Enfilade

Now accepting proposals for this panel for next year’s ISECS Congress in Rotterdam:

Alternative Markets and Visual Culture in Eighteenth-Century France
ISECS Congress, Rotterdam, 26–31 July 2015

Proposals due by 12 January 2015 (though earlier submissions encouraged)

Organiser: Dr. Esther Bell (Curator in Charge, European Paintings, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco) and Dr. Jessica Fripp (Post-doctoral Fellow in Visual and Material Culture, Parsons The New School for Design)

Academic artistic practice in the eighteenth century was at odds with the growing commercial culture of the period. From its foundation, the Royal Academy prohibited its members from dealing in art, an offense that was deemed cause for expulsion by 1777. Critics similarly looked down on painting for profit. In 1747, La Font de Saint Yenne had harsh words for artists who chose the more financially lucrative practice of portraiture over the more noble art of history painting. Diderot suggested that Fragonard’s turn away from history painting was caused by “l’appas du gain.”

Of course, even artists who appeared to resist the lure of monetary wealth were embedded in complex systems of exchange based on other forms of capital. This panel seeks to explore alternative markets of exchange that developed around the production of eighteenth-century visual culture and the forms of symbolic capital artists could accumulate. Papers might address topic such as: the role of collecting works by one’s contemporaries, friendship networks between artists and artists and patrons, celebrity as currency, gift exchange and favors, artistic dynasties and family allegiances. We especially encourage papers that demonstrate exchange across France’s borders, including its colonies or other European entities.

Information on how to submit abstracts can be found here»