Enfilade

From ArtHist.net:

The Age of Rubens: 2023 Summer Course for the Study of the Arts in Flanders
Belgium, 18–28 June 2023

Applications due by 20 February 2023

Annually, the Summer Course 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 7th edition of the Summer Course will focus on ‘The Age of Rubens’. It will be held 18–28 June 2023. Excursions will be made to Antwerp, Mechelen, Leuven, Scherpenheuvel, Bruges, Ghent, Liège, and Brussels. The language of the Summer Course is English.

Who can apply?
Participants have a master’s degree or are PhD student, junior curator, or restorer, and they are specialised in art in the Age of Rubens. The master’s degree was earned maximum 10 years ago.

Participation fee
The participation fee of the Summer Course is fixed at €1280 (including VAT) per person. The fee includes the full 11-day programme, 10 overnight hotel stays in a single-occupancy room, all transportation within the programme, all entry tickets, 2 receptions, 5 lunches, and 5 dinners. Not included in the participation fee is the transport to and from Belgium.

How to apply?

All applicants should send a resume, a letter of motivation, and a letter of recommendation from a faculty member or a museum professional to an.seurinck@vlaamsekunstcollectie.be.

Grants
In addition to the regular applications materials, candidates applying for financial aid are asked also to send a statement explaining their financial need.

Partners

The Summer Course for the Study of the Arts in Flanders is a joint initiative of the KMSKA (Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp), Musea Brugge, Museum of Fine Arts Ghent, M Leuven, Mu.ZEE Ostend, Ghent University, KU Leuven, the Flemish research centre for the arts in the Burgundian Netherlands, the Rubenianum, and the Flemish Art Collection. Structural content partners for this edition are the KBR (Royal Library of Belgium), The Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage (KIK-IRPA), and the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium. This edition is coordinated by Flemish Art Collection, KMSKA, and Rubenianum.

Mirabel Jane Neville[?], mid-nineteenth-century watercolour of the Saloon at Audley End, Essex.

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From the project announcement:

‘Spaces of Femininity’: Making Art and Craft in the English Country House, c.1750–1900
AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Partnership
PhD Project supervised by Kate Retford and Peter Moore, starting 1 October 2022

Applications due by 9 May 2022

Birkbeck, University of London and English Heritage are pleased to announce the availability of a fully funded collaborative doctoral studentship, from October 2022. This is to undertake research into the artistic production of women in country houses in the later eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, using English Heritage properties as case studies. This PhD project will be jointly supervised by Professor Kate Retford (History of Art Department, Birkbeck) and Dr. Peter Moore (Curator of Collections and Interiors, Audley End and Wrest Park). The closing date is Monday, 9 May 2022, 5pm.

Country houses are full of ‘amateur’ art work—particularly the work of the wives and daughters who lived in them, and particularly from the later Georgian and Victorian periods when such practice flourished, and the commercial sector developed to support it (providing instruction manuals, materials, tutors etc). This ranges from drawings, etchings and watercolours through to objects such as containers crafted from shell work, panelled folding screens showcasing petit-point needlework and hand painted ceramics. The houses managed by English Heritage are no exception. The student will select case studies from amongst properties such as Audley End, Wrest Park, and Brodsworth, considering objects and interiors still at the houses, as well as material now in other public or private collections.

The student has the scope to develop both the topic and approach, in conjunction with the supervisors, but proposed research questions include:
1  What kinds of work did these women produce? In which genres and media did they work?
2  Why did they produce such work? A popular contemporary stereotype presented this as a genteel accomplishment, of particular value in the marriage market: does this hold up?
3  What did these women do with such work? Was it intended for display, whether in their own home or elsewhere? To what extent did this creative practice support familial and social networks through exchange of these objects?
4  What relationship did these women have with the ‘professional’ art world? What instruction manuals and other pedagogic literature did they consult? What commercially produced materials did they use? Who taught them, and how did tutoring work in practice? How did they engage with the organisations that provided training, prizes and opportunities for exhibiting work?
5  What can this work tell us about women’s historical experience? What can it tell us about their daily lives and personal relationships? What can it tell us about their relationships with their houses and landscapes?
6  What can this work tell us about the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century domestic interior? How did these objects relate to the décor and furnishings designed and created by professionals?

This studentship will provide the student with both invaluable academic skills and experience of working in the heritage sector. It will involve the student in a range of interdisciplinary research activities, drawing on archival and primary textual material and working closely with collections and interiors. In addition to preparing the PhD thesis, it is envisaged that the student will also be engaged in a range of related activities such as cataloguing and interpretation work, and to take the lead on a temporary display at Audley End. They will also be expected to play a full role in the research cultures of both institutions.

Additional information is available here»

Saltram House, near Plymouth in Devon, England; in 1957 the house was donated by the Parker family to the National Trust (Photo: National Trust). More information is available here.

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From the project description:

Global Connections and Local Contexts: The Material Culture of Saltram, c.1725–1840
Applications due by 20 February 2022

The global links of country houses have attracted considerable attention in recent years, but the furore over colonialism has tended to overshadow the supply and materiality of global goods and the ways in which these artefacts were integrated into a wider array of goods of local and European provenance. Saltram, with its mix of British, European, and global objects, forms a perfect collection through which to explore these issues.

The project explores global-local interaction through the belongings and consumption practices of the Parker family in the period 1725–1840. Perhaps best known for its Robert Adam interiors and Reynolds paintings, Saltram also has a range of Asian objects, including Chinese wallpapers and porcelain, and items of high quality European furniture and porcelain, as well as a large collection of mahogany furniture made in British workshops. These combine with a varied archival collection that is especially rich in family correspondence.

The project seeks to entangle the global with the local by exploring the consumption practices and motivations of the Parker family. This will provide a better understanding of the significance of global goods as one part of the material culture of the country house, set within the context of locality, domestic space, and family relations, the broader influences of taste and fashion, and the commercial worlds of international trade and manufacturing.

The project is framed by four key research questions:
1. What was the origin of goods within the collection and what were the routes of supply through which they came to Saltram? This allows the shifting relative importance of global goods to be assessed and places the house at the centre of local, national, European and global networks of supply.
2. What were the material and behavioural contexts in which these things were displayed, used and consumed? This means: assessing where things were located in the house and garden, how were they used and by whom; and exploring the history of display.
3. How were individual and assemblages of objects linked to personal identity and how did they reflect and shape the character of the house? What motivations underpinned the consumption of these goods, and what meaning did they hold for their owners?
4. How can these tangled histories be related to visitors to include and engage local and diverse audiences? This involves understanding and evaluating audience expectations and engagement.

The student is encouraged to define their own doctoral research project within these broad parameters. The research results will inform a range of public-facing outputs at Saltram. Indeed, a core aim of the project is to identify ways to quickly embed new research findings into public programming and the student will work closely with the engagement as well as the curatorial team. The project thus has the potential to make an important contribution to how the National Trust at Saltram tells a greater variety of stories to more diverse audiences. The student will receive training from the curatorial and conservation team on object handling and the NT’s collections management system and from the engagement team on audience engagement and partnership working.

Candidate Requirements
In addition to our standard entry requirements, applicants should have:
• Masters in an appropriate discipline at merit or distinction OR equivalent experience working in the heritage sector
• Knowledge of the history/arthistory/heritage of the English country house
• Experience of undertaking research using archives or material objects
• Ability to work independently, as an effective part of a team, and with members of the public
• The student will need to be willing and able to travel between Manchester and Saltram

This opportunity includes fees funding plus an annual stipend at the Research Council minimum rate (set by UKRI), which for 2021/22 is £15,609 per annum for home and overseas applicants.

Interested applicants should contact are welcome to contact Professor Jon Stobart for an informal discussion. For application details, please consult the project description available as a PDF file here. The closing date is 20th February 2022.