Enfilade

From ArtHist.net:

Making, Collecting, and Understanding Dutch and Flemish Drawings, 1500–1800
Amsterdam, 1–2 June 2023

Proposals due by 1 March 2023

This international symposium will celebrate Old Master drawings on the occasion of the exhibition The Art of Drawing: Master Drawings from the Age of Rembrandt in the Peck Collection at the Ackland Art Museum, on view at the Rembrandt House Museum (18 March – 11 June 2023).

Research in early modern Dutch and Flemish drawings touches on a wide variety of issues, including the study of materials and techniques; issues of attribution and oeuvre cataloging; and expanding our understanding of the provenance, collecting, and display of works on paper. This symposium aims to be wide ranging and inclusive of both art historians and conservation scientists. It offers scholars a chance to come together to present and discuss recent research in this specialized field, which now evolves to encompass new methodologies and concerns.

We invite scholars from all phases of their careers to submit proposals for papers. Subjects of interest include, but are not limited to: close studies of individual artists or drawings, connoisseurial concerns such as attributions of drawings to Rembrandt and his School, recent advances in technical research such as XRF imaging and watermark analysis, the study of early collections, and the sources and history of use of certain materials. We also welcome considerations that treat methodological concerns generally, or provide historiographic context for the field.

Lectures will be 20 minutes in length. To propose a topic, please send a short abstract (200 words) and a CV by 1 March 2023 to PeckDrawingsSymposium@rijksmuseum.nl. The organizers will respond by 15 March 2023.

Organizing Committee
• Dana Cowen, Ackland Art Museum, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• Robert Fucci, University of Amsterdam
• Ilona van Tuinen, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
• David de Witt, The Rembrandt House Museum, Amsterdam

More information is available from the conference website:

HECAA at 30: Environments, Materials, and Futures in the Eighteenth Century
Boston, Cambridge, and Providence, 12–14 October 2023

Proposals due by 1 April 2023

The Historians of Eighteenth-Century Art and Architecture are delighted to announce that the Call for Papers for HECAA@30: Environments, Materials, and Futures in the Eighteenth Century is now available. Please visit the conference website for a list of open sessions and details. Applications for participation are due to session chairs by 1 April 2023.

This in-person conference will take place in Boston, Cambridge, and Providence from 12–14 October 2023, with morning plenary sessions followed by gallery sessions, tours, and architectural site visits each afternoon.

On the land of the Massachusett and neighboring Wampanoag and Nipmuc peoples, Boston developed in the eighteenth century as a major colonized and colonizing site. Its status today as a cultural and intellectual hub is shaped by that context, making it a critical location to trace the cultural legacies of racism and social injustice between the eighteenth century and today. For whom is ‘eighteenth-century art and architecture’ a useful category? What eighteenth-century materials, spaces, and images offer tools or concepts for shaping our collective futures? In considering these questions, we aim to expand HECAA’s traditional focus on Western European art and architecture and specifically encourage proposals from scholars working on Asia, Africa and the African diaspora, Indigenous cultures, and the Islamic world.

We welcome proposals for contributions to panels, gallery sessions, roundtables, and workshops. Scholars at any career stage, and all geographic and material specializations, are encouraged to apply. We look forward to seeing you in Boston!

Image: Desk and Bookcase, mid 18th century. Puebla, Mexico (MFA Boston, Henry H. and Zoe Oliver Sherman Fund, 2015.3131).

From ArtHist.net:

De habitudine Ordinis ad artem: Arts, Religion, and Culture in the Capuchin Order between the 16th and 18th Centuries
University of Teramo, 12–14 April 2023

Proposals due by 19 February 2023

Officially founded in 1528 with the bull Religionis Zelus by Pope Clement VII, the Order of the Friars Minor Capuchin lived the twenty years preceding the Council of Trent imitating St Francis and his first companions through preaching and the teaching of young people. Despite the escape to Switzerland of the famous Vicar and preacher Bernardino Ochino in 1542, the Order survived, and the Council of Trent (1547–63) gave great impetus to the Order’s spread, thanks partly to the participation of the Vicar General Bernardino da Asti as consultant. In 1574 Pope Gregory XIII allowed the Capuchins to found convents outside the Italian peninsula. Friars went to France, Spain, and the German-speaking regions; and new settlements were founded in Switzerland, Belgium, Austria, Bohemia, Bavaria, Westphalia, and Ireland. A century after their founding, the Capuchins had more than 40 provinces, 1200 friaries, and nearly 20,000 brothers. As missionaries, the Order was extremely active, evangelizing throughout the world; from Northern Europe to Brazil, from Congo to the Middle East, from North Africa to the West Indies, they were one of the main players, in close contact with sovereigns and the Holy See.

While many Capuchins had studied the visuals arts before entering the Order, especially in the years between 1618 and 1761, the Capuchin way of life was often antithetical to artistic practice. In fact, in the General Chapter of 1627, friars were forbidden to accept any painting or carving work requested by laymen. And yet, although the culture of the arts was not originally part of the Order’s activities and artistic practice was in many cases hindered, there were many who reached high levels in the cloister, especially in painting and wooden sculpture. During the 17th and 18th centuries, many Capuchins devoted themselves to painting, driven by different motivations: for pleasure and in response to commissions from nobles and benefactors. Sculpture was practised even more frequently, often for decorating the small churches that, according to the Constitutions, were not allowed to be sumptuous, but decorated only with poor and simple ornaments. The right combination of simplicity of material and preciousness of form was expressed in the works of the friar cabinet-makers (marangoni).

While numerous studies have addressed the relationship between the arts and the Capuchin Order, many questions remain under unexplored. This conference De habitudine Ordinis ad artem: Arts, Religion and Culture in the Capuchin Order between the 16th and 18th Centuries—organised by the University of Teramo with the patronage of the Seraphic Province of the Immaculate Conception of the Capuchin Friars Minor, the International Society of Franciscan Studies, and the Capuchin Historical Institute—will consider the difficult and elusive relationship between art, culture, religion, and the Capuchin Order on an international level, with particular attention paid to historical contexts and religious dimensions—a prerequisite for understanding Capuchin artists, the production of art objects, patronage, and Capuchin relations with the secular world globally. With the aim of fostering discussion and scientific debate, other topics relevant to the theme of the conference are also welcome. The most significant contributions will be considered for publication.

The conference will be divided into five sessions:
• the Capuchin Order in the context of the post-Tridentine Church
• artistic practice between norms, prohibitions, and customs
• cultural objects of the Capuchin world: use and circulation
• capuchin patronage
• images, knowledge, and preaching between devotion and catechesis

Each proposal must consist of two parts: the paper abstract (max 2000 characters including spaces) and a speaker profile (max 1500 characters including spaces) highlighting the curriculum vitae and professional position. The two parts must be combined in a single Word or PDF file. Interested parties must submit proposals by 19 February 2023, by uploading the documents here.

Scientific Committee
Massimo Carlo Giannini (University of Teramo) president
Raffaella Morselli (University of Teramo)
Alessandro Zuccari (Sapienza University of Rome)
Giorgio Fossaluzza (University of Verona)
Vincenzo Criscuolo (Capuchin Historical Institute)
Grado Giovanni Merlo (University of Milan)
Luigi Pellegrini (University of Chieti-Pescara)
Luca Siracusano (University of Teramo)
Cecilia Paolini (University of Teramo)

Organisation and scientific coordination
Pietro Costantini, pcostantini@unite.it

Pałac Karnickich, Warsaw. Constructed in 1877 for a government official and rebuilt after World War II, the building now houses the Deutsches Historisches Institut Warschau.

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From ArtHist.net and the Deutsches Historisches Institut Warschau:

Jewish or Common Heritage? (Dis-)appropriation of Synagogue Architecture in East-Central Europe since 1945
POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews and the German Historical Institute, Warsaw, 12–14 September 2023

Proposals due by 31 January 2023

The synagogues that remained standing after World War II have faced an uncertain destiny. As abandoned buildings, they were susceptible to decay quickly and, as former buildings of worship—for legal, cultural, and architectural reasons—posed a great challenge in terms of their reuse. Consequently, many synagogues simply fell into ruins, some were turned into secular buildings of various purposes, and few could have been used as houses of prayer again.

In postwar Europe, synagogue architecture was culturally categorized as an element of Jewish heritage that appeared to be isolated from the common heritage of a city or town—wherever a synagogue stood. At first, synagogues were not considered a shared but a distinct patrimony of a place. A shift in such a state of affairs could have been observed in the last three decades that witnessed a ‘rediscovery’ of synagogues. Though one can still find abandoned synagogues in small towns, in most of the bigger municipalities, these buildings were ‘rediscovered’ as a part of local history and culture and thus became part of the common heritage. In many regions of Europe, the ‘rediscovery’ of the former synagogues led to their restoration and opening to the public, and in rare cases, to their reuse by Jewish communities.

“The Jewish Town / Muranów (1648–1772),” gallery of the Core Exhibition at the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, Warsaw (Photo by M. Starowieyska and D. Golik). More infromation»

These processes have already been quite well researched in western parts of Europe. A desideratum, however, is approach to the Jewish architectural heritage in those East-Central European territories, whose state affiliation changed after 1945 and whose population was exchanged. For example, in the former Eastern German territories, synagogues still standing at the end of the war became a foreign body in the urban space in a double sense. They neither belonged to the heritage of the new inhabitants, understood as ‘national’ or ‘own’, nor were they clearly attributable to the heritage of the pre-war German population. Synagogues were, therefore, not ‘hostile’ buildings, but in any case, they were irritating as characteristic objects of architecture. A contributing factor was that Jewish communities lasted only in a few cities in these areas.

The aim of the conference is a historicization of the processes of rediscovery in the recent past. We invite contributions linking the historical dimension in dealing with the Jewish architectural heritage with current developments in this field. The focus will be on the historical, political, and cultural preconditions and present processes having an impact on the handling of the Jewish built heritage. The key actors and decision-makers should also be taken into account. Therefore, the connection of the micro and macro levels is indispensable for the understanding of these developments because the impact of local actors and political decisions at the central level are closely interrelated. Global and memory culture trends have also contributed to the interest or disinterest in the respective religious buildings. In addition, transnational networks that influenced the preservation of synagogues will be considered, for example, in the context of the Polish-German dialogue.

The conference will not only discuss examples of a ‘successful rediscovery’ of Jewish architectural monuments. The aim is rather to draw conclusions about broader contexts based on concrete examples. It may be possible to identify patterns that indicate ‘success’ or ‘failure’ of the rediscovery. We also invite contributions that would pose the question of a model of a ‘successful’ or ‘failed’ rediscovery. If possible, however, the focus should be on those East- Central European cities or regions whose territorial affiliation changed in the wake of World War II.

The conference is a cooperation of Bet Tfila – Research Unit for Jewish Architecture in Europe at TU Braunschweig, GHI Warsaw and POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews. It takes place within the framework of the “DFG Priority Program 2357: Jewish Cultural Heritage,” which is funded by the German Research Foundation. The conference will take place 12–14 September 2023 at the POLIN Museum for the History of Polish Jews and at the German Historical Institute in Warsaw. Travel costs to and from the conference can be reimbursed within the usual limits.

Submissions will be accepted from any discipline as long as the topic relates to this broad theme. Scholars, experts, and practitioners are welcome. Abstracts should be 200–300 words. Although we welcome speakers from any country, the language of the conference will be English. For best consideration, please submit your abstract and a short CV by 31 January 2023 to Kamila Lenartowicz (k.lenartowicz@tu-braunschweig.de) and Christhardt Henschel (henschel@dhi.waw.pl). Applicants will be informed about their participation by 14 March 2023.

Organizers
• Kamila Lenartowicz and Zuzanna Światowy (Bet Tfila – Research Unit for Jewish Architecture in Europe, Technische Universität Braunschweig)
• Christhardt Henschel (German Historical Institute, Warsaw)
• Aleksandra Jakubczak-Gabay (POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews)

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For the American context, see Mark Gordon, “Rediscovering Jewish Infrastructure: 2022 Update on United States Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Synagogues,” American Jewish Historical Society (4 November 2021), available here. –CH

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Note (added 18 January 2023) — More information on the polychrome ceiling, a life-sized wooden replica of the ceiling of the synagogue of Gwoździec at the POLIN Museum, is available here at Enfilade (now largely out-dated) and here with Ariel Fein’s essay for SmartHistory (4 April 2022).

From the conference website:

Listening In: Conversations on Architectures, Cities, and Landscapes, 1700–1900
ETH Zurich, 14–15 September 2023

Proposals due by 10 March 2023

Who do we listen to when we write histories of architectures, cities, and landscapes? How many women authors can we find among our sources? How many of them are cited by those whose research we read? We argue that women and other marginalised groups have always been part of conversations on architectures, cities, and landscapes—but we have not had the space to listen to them. This conference is an invitation to reconstruct such conversations, real, imagined, and metaphorical ones, taking place in the 18th and 19th centuries, in any region, in order to diversify the ways we write histories. Taking the art of conversation, integral as both practice and form to the period in Western thought, and repurposing it to dismantle the exclusivity of historiography, this conference calls for contributions which bring women into dialogue with others.

Listening In proposes a new approach to the ‘canon’ and its protagonists. Rather than either fighting its existence or expanding it by means of ‘exceptions to the rule’, we call for the setting up of productive conversations. We acknowledge that the canon never exists on its own; instead, it is shaped by what Griselda Pollock has called “that which, while repressed, is always present as its structuring other” (1999, 8). This conference is envisaged as a listening exercise. We regard a conversation as both codified practice as well as a specific act of verbal exchange, spoken or written, on a particular subject—here architectures, cities, and landscapes—occurring in a specific site, from street to salon, kitchen to court, construction site to theatre, field to church, or book to newspaper, to name but a few.

We invite papers on conversations that grapple with hierarchies and inequalities, incorporating asymmetrical power relationships while taking care not to gloss over the struggle, pain, and conflict often occurring in these situations. Papers should highlight at least one protagonist identifying as a woman, and are encouraged to also listen to
• persons marginalised because of their race, class, religion, sexual orientation, or else,
• so-called ‘canonical’ figures, both architects and critics as well as those from other professions, disciplines, or domains,
• individuals from different geographical regions, including those affected by the violence of imperialism and colonialism.

Can a focus on conversations help to include in historiography new protagonists as well as sites which we have so far not seen? How about printed sites, in pamphlets, books, magazines, newspapers, or letter writing? And what are the critical notions around which these conversations occur, such as the sublime, character, or sensibility, but also those emerging from indigenous or non-western knowledges, on different sites and in different media? Further, what shifts, if we start from conversations, rather than, for instance, drawings and buildings? How will it affect histories of architectures, cities, and landscapes if these conversations are inclusive rather than exclusive?

This call invites contributions from and on all regions, particularly those that centre intersectional marginalisations. We are interested to hear about every-day experiences and sites so far less explored as well as new reflections on better-known events and structures. We hope to attract speakers from diverse regions, disciplines, backgrounds, and career stages, who are willing to engage with new materials in innovative ways, listening to each other and our sources. The conference is planned as a focused, single-strand event aimed at creating networks of scholars, facilitating exchanges, stimulating groundbreaking discussions, and producing new knowledges.

Listening In is organised in the context of two externally funded research projects based at gta, ETH Zurich: WoWA (Women Writing Architecture 1700–1900) is funded by the ERC, led by Anne Hultzsch, and studies female experiences of architecture and landscapes as recorded in women’s writings from South America and Europe. The SNSF-funded project Building Identity: Character in Architectural Discourse and Design 1750–1850, led by Sigrid de Jong and Maarten Delbeke, focuses on the uses and meaning of the notion of ‘character’ in architectural criticism and practice. Both projects share an interest in the experiences of marginalised groups, especially those who identified as women, and strive to have them heard not in a niche, but in the centre of our field. With this conference we wish to open up our approaches to a wider field of research, going beyond our respective geographical frameworks.

Please submit the following by 10 March 2023 to listening@arch.ethz.ch
• an abstract of no more than 300 words
• your name and professional affiliation if any
• a short curriculum vitae (ca 100 words)

Key Dates
1 December 2022 Launch call for papers
10 March 2023 Deadline to submit abstracts
April 2023 Paper selection and notification of authors
1 May 2023 Speakers confirm their participation
14–15 September 2023 Conference at ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Organisers
PD Dr Anne Hultzsch
Dr Sigrid de Jong
Prof Maarten Delbeke
Dr Sol Pérez Martínez

From the Call for Papers:

Community and Collaboration in Dutch and Flemish Art, 1560–1800
Center for Netherlandish Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 12 May 2023

Organized by Rachel Kase and Sarah Mallory

Proposals due by 1 February 2023

The Center for Netherlandish Art (CNA) seeks 20-minute papers from emerging scholars that critically and creatively engage with the theme of Community and Collaboration in Dutch and Flemish Art in the long 17th century (ca. 1560–1800), with a particular interest in topics that explore new methods or histories.

Topics might include but are not limited to:
• Visualizations of artists’ studios and other spaces of cooperation
• Physical and psychological isolation and exile within and beyond the Dutch Republic and Flanders
• Artists as community leaders
• The role of gender and gender identity in community

A total of three papers will be selected for presentation during the 2023 CNA Colloquium, scheduled for Friday, 12 May 2023. This daylong event offers a platform for selected emerging scholars to share original research with the international community of experts in the field. The program will be held in a hybrid format, allowing for both in-person and virtual participation. Further event details will be shared closer to the event date.

We invite contributions from MA students, PhD candidates, and postdoctoral researchers with less than five years of working experience. Individuals of all nationalities may apply. As we amplify our efforts toward becoming truly inclusive, ensuring that diversity and equity are lived values, we actively encourage candidates from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds to submit proposals.

Please submit a title and abstract (500 words maximum) and a CV in one single PDF file to cna@mfa.org, with ‘Call for Papers’ included in the email’s subject line. Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis through February 1, 2023. Selected participants will be notified by 17 February 2023. Selected candidates will have the opportunity to workshop their papers during a rehearsal presentation one week prior to the event.

Scholarship and museum exhibitions have long recognized the artistic achievements of individual artists like Rembrandt, Vermeer and Rubens, but in the 17th-century Netherlands collaboration, partnership, and studio practices fueled artistic creativity and production. Studio practices, such as those described by Rembrandt’s pupil Samuel van Hoogstraten, could also reinforce and reflect power and hierarchy. Likewise, Rubens and his pupil Anthony van Dyck together shaped—and re-shaped—visual convention for aristocratic portraiture. Artists reached outside the studio to engage with collaborators in other professions, forming partnerships that resulted in various types of printed, visual, and performing arts. Artist studios, guilds, chambers of rhetoric, marketplaces, universities, churches, and private homes—to name a few places—also served as sites of artistic mentorship, teaching, and innovation.

On the other hand, long periods of travel and infrequent correspondence made it difficult to forge lines of communication or connection. Though many artists were active in creative and commercial centers, some were not. Some may have experienced uncomfortable isolation—phases of boredom and restlessness, social confinement, or geographic remoteness—not dissimilar to the experience that many people had early in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The work of Frans Post and Albert Eckhout demonstrates some ways in which Dutch artists attempted to represent ideas of community and isolation beyond the Republic, while Dutch and Flemish artists such as the Bamboccianti and Bentvueghels sought the companionship of their countrymen even while pursuing new ideas and experiences in Rome. Gender, political beliefs, religious affiliations, and other aspects of personal identity also informed artistic collaboration and a sense of community; as much as some artists were embraced for their abilities and beliefs, others were exiled. From Pieter Bruegel the Elder and Jan Steen’s crowded and lively scenes of taverns and domestic life, to the isolation seen in Rembrandt’s later self-portraits—works of art from this period show a spectrum of collaboration and community throughout the period.

Organized by Rachel Kase and Sarah Mallory, with support from the Center for Netherlandish Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.