum, Peabody Essex Museum, and the Toledo Museum of Art. The exhibition will travel to the Peabody Essex Museum April 13–July 7, 2024, and to the Toledo Museum of Art August 17–November 10, 2024.

For more information, https://thewalters.org/exhibitions/ethiopia-crossroads/

Call for Applicants: Mediterranean Art History: An Introduction, Mediterranean Studies Summer Skills Seminar (17—20 June 2024, Remote), Due By 15 April 2024

Call for Applicants

Mediterranean Art History: An Introduction

Mediterranean Studies Summer Skills Seminar

17—20 June 2024, Remote

Led by Dr. Karen Rose Mathews, University of Miami

Due by 15 April 2024

This online Summer Skills Seminar provides participants with an overview of key concepts and methodologies in the study of Mediterranean art history. The course will address the themes of mobility, connectivity, and encounter in relation to the visual culture of peoples and territories across the sea. Participants will acquire an art historical tool kit to assist them in conducting their own research on the visual culture and artistic production of the medieval Mediterranean.

Proposed Program

Monday, 17 June 2024: Who?—People
10am-12pm & 1-3pm MDT (12-2pm & 3-5pm ET)

1. Patrons, artists, merchants, and producers
2. Patronage, production, dissemination of artworks, and reception theory

Tuesday, 18 June 2024: What?—Things
10am-12pm & 1-3pm MDT (12-2pm & 3-5pm ET)

1. Materials, aesthetics, and symbolism
2. Theoretical approaches to objects and things

Wednesday, 19 June 2024: Where?—Places
10am-12pm & 1-3pm MDT (12-2pm & 3-5pm ET)

1. Sense of place and space in the Mediterranean
2. Mediterranean spaces: Case studies

Thursday, 20 June 2024: How?—Routes, Vectors, and Means of Communication
10am-12pm & 1-3pm MDT (12-2pm & 3-5pm ET)

1. Mediterranean environment: Motivations and vectors of exchange
2. Approaches to medieval Mediterranean visual culture

Application period: 15 April 2024
Acceptance/Stand by Notifications: 21 April 2024

For more information about the program, please see the link: https://www.mediterraneanseminar.org/overview-mediterranean-art-2024

New Video! Friends of the ICMA presents Medieval Coming Attractions 2023-2024, 11 December 2023

New Video

Friends of the ICMA presents Medieval Coming Attractions 2023-2024

11 December 2023 11 AM Et

The Friends of the ICMA held the latest in a series of special online events on Thursday 21 December 2023 at 11:00am ET (17:00 CET). The hour-long program previeweed three medieval exhibitions, each introduced by its curator.

Diane Wolfthal spoke about her exhibition Medieval Money, Merchants, and Morality. The exhibition is on view at the The Morgan Library & Museum through 10 March 2024. 
https://www.themorgan.org/exhibitions/medieval-money

Peter Carpreau introduced his exhibition, Dieric Bouts: Creator of Images. The exhibition was on view at M Leuven through 14 January 2024. 
https://www.mleuven.be/en/programme/dieric-bouts

Andrea Myers Achi spoke about her exhibition Africa & Byzantium. The exhibition is on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art until 3 March 2024.
https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/africa-byzantium

The panel was introduced and moderated by Leslie Bussis Tait, Chair of the Friends of the ICMA.

To watch the video, visit the Special Online Lectures page.

ICMA in London (7 Feb) and Edinburgh (12 Feb): tannczen, helsen, kussen, vnd rawmen: Of Dancing and Dalliance in the Late Middle Ages; Nina Rowe, lecturer

The ICMA at the Courtauld Lecture is presented in London on Wednesday 7 February 2024. Register HERE. In-person only.

ICMA in Edinburgh Lecture is presented on Monday 12 February 2024. Register HERE. In-person and virtual options to attend.

SEE BELOW FOR MORE INFORMATION.

Nikolaus Türing, Relief with Morris Dancers, detail of the Goldenes Dachl, Innsbruck, ca. 1496-1500. (Photo: Stadtarchiv Innsbruck / Museum Goldenes Dachl)

ICMA IN LONDON
ICMA AT THE COURTAULD LECTURE

TANNCZEN, HELSEN, KUSSEN, VND RAWMEN: OF DANCING AND DALLIANCE IN THE LATE MIDDLE AGES

NINA ROWE, LECTURER

The Courtauld, Vernon Square Campus
17:30 GMT, Wednesday 7 February 2024
Register HERE
In-person only

In the German realm in the late Middle Ages, dancing was cause for both celebration and concern. Poets crafted animated accounts of boisterous roundelays welcoming winter and summer, municipal leaders designated festival days when citizens were permitted to whirl and shuffle in city squares, and churchmen admonished Christian youths to beware the seductions of frivolous young ladies on the dance floor. In short, literary and administrative texts evoke the appeal and hazards of dance, both as pastime and performance, in the southern part of the Holy Roman Empire, circa 1450 to 1500. Scholars of medieval art, however, have seldom probed the array of images showing couples spinning, performers leaping, and folks on the sidelines being enticed into the joyful fray. This lecture examines illuminations, wall paintings, prints, and sculptures that capture a variety of attitudes toward dancing in the regions of Bavaria and Austria in the second half of the fifteenth century. Clerics may have condemned dancing as a tool of the devil that irresistibly leads to unchastity and thereby damnation, but artistic evidence indicates that laypeople were willing to take their chances. In public images and small-scale works targeted to wealthy urban audiences, viewers could learn about the risks of dance, but also find encouragement to step out and join the party.

Nina Rowe is a Professor of Medieval Art History at Fordham University in New York City. Her books include The Jew, the Cathedral, and the Medieval City: Synagoga and Ecclesia in the Thirteenth Century (Cambridge UP, 2011) and The Illuminated World Chronicle: Tales from the Late Medieval City (Yale UP, 2020), as well as edited volumes, most recently: Whose Middle Ages?: Teachable Moments for an Ill-Used Past (Fordham UP, 2019). She has held fellowships from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the American Council of Learned Societies, and she served as President of the International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA), 2020-2023.

Organised by Dr Tom Nickson (The Courtauld) and Dr Jessica Barker (The Courtauld). 

Register HERE

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ICMA IN EDINBURGH

DANCING AND DALLIANCE IN THE LATE MIDDLE AGES: TANNCZEN, HELSEN, KUSSEN, VND RAWMEN

NINA ROWE, LECTURER

Edinburgh College of Art, The University of Edinburgh
Hunter Lecture Theatre
17:15 - 19:30 GMT, Monday 12 February 2024
Register HERE

Professor Nina Rowe will repeat her ICMA at The Courtauld Lecture (listed above) for an Edinburgh audience, with both in-person and virtual options to attend. Please register to indicate your attendance.

For those attending in person, the lecture will take place in the Hunter Lecture Theatre (0.17) of the Hunter Building, 74 Lauriston Place Edinburgh, EH3 9DF. A wine reception will follow in the John Higgitt Gallery, also in the Hunter Building.

Organised by Dr. Heather Pulliam (The University of Edinburgh).

Register HERE

BRIGITTE BUETTNER'S "THE MINERAL AND THE VISUAL: PRECIOUS STONES IN MEDIEVAL SECULAR CULTURE" AWARDED 2023 ICMA ANNUAL BOOK PRIZE

ICMA ANNUAL BOOK PRIZE

We are delighted to announce the recipient of the 2023 ICMA Annual Book Prize:

BRIGITTE BUETTNER
THE MINERAL AND THE VISUAL: PRECIOUS STONES IN MEDIEVAL SECULAR CULTURE

The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2022.
Click here for the Penn State University Press site

Brigitte Buettner’s The Mineral and the Visual: Precious Stones in Medieval Secular Culture is a landmark study, deeply learned and intellectually adventurous. Physically, it is also an exquisitely beautiful book that brings to light a variety of objects that do not usually get the kind of careful, highly critical analysis they find here. In Buettner’s deft hands, crowns, illuminated lapidaries, stones carved with figures, and geographic manuscripts (among other things) demonstrate the depth of the medieval fascination with the mineral, tying it to the once-living bodies that wore, handled, and viewed these objects. Buettner skillfully weaves together contemporary theory with medieval epistemologies and plays out a coherent argument about the significance of precious stones that situates them within a larger, very timely, reexamination of relationships between the intellectual and material cultures of antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the early modern, and between the Latin Christian sphere of western Europe and the wider worlds of Byzantium, Islamic north Africa and western Asia, Persia, India, and China. While reveling in the visual and material delights of the Gothic mineral arts, the book does not ignore the more sinister aspect of this history, namely its seminal role in the growth of extractive colonialism, especially after 1492. This broad and nuanced view of the later European Middle Ages in a global context will make The Mineral and the Visual a profoundly influential book for future medievalist scholarship. Furthermore, it is written in elegant, lively prose that moves the complex argument along in a lucid fashion. In the words of Alexander Neckam, chosen by Buettner herself to conclude this innovative monograph, it is “a delight, a study, and a treasure.”


We thank the ICMA Book Prize Jury:
Alexa Sand (chair), Benjamin Anderson, Heather Badamo, Till-Holger Borchert, and Eric Ramirez-Weaver

Exhibition Closing: Septimanie. Languedoc et Roussillon de l’Antiquité au Moyen Âge, Henri Prades Museum, Lattes, 17 June 2023 - 5 February 2024

Exhibition Closing

Septimanie. Languedoc et Roussillon de l’Antiquité au Moyen Âge

Henri Prades Museum, Lattes (Occitanie), France

17 June 2023 - 5 February 2024

Le musée Henri Prades, en collaboration avec l’Inrap, présente une nouvelle exposition « Septimanie. Languedoc et Roussillon de l’Antiquité au Moyen Âge » du 17 juin 2023 au 5 février 2024.

Pendant longtemps, la période comprise entre la disparition de l’empire romain et l’apparition de la société féodale a été considérée comme une époque de transition. Son intérêt archéologique et artistique a souvent été minoré ou dévalué. Pourtant, les recherches conduites au cours de ces dernières décennies ont montré la richesse des témoignages conservés et l’importance des phénomènes de continuité, bien loin de l’image d’un « âge sombre » véhiculée dans l’imaginaire collectif.

Entre Romains, Wisigoths, Arabes et Francs, l’ensemble territorial mouvant de la Septimanie constitue l’arrière-plan géopolitique incontournable de l’exposition. Le propos sera toutefois davantage tourné vers l’histoire quotidienne des hommes et des femmes qui ont cultivé et dominé ces terres, commercé et échangé, puissants et misérables que, pas à pas, l’archéologie permet aujourd’hui de mieux situer.

Une exposition conçue par le Site archéologique Lattara – musée Henri Prades, en
collaboration avec le CNRS, l’Inrap, le Service régional de l’archéologie – Drac Occitanie et le LabEx Archimede.

For more information, https://www.inrap.fr/septimanie-languedoc-et-roussillon-de-l-antiquite-au-moyen-age-17256 and https://musees-occitanie.fr/en/musee/site-archeologique-lattara-musee-henri-prades/

Exhibition Closing: Shrines and Stones from St. Pantaleon, Museum Schnütgen, Cologne, 31 May 2023 - 31 January 2024 (Beginning of 2024)

Exhibition Closing

Schreine und Steine aus St. Pantaleon / Shrines and Stones from St. Pantaleon

Museum Schnütgen, Cologne, Germany

31 May 2023 - 31 January 2024 (Beginning of 2024)

As precious loans from St. Pantaleon, one of Cologne’s twelve large Romanesque churches, the museum is showing the two reliquary shrines of Saints Albinus and Maurinus, as well as three fragments of the stone sculptures from the church’s 11th-century west façade. They are among the oldest examples of post-antique monumental sculpture in Cologne.

The Church of St. Pantaleon is currently undergoing extensive restoration work, which offers the opportunity to view the two magnificent pieces of 12th-century Cologne goldsmithing from there, together with works of the same period from the museum’s own collection.

The shrines were previously essential loans for the special exhibition Magic Rock Crystal. Of course, there is more to discover about them than the sparkling rock crystals on the roof ridges of the house-shaped shrines. Time to take a closer look at them!

Thus, the enamels of the shrine of St. Maurinus now stand in close proximity to those of the Golden Panel from the Church of St. Ursula and a precious book cover, which are attributed to the same Cologne workshop. The blue and gold enamel of the shrine of St. Albinus, on the other hand, is found in the decoration of other medieval shrines, which makes the modular principle of these goldsmith’s works comprehensible.

In addition to the shrines, three fragments of medieval sculptures from the west façade of St. Pantaleon are on display, whose enormous size is unusual for the period in which they were made. Together with various sculptures from the museum’s own collection, these fragments give an impression of the once rich sculptural ornamentation of the Church of St. Pantaleon.

For more information and tickets, visit https://museum-schnuetgen.de/Shrines-and-Stones-from-St-Pantaleon

Exhibition Closing: Georgia: A Story of Encounters, Art and History Museum, Brussels, 27 October 2023 - 18 February 2024

Exhibition Closing

Georgia: A Story of Encounters

Art and History Museum, Brussels, Belgium

27 October 2023 - 18 February 2024

Fragment of a stele, 6th century © Bryan Whitney/ Georgian National Museum

This autumn, europalia will dedicate its festival to Georgia. From 4 October 2023, a comprehensive programme, teeming with exhibitions, performances, concerts, films, dance shows, theatre pieces and literary encounters, will roll-out across Belgium. In this context, the Art & History Museum will host a heritage exhibition focussing on the culture, history, and art of Georgia since the Neolithic period.

At the crossroads of East and West, traversed by trade routes linked to the Silk Roads, and always the object of ambition of the great powers surrounding it, Georgia has been a place of encounters and exchanges from which it has drawn cultural nourishment. The result is a heritage of unparalleled richness.

Wine, fire & myths

Wine has been produced in Georgia for at least 8000 years. It accompanies a ritualised art of dining with refined cuisine, an integral part of the country’s heritage. As the oldest cultural asset in Georgia, wine will be the starting point for the exhibition. Metalwork – gold and bronze – will also pay a central role. From the Bronze Age onwards, Georgian metalworkers produced pieces of unprecedented delicacy and sumptuousness. The myth of the Golden Fleece has its roots in Georgia: the region was known to the Greeks for its wealth in gold.

After the Greeks, who established trading posts there, numerous other powers would meet and confront each other on this small, coveted territory of the Caucasus: Romans, Persians, Arabs, Byzantines, Mongols, and Ottomans contributed to a unique intermingling of cultures, but also sowed destruction in their wake. A Christian country since the 4th century, Georgia struggled to assert itself in the midst of the great powers around it. It succeeded brilliantly between the 11th and 13th centuries, the golden age of Georgian unification, which shone economically and culturally throughout the Middle East under the reign of its emblematic sovereign, Queen Tamar.

Exhibition curators: Prof. Bernard Coulie & Prof. Nino Simonishvili
Co-curator: Marie-Eve Tesch

For more information and to order tickets, visit https://www.artandhistory.museum/en/georgia-story-encounters.

Call for Papers: The Courtauld Postgraduate Medieval Colloquium, London (15 March 2024), Due By 31 January 2023

Call for papers

The Courtauld Postgraduate Medieval Colloquium

Friday, March 15, 2024, The Courtauld, Vernon Square campus, London

Due By 31 January 2024

Studies of medieval art have often focused on works of art featuring, or patronised by, those in positions of authority. More recently, scholars have moved towards a wider understanding of the ways in which works of art established a sense of authority and impacted the identity of the communities who viewed and used them. However, concepts of ‘authority’ and ‘identity’ and their complex interrelationship are rarely interrogated in a holistic way.

The two concepts are often inextricably linked. Identities were shaped by those in positions of authority; images endowed with ‘authority’ could influence how those interacting with them self-identified; patrons claimed authority through images, often forging their public identity as charitable, pious figures. But what did it mean to claim authority in the Middle Ages, and what exactly did it mean to have an identity? Even today, these concepts are complex and multi-faceted – most notably, one’s self-identification can differ dramatically from that imposed by others.

In this colloquium we want to address these topics afresh, exploring how art and material culture reflect and produce concepts of identity and authority. Papers might consider issues such as gender, sexuality, race, religion, and culture more broadly. We will also consider how alternative perspectives could reinforce or subvert ideas of an authoritative figure, voice or image.

The Courtauld Institute’s Annual Postgraduate Medieval Colloquium invites speakers to consider the complex intersections of authority and identity and how these two distinct, but often bound concepts were presented and experienced in the art and material culture of the Middle Ages.

We welcome applications from research students at all levels, in the UK and abroad, though regrettably we cannot cover speakers’ travel or accommodation costs. Papers could embrace a variety of topics including, but in no way limited to:

• How works of art are mediated through links to religious or secular authority figure(s)

• The mythologizing of identity by authority figures

• The ways in which personal or communal identities are reflected or projected

• The subversion of authority and authority figures

• Minority versus majority identity and authority

• Groups and belonging

• Identity and non-belonging: Ideas of ‘otherness’ or monstrosity

• Subversion of cultural/religious/personal/communal identity

• Suppression of identity.

• Revealing and concealing identities

• Identity and authority in relation to gender and sexuality

• Identity and authority of genealogy and lineage

• The ‘afterlives’ of identities: changes in reception and perception through time

The Medieval Postgraduate Colloquium will take place at the Courtauld’s Vernon Square campus, in person only. To apply, please send a proposal of up to 250 words for a 20-minute paper, together with a CV to Florence.eccleston@courtauld.ac.uk and Jane.stewart@courtauld.ac.uk by the 31st January 2024.

Conference: Superficies–Surfaces, Skins and Textures. Sensory Encounters with Books and Related Multi-layered Objects, University of Zurich, 18-20 January 2024 (In-Person & Online)

Conference

Superficies–Surfaces, Skins and Textures. Sensory Encounters with Books and Related Multi-layered Objects

Institute of Art HistorY, the University of Zurich

(In-Person & Online)

18 January – 20 January 2024

Évangéliaire de la Sainte-Chapelle, BnF, Latin 8851, fol. 1v-2r, 3r, photo: Thomas Rainer, Courtesy: BnF, Département des manuscrits

The research group “Textures of Sacred Scripture. Materials and Semantics of Sacred Book Ornament” and the Chair of Medieval Art History at the University of Zurich are organizing an international conference on “Superficies – Surfaces, Skins, and Textures. Sensory encounters with books and related multi-layered objects”. The conference, funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation.

No registration is required for on-site participation.

To participate online, please register via this link: https://uzh.zoom.us/meeting/register/u5EoduGspjIpHtFIMxg1O7ObRCUp2mk81vrI After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Here is a link to the program.

Surfaces are boundaries that mediate our sensory interactions with objects. Surfaces reveal, but they also conceal. In traditional aesthetic discourse, their multiple tactile and visual qualities are often contrasted with depth, and in a pejorative sense, superficiality is opposed to inner virtue and an intellectual understanding of things. This stark opposition between outer surface and inner core is put to the test by multi-layered objects such as books. Here, surfaces abound. Once opened, books in codex format display a multitude of layered skins and textures that are essential for the visual and haptic experience of the object in space and time. Perhaps more than other objects, books tangibly embody the complex relationship between surface and depth, through their composition and spatial structure as multi-layered objects. While the surfaces of sculpture and architecture have recently come to the attention of art historians, the surfacescapes – to use an expression coined by the art historian Jonathan Hay – of books and other multi-layered objects have been far less examined.

The conference aims to take a fresh look at the diversity of surface landscapes in books and other multi-layered objects. From the highly valuable vestments that clothe the exteriors of precious books to the parchment skins of their interiors, all layers are the product of diverse surface treatments. Techniques such as coating, polishing, tooling, and engraving determine the visual and haptic qualities of bindings and pages, and are reflected in their textures and sensory qualities.

Topics of particular interest are:

• Surfaces and the multi-layered spatiality and temporality of books and related objects.

• Ornament as surface and surface as ornament.

• Surface and ground.

• The textures, multi-materiality, and sensory qualities of surfaces.

• The preparation of surfaces to receive writing or painting, and the production pro-cesses concerning surfaces.

• The material traces of use, damage, and reworking that become inscribed into the surfaces of objects.

• Surfaces and transparency.

• The rough and the smooth: tactile dimensions of surfaces.

• Surfaces in relationship to the human body and its skin.

• Surfaces and the critique of superficiality.

The conference is organized by Simon Breitenmoser, David Ganz and Thomas Rainer.