Enfilade

Tableau Vivant: La Politique de l’Interruption
Paris, 31 October 2014

Proposals due by 15 June 2014

Journée d’études organisée par Michel Poivert et Julie Ramos

Désormais étudié dans ses différentes modalités historiques et esthétiques, le tableau vivant ne cesse de nous interroger sur la puissance d’un arrêt (du geste comme de l’image) : quelle est la nature de la force expressive de l’immobilité ? Considérer parfois comme anachronique au regard des arts du mouvement, le tableau vivant dans ce qu’il peut avoir d’archaïque propose une intensité que le théâtre ou l’arrêt sur image au cinéma ont largement expérimentée. L’artifice de l’immobilité contrainte des tableaux vivants peut-elle se comprendre à l’aune d’une réflexion sur les rapports entre l’image et le politique ? En performant le tableau vivant, la scène et le corps s’inscrivent dans une relation à l’espace social qui n’est pas dénué d’enjeux idéologiques. Objet singulier de l’histoire de l’art, le tableau vivant ouvre en réalité des perspectives plus larges qui concernent toutes les pratiques artistiques, le théâtre et la danse, la vidéo et la performance, ou bien encore l’installation. En proposant de repérer les enjeux politiques de l’immobilité à travers le paradigme du tableau vivant, il sera question d’autorité et de liberté, de l’économie générale du rapport entre le spectateur, l’auteur et l’acteur, et peut être aussi de penser la question de la création en dehors de l’image.

Date limite de réception des propositions de communication : 15 juin 2014.Les propositions doivent être adressées à Michel Poivert (m.poivert@orange.fr) et Julie Ramos (julie.ramos@free.fr). Les propositions de communication ne devront pas dépasser 300 mots et comporter : nom et prénom de(s) auteur(s), court C.V. et bibliographie sélective, titre(s), fonction(s) et institution de rattachement, coordonnées (adresse postale et électronique, téléphone), titre de la communication et principaux arguments.

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Le « tableau vivant » questionne les définitions traditionnelles de l’art. Communément défini comme un arrangement de personnes vivantes reproduisant de manière immobile une composition artistique, que ce soit une peinture, une sculpture ou une estampe, le tableau vivant aurait, selon un récit largement admis, connu son apogée au XIXe siècle (notamment par sa désignation en 1839 dans le récit La Toison d’or de Gautier.) C’est toutefois à cette période qu’il commence à être dévalorisé pour ses rapports avec le divertissement populaire, la photographie, voire l’érotisme. Cette croyance en un déclin du tableau vivant a contribué à concentrer son étude autour de 1800 (voir l’étude pionnière de Kirsten G. Holmström), à occulter ses origines plus anciennes, ainsi qu’à négliger ses évolutions ultérieures et son apport à l’histoire de l’art. L’objectif de la journée d’étude est de pallier ces manques en rassemblant des spécialistes du Moyen Âge, de l’époque moderne (XVIIe–XVIIIe siècles) et de la période contemporaine, afin d’en saisir les enjeux dans la longue durée.

Les études sur le tableau vivant ont jusqu’à présent majoritairement été menées par des historiens du spectacle. Ils l’ont en effet rattachés aux réformes scéniques du XVIIIe siècle, qu’il s’agisse de la redécouverte de la pantomime antique chez les théoriciens de la danse (Cahusac, Noverre, etc.) ou de la théorie du « quatrième mur » de Diderot, qui valorise l’immobilisation de l’action théâtrale en un « tableau dramatique ». À ces éléments s’ajoute l’ascendant, analysé par les historiens de l’art, des théories néo-classiques (Winckelmann, Lessing, etc.), qui préconisent pour les arts visuels la représentation du « moment fécond » d’une action, rendu sensible dans un geste suspendu exprimant la vie intérieure des figures. La plupart des spécialistes identifient ainsi le premier tableau vivant moderne dans la reproduction de L’Accordée de village de Jean-Baptiste Greuze au milieu de l’acte II des Noces d’Arlequin donné par Carlin à la Comédie Italienne, en 1761, l’année même de l’exposition de la toile au Salon.

Le tableau vivant s’émancipe ensuite rapidement de la scène pour se propager comme genre autonome dans les salons privés de l’élite cultivée européenne. S’y associe la pratique dite des « attitudes », inaugurée par Emma Hart, épouse de Sir William Hamilton, qui adoptait des « poses plastiques » inspirées des statues antiques et des silhouettes des vases étrusques de la collection de son époux. Enfin, Goethe contribue à la vogue des tableaux vivants au XIXe siècle, en les insérant dans la trame de son roman Les Affinités électives (1809). Il avait non seulement assisté au « attitudes » de Lady Hamilton lors de son voyage à Naples en 1787 et avait inclus le tableau vivant à ses réflexions sur le théâtre (voir l’essai sur son monodrame Proserpine) mais il en avait aussi été l’ordonnateur à la cour de Weimar.

Le tableau vivant et ses genres connexes (les attitudes et « poses plastiques ») questionnent les frontières à la fois esthétiques et sociales : entre œuvre originale et reproduction, imitation d’une image et présence des protagonistes, auteur et spectateur, mise en scène de soi et voyeurisme. Il contribue notamment à briser le contrôle à l’accès culturel, par son lien aux pratiques amateures et par ses déplacements d’un monde « aristocratique » et « artiste » aux scènes populaires, aux ateliers de photographie et aux premières projections filmiques. Au-delà de l’histoire du tableau vivant durant les XVIIIe et XIXe siècles, qui contribue à l’arrimer à la question du « faire tableau » dans l’ensemble des arts, l’étude de ses précédents dans les Mystères médiévaux et les fêtes d’Ancien Régime ouvre d’autres perspectives. Si les chercheurs n’ont repéré, pour ces périodes anciennes, qu’une seule occurrence d’une performance réalisée d’après une œuvre d’art (la reproduction du fameux polyptyque de l’Agneau Mystique des frères Van Eyck lors de l’entrée de Philippe le Bon à Gand en 1458), nombreuses sont les performances de personnes s’immobilisant pour « faire image » à l’occasion des rituels religieux et princiers. Leur disparition progressive au profit des « machines » et des décors imposés par la monarchie absolue pose la question du pouvoir qui s’y déploie. Pouvoir de figer l’infigurabilité du vivant ? Ou revanche du vivant sur l’image lors de performances dont l’hybridité fondamentale (entre l’art et de la vie) permet d’en briser l’efficacité ? Ces questions semblent réactualisées par les pratiques plus contemporaines du tableau vivant, du cinéma à l’art contemporain, en passant par le très populaire festival Pageant of the Masters, organisé à Laguna Beach depuis 1933. Elles permettent d’envisager les relations entre image et performativité, leurs affinités et leurs tensions dans l’instant suspendu. Elles supposent d’interroger le rôle de l’auteur de ces images collectives, mais aussi leur dimension politique.

Images IV: Images of the Other: Istanbul—Vienna—Venice
Austrian Cultural Forum, Istanbul, 2–4 September 2014

Proposals due by 20 June 2014

After the conferences Images I: Films as Spaces of Cultural Encounters (2011), Images II: Images of the Poor (2012), and Images III: Images of the City (2013), the Images Project is planning to focus on ‘Images of the Other’ as documented in images and representations of Istanbul, Vienna, and Venice in its 2014 conference.

Since the Middle Ages all three cities have been (culturally) mythologized as points of cultural intersection in works of literature, arts and film—be it as the spaces where East meets West, where lines blur between the conscious and the subconscious, between life and death, between the visible/ the seen and the invisible/ the unseen, or as spaces identified with the evil, as the Moloch luring—all these mythologizations being part both of the self-perception documented in the native cultural production and of the perception from the (cultural) ‘outside’. Regarding this fact the Images project has decided to discuss the (historically) changing representation and perception of the three cities in its 2014 conference Images IV: Images of the Other: Istanbul—Vienna—Venice, with the representations being seen as documentations of cultural approaches and also of cultural concepts. Hence, the historically grown mythologizations of the three cities create a sheer unlimited number of potential cases of both cultural encounters and conflicts, including most of the socially relevant fields in the academic discourse on the topic, like politics, communication, culture, and migration.

In order to discuss issues like the above mentioned Images IV: Images of the Other: Istanbul—Vienna—Venice invites scholars, architects, photographers, writers, artists, and filmmakers to propose papers in the following fields of research and interest:

• The Making of a Myth (theoretical approaches with special reference to Istanbul, Vienna, and Venice)
• The psychology of feeling Istanbulite, Viennese and Venetian
• The psychology of attraction (theoretical approaches with special reference to Istanbul, Vienna, and Venice)
• Istanbul’s, Vienna’s, Venice’s cityscape as a (mythologized) statement
• The impact of the media (news, internet, daily soaps) on the perception of Istanbul, Vienna, and Venice
• Images of Istanbul, Vienna, and Venice in feature films (present and past)
• Images of Istanbul, Vienna, and Venice in the Arts (present and past)
• Images of Istanbul, Vienna, and Venice as seen by photographers (present and past)
• Images of Istanbul, Vienna, and Venice in literature (present and past)

The conference Images IV: Images of the Other: Istanbul—Vienna—Venice is planned as an interdisciplinary international conference. It will bring together senior scholars with PhD students, postdoctoral academics, and members of the artistic community without following the classical keynote speaker pattern but rather inviting all speakers either to present their research findings in 20-minute (paper) presentations plus 10 minutes for discussion or in 120–150 minute panels (4–5 panelists). There will be no parallel sessions. All sessions will be plenary sessions. The conference language is English. Selected articles of each session/ field of research will be published as a volume of conference proceedings. Münster, Berlin, Vienna and New York based LIT Verlag has already declared strong interest in publishing the conference proceedings. The publication will provide limited space for black-and-white illustrations. Please, send paper proposals to images-1@gmx.at and cc them to veronika.bernard@uibk.ac.at and otuzun@hotmail.com and gonul.ucele@bahcesehir.edu.tr

Deadline for paper submission for publication in conference proceedings: 1 month after conference
Planned date of publication of conference proceedings: July 2015

Images Project Director
Veronika Bernard (University of Innsbruck)

Conference Organizing Committee
Veronika Bernard (University of Innsbruck, Innsbruck)
Hatice Övgü Tüzün (Bahçeşehir University, Istanbul)
Gönül Ücele (Bahçeşehir University, Istanbul)

Thanks again to Christina Smylitopoulos, HECAA is scheduled to be represented at this year’s UAAC Conference! Details and a full list of panels are available here»

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Universities Art Association of Canada / l’association d’art des universités du Canada
OCAD University, Toronto, 20–26 October 2014

Proposals due by 18 June 2014

HECAA Open Session (Historians of Eighteenth-Century Art and Architecture)
The objective of this society is to stimulate, foster, and disseminate knowledge of all aspects of visual culture in the long eighteenth century. This HECAA open session welcomes papers that examine any aspect of art and visual culture from the 1680s to the 1830s. Special consideration will be given to proposals that demonstrate innovation in theoretical and/or methodological approaches. Please email proposals for 20-minute papers to Dr. Christina Smylitopoulos (University of Guelph), csmylito@uoguelph.ca.

Collecting and Display: New Directions in Museology
MEWO Kunsthalle, Memmingen, 10–12 October 2014

Proposals due by 16 June 2014

Research in the history of collecting has often focused on the development and the uses of historical collections of art and artefacts, their composition and the choreography of display. Over the past decade, the international forum Collecting & Display has been investigating diverse aspects of Collecting History: female collectors, dynastic ambition, the role of nature, or the location of display rooms within the context of princely residences.

To celebrate the first decade of our existence as well as the launch of a dedicated series of publications—Collecting Histories under the editorship of founding member Andrea Gáldy, PhD, FHistS—we propose a conference dedicated to new directions in the areas of collecting, display, visitor experience and the use of modern media in today’s museums that might or might not dispel with the need to engage with actual objects, and whether and how the engagement with the history of collections has influenced and modified contemporary museology.

With this event we intend to look forward towards a future, which oftentimes looks bleak due to funding cuts but also offers exciting prospects as far as the diverse possibilities of display are concerned; not to forget the rising visitor numbers at many of the great museums worldwide. What is the mission of collections and museums? And, how does one balance the history of collections and the collections themselves against the need for outreach activities, the call for edutainment and popular access in conjunction with a sustainable use of collectibles? Is there a way in which the past of a collection may point the way towards the best practice in use and presentation of the exhibits? The organisers of this conference invite proposals from scholars of the history of collecting as well as museum professionals (curators, art historians, librarians, administrators, IT specialists) who intend to explore the intersection between scholarly approach to and hands-on occupation with collections.

Keywords
Target audience and visitor experience
Museum outreach and education
Technical innovation
Knowledge and collections
State of the art museum display in a period/listed building
Coping with diminishing funding
Who cares about cultural heritage and whose is it anyway?

Please send proposals of c. 250 words to Dr Andrea Gáldy collecting_display@hotmail.com and Dr Axel Lapp axel.lapp@memmingen.de by 16 June 2014.

While this is primarily a Renaissance and seventeenth-century project, the organ of San Pietro di Castello is the mid-eighteenth-century work of Pietro Nachini. Surely ‘San Pietro in the Eighteenth Century’ would make a fine epilogue to the proceedings . . .

The Church of San Pietro di Castello and the Birth of the Patriarchate of Venice
Venice, 10–12 December 2015

Proposals due by 15 June 2014

The research project Chiese di Venezia. Nuove prospettive di ricerca (Churches of Venice. New Research Perspectives), promoted by the Studium Generale Marcianum and representing one of the activities of the ISSR San Lorenzo Giustiniani, consists in a long-term program of multidisciplinary conferences, each focused on a particular church of Venice. The project aims at promoting the combination of the different disciplines in order to understand the complex phenomena and dynamics of which Venetian churches, in their articulate reality and manifold meanings, have been catalyst elements for centuries. Besides facing in an innovative way the study of the churches of Venice, ‘releasing’ the potentialities of each discipline through their mutual comparison, the project takes up the challenge of reaching a wider public than just the specialist one, whose contributions, constituting a central aspect, are collected in a special series of volumes edited by Marcianum Press.

After the study of  the churches of San Bartolomeo (2011), of the Scalzi (2012), of San Lazzaro dei Mendicanti (2013) and of San Zaccaria (scheduled for 2014), the conference of 10–12 December 2015 will be dedicated to the study of the church of San Pietro di Castello. In the context of the urban development of Venice, the Olivolo Island, set at the extreme peripheral area of the town, was appointed to be the see of the Bishop’s complex (including the cathedral, the bishop’s palace and the residences of the canons) since the 9th century. Since 1451, when the island was chosen to be the seat of the Patriarch of Venice, a series of urban and architectural renewals led to a complete restoration of the complex by Mauro Codussi, Andrea Palladio, Francesco Smeraldi, Gerolamo Grappiglia and Baldassarre Longhena.

The conference will concentrate on the transformation from the Episcopate of Castello to the Patriarchate of Venice, in the framework of Renaissance Venice, and will focus the attention on the early patriarchs, particularly on Lorenzo Giustiniani. The figure of the proto-patriarch of Venice, who played a fundamental role in the history of the local Church, will be studied not only in the context of the changing fortunes of the Venetian Church of the 15th century but also in the wider context of the changing fortunes of the whole town during 16th and 17th centuries, when the process of canonization and the following worship of the Saint represented the key to discover the relationship between Church and state. The conference intends to reconsider, from a multidisciplinary point of view, the role of the Patriarchate in the history of the town, starting from the church of San Pietro di Castello in its architectural consistency, passing on to the following decoration campaigns and getting to the 17th century rebuilding.

In particular, the following topics will be analysed:
• The area of the parish: social and pastoral aspects
• The curia: the patriarchal palace and the residences of the canons. Historical-architectural aspects, fortunes of the chancellery and life of the familia patriarchalis
• The Giustinianean Reform in the context of the Italian Church of 15th century
• Worship and music in San Pietro di Castello
• The church’s interior decoration between the 15th and 16th century
• The façade: sacred liturgy and urban ritual
• The worship of Saint Lorenzo Giustiniani: religious and civil rituals. The worship of the Saint in the area of the Republic: prayers, churches, place names and festivals dedicated to San Lorenzo Giustiniani outside Venice
• The iconography of Saint Lorenzo Giustiniani
• Seventeenth-century church: the chancel (architecture, painting, sculpture), the Vendramin Chapel and Luca Giordano. The interior decoration of the church.

Proposals, accompanied by a brief abstract (200 words, max 1200 characters) and by a one-page cv, will have to be submitted sending an e-mail to chiesedivenezia@marcianum.it by 15th June 2014. Successful applicants will be notified by 31st July 2014.

From Le Blog de L’ApAhAu:

Penser le génie à travers ses usages / The Uses of Genius
Special Issue of L’Esprit Créateur (Johns Hopkins University Press), Fall 2015

Proposals due by 30 June 2014

Le génie est, depuis la première modernité, l’une des notions par lesquelles se construit la valeur des œuvres d’art et des innovations scientifiques, de même que celle de leurs agents (artistes, poètes, scientifiques, philosophes, inventeurs, grandes figures de toutes sortes). À ce titre, le génie permet d’ancrer le sentiment d’appartenance des communautés autour d’une instance de valorisation qui leur est universellement reconnue, sur laquelle peuvent être fondées les hiérarchies culturelles, les mécanismes d’admiration et d’émulation, les stratégies de recyclage du passé, la constitution projective de la postérité, etc. Bref, malgré son extrême singularité, le génie permet de fonder du commun. Ainsi, cette figure peut être envisagée non pas comme un naturel inné dont on pourrait s’employer à comprendre la cause (transcendantale ou physiologique), mais plutôt comme une construction historique et culturelle correspondant à différents usages.

C’est précisément ces usages du génie que nous proposons d’interroger, dans le cadre d’un numéro collectif de la revue L’Esprit créateur (Johns Hopkins University Press) dont la publication est prévue pour l’automne 2015.

Plus particulièrement, les propositions attendues s’intéresseront au statut problématique que possède la notion de génie au sein des discours dans lesquels elle se trouve impliquée, du Moyen Âge aux vingtième et vingt-et-unième siècles français. Il s’agira non seulement de souligner la variété des constructions dont le génie a fait l’objet dans son histoire, mais aussi d’insister sur les utilisations particulières de cette notion en fonction des contextes de son élaboration (disciplines, pratiques de valorisation, querelles et débats ; enjeux politiques, économiques, sociologiques, linguistiques, littéraires, philosophiques, esthétiques, etc.). Loin de relever de l’évidence, le génie demande au contraire à être sans cesse redéfini selon les circonstances dans lesquelles il est convoqué. Nous ne chercherons donc pas à saisir l’essence du génie, mais plutôt à interroger les modalités même de cette utilisation. Pour ce faire, nous proposons d’aborder le génie dans la longue durée, de façon à mettre en évidence la pluralité des champs dans lesquels la notion est investie. Nous inscrivons cette longue durée dans le contexte français (ce qui n’exclut pas de considérer les phénomènes de transferts culturels), non seulement parce que l’histoire française du génie a été négligée jusqu’à présent par la critique, mais aussi pour nous permettre de mesurer les conséquences de cette spécificité dans l’élaboration des discours.

Plusieurs angles d’approche peuvent être envisagés (mais la liste n’est pas exhaustive) :

• Quelles sont les modalités du rapport entre la singularité du génie et la communauté à laquelle il appartient selon une époque/région/circonstance donnée ?
• Comment (dispositif publicitaire, acteurs, public, médias, etc.) et à quelles fins ont été construites dans leur temps les grandes figures du génie ?
• Comment se constitue le rapport du génie à la norme et à ses éventuelles transgressions, aux usages et aux innovations, à la règle et au dérèglement sous toutes ses formes ?
• Y a-t-il une éthique propre au génie ?
• Comment les différentes formes d’art représentent-elles le génie ?
• Quel(s) génie(s) aujourd’hui et pourquoi?

Les propositions d’articles d’une page maximum, accompagnées d’une brève bio-bibliographie pourront nous être adressées par mél aux adresses suivantes : ann.jefferson@new.ox.ac.uk & jean-alexandre.perras@mod-langs.ox.ac.uk avant le 30 juin 2014. La date limite pour la remise des articles est le 31 décembre 2014.

Responsables du numéro
Ann Jefferson, Professor of French, New College, Oxford
Jean-Alexandre Perras, Postdoctoral fellow, Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford

The 2015 ASECS Conference takes place in Los Angeles, March 19–22. Proposals for panels are due by June 1. Details and a form for submitting a session for consideration can be found here»

As posted at H-ArtHist:

Diocletian’s Palace in the Works of Adam, Clérisseau, and Cassas
Institute of Art History – Center Cvito Fiskovic, Split, Croatia, 27–29 November 2014

Proposals due by 30 June 2014

The Grand Tour, as an educational rite of passage, reached its peak in the 18th century, widening its travelling radius outside of Rome and Italy onto further parts of the Roman Empire, among which Dalmatia held a prominent position. The international interdisciplinary conference on architecture, urban planning, and architectural decoration aims to explore the role of Diocletian’s Palace in the work of Robert Adam, Charles-Louis Clérisseau, and Louis-François Cassas, as well as the influence of Diocletian’s palace on the development of European neoclassicism.

We welcome proposals for 20-minute papers. Each proposal should consist of a 250-word abstract and short biographical statement. Proposals are due by 30/06/2014 (with notification of acceptance by 15/07/2014). Direct proposals and questions as a PDF attachment to asverko@ipu.hr.

Important information
• There is no conference fee.
• Accommodation for the participants can be arranged at organizer’s expense.
• The organizers are not able to pay for the travel expense of the participants.
• Conference languages: English and French.
• The length of spoken contribution should not exceed 20 minutes. Contributions will be divided into sections according to their topics. Each section will be followed by discussion.
• Papers will be published in the conference proceedings. Please send final written version (both in English or French) by 31/01/2015.

Scientific Committee
Joško Belamaric (Institute of Art History – Centre Cvito Fiskovic Split)
Milan Pelc (Institute of Art History Zagreb)
Pierre Pinon (ENSA de Paris-Belleville, École de Chaillot, Institut
national d’Histoire de l’Art Paris)
John A. Pinto (Princeton University)
Ana Sverko (Institute of Art History – Centre Cvito Fiskovic Split)

Organizing Committee
Joško Belamaric (Institute of Art History – Centre Cvito Fiskovic Split)
Milan Pelc (Institute of Art History Zagreb)
Ana Sverko (Institute of Art History – Centre Cvito Fiskovic Split)

From the Call for Papers:

Animating the Eighteenth-Century Country House
The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, London, 5–6 March 2015

Proposals due by 14 July 2014

Organised by the Paul Mellon Centre, the National Gallery, and Birkbeck, University of London

When we visit a Georgian country house, wander through its interiors, and stop to look across a rope at a particular arrangement of pictures and furniture, it is common to experience the sense we are looking at a snapshot of the past, a frozen moment of time. This impression of the country house as a static, unchanging environment belies a crucial aspect of such properties: the fact that, during the eighteenth century itself, they were continually in flux and being fashioned and experienced anew. Recent research encourages us to think afresh about such issues. Sources such as diaries, letters, inventories, catalogues and account books show country-house objects being inherited, gifted, purchased, removed and relocated, and provide evidence that the spaces in which such objects were located were subject to constant development and reconceptualization. Accordingly, this conference will focus on the Georgian country house as an environment that was always evolving, and that was animated by the interaction between objects and people.

This conference will look at the ways in which objects, when placed on display within a particular space—a room, a corridor, a garden—entered into different kinds of dialogue with the contents, decoration and associations of that environment, all of which were subject to change and adaptation. It will also explore the ways in which the evolving spaces of the country house, and the forms of display found within them, were experienced—by those who lived in the house, by those who visited as tourists or invited guests, and by those who engaged vicariously through the process of ‘armchair travel’, reading guidebooks and other contemporary accounts.

This two-day event, which will include a half-day visit to a local property, aims to bring together scholars from a variety of fields with the objective of animating the eighteenth-century country house. Proposals for contributions are welcomed from art historians and historians working on all aspects of the eighteenth-century country house, including architecture, painting, sculpture, the decorative arts and garden history.

We particularly welcome proposals for papers exploring the following topics:
•    Acquisition: the purchase, commissioning, inheritance, gifting of works of art, furniture, books and other materials.
•    Display: picture hangs; room arrangements and decorative schemes; the organisation of art collections within and between different properties owned by the same family; garden design and layout.
•    The country house as lived environment: the lived experience of the country house as a family home; as a site of hospitality; as a space in which artists may have worked.
•    The country house as tourist destination: country house tourism; visitor experience; the multifarious literature related to country houses, including guidebooks, regional guidebooks, and periodical articles.

Abstracts for 25-minute conference papers should be no longer than 300 words in length, and should be accompanied by a short biography (of no more than 100 words) detailing any work or recent publications of particular relevance. Please send abstracts and biographies by Monday 14 July to:
Amelia Smith, The National Gallery/Birkbeck, University of London, amelia.smith@ng-london.org.uk.

Faith, Politics, and the Arts: Early Modern Transfers between Catholic and Protestant Cultures
Philipps-Universität Marburg, Germany, 9–11 March 2015

Proposals due by 22 May 2014

The search for transcendental systems of belief that provide orientation in the confused realities of everyday life is an anthropological constant which characterizes contemporary multi-cultural communities just as much as the no less troubled societies of the past. Religion can inform political decisions, sustain certain forms of government, underpin or destabilize the social order. The conference Faith, Politics, and the Arts will explore the role of the arts as a means for shaping and interpreting the interrelation of religion and politics. Conference papers are intended to focus on Catholic and Protestant cultures in the Early Modern period (1517– ca. 1800). Central questions to be addressed are: How did Catholic and Protestant cultures visualize the relationship between God, ruler and subjects // spiritual and temporal power? In what ways and to what ends did the art production of Protestant cultures appropriate and modify visual formulae developed for Catholic societies (and vice versa)? To what extent did such transfers promote or undermine religious tolerance?

We invite proposals for papers from a wide range of disciplines engaging with the visual arts as well as architecture, drama, fashion, and material culture. Among others, topics may include: religious imagery in the palaces of political leaders; political elements in the pictorial programme, design and layout of churches and chapels; prints commenting on religiously motivated conflicts; diplomatic gifts between Catholic and Protestant powers; images promoting religious tolerance; theatre productions touching on confessional issues; the staging of the Eucharist and of religious processions; frontispieces to theological treatises; prints with satires on fashions associated with the ‘foreign’ religion etc.

Abstracts may be submitted in German, English, Italian, and French. Please send an abstract for a 30-minute paper plus a short CV to PD Dr. Christina Strunck (strunck@staff.uni-marburg.de) and Julia Bender-Helfenstein, M. A. (benderhelfenstein@googlemail.com) by May 22, 2014.