Online Conversation | Architecture’s Archive, 1400–1800
From the Society of Architectural Historians:
Architecture’s Archive: Paperwork in Early Modern Practice, 1400–1800
With Christine Casey, Farshid Emami, Eleonora Pistis, and Saundra Weddle
Online, An SAH Connects Session, Friday, 20 March 2026, noon EST
From drawings and invoices to maps, inventories, and account books, early modern architectural practice abounded with paperwork. These documents emerged from a historical moment beginning around 1400 that witnessed the rise of new technologies and regimes for the management of information. While essential to historical scholarship, documents have long been taken for granted merely as sources to mine for data. Towards a fuller view of paperwork, this SAH Connects event invites a reframing of documents as spatial objects whose form, use, content, and production merit critical consideration.
Documents call attention to questions of process but also, more generally, the material realities of building in the early modern world. Panelists will speak about the historiographic and methodological stakes of a document that has animated their scholarship. Among the questions to be considered are: What do documents clarify or obscure? How did documents serve institutions, particular those that oversaw building activity? How did architectural documents circulate? What new possibilities do documents provide for uncovering non-elite figures or extra-architectural actors who shaped the built environment? Who is absent from documents? What temporal, material, or scalar slippages exist between documents and buildings? How do we wrestle with fragmentary or compromised documentary evidence? While anchored in the early modern world, this conversation will invite broad critical reflection on the documentary sources that underpin architectural history.
With the goal of highlighting new work, we have invited authors whose recently published books engage with a variety of building cultures at a range of scales from across the early modern world. Speaking from their books, each participant will discuss a single historical document that was central to their analysis of the actors, systems and processes that shaped the built environment.
• Christine Casey, Trinity College Dublin | Architecture and Artifice: The Crafted Surface in Eighteenth-Century Building Practice (Yale University Press, 2025).
• Farshid Emami, Rice University | Isfahan: Architecture and Urban Experience in Early Modern Iran (Penn State Press, 2024).
• Eleonora Pistis, Columbia University | Architecture of Knowledge: Hawksmoor and Oxford (Harvey Miller, 2024).
• Saundra Weddle, Drury University | The Brothel and Beyond: An Urban History of the Sex Trade in Early Modern Venice (Penn State Press, 2026).
The session will be moderated by Matthew Gin (University of North Carolina, Charlotte), Ann C. Huppert (University of Washington), and Kristin Triff (Trinity College).
Registration is available here»
SAH CONNECTS, a year-round series of virtual programs related to the history of the built environment, provides a platform for the SAH community to collaborate, share their work, engage in timely discussions, and reach worldwide audiences.
Symposium | El Prado en femenino III: Queen Isabel de Farnesio
Next month from The Prado, with some simultaneous translation planned:
Key Women in the Creation of the Collections of the
Museo del Prado III: Isabel de Farnesio
Online and in-person, Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid, 9–10 March 2026
Organized by Noelia García Pérez
Jean Ranc, Isabel de Farnesio, 1723, oil on canvas, 144 × 115 cm (Madrid: Museo Nacional del Prado).
It was probably Queen Isabel de Farnesio (1692–1766), patron of the arts, who most decisively contributed to giving shape to the Museo del Prado’s collections. This third edition of the series Protagonistas femeninas en la formación de las colecciones del Museo del Prado invites us to reconsider the significance of her patronage and her pivotal contribution to the artistic collection that the Museum now preserves. As in previous editions, this scientific meeting was designed with the intention of recovering, studying, and disseminating the cultural agency of the women of Europe’s royal houses, whose collections and artistic decisions have left a profound imprint on the identity of the Museum.
Throughout the sessions, a group of notable national and international specialists will examine the political, cultural, and dynastic context in which Elisabeth Farnese advanced her patronage; the mechanisms through which she built her public image as queen consort in the exercise of her power; the complex network of mediators that made the realization of her collections possible; and her extraordinary relevance in the fields both of painting and classical sculpture. From an initial analysis of the interests of other queenly European patrons—for instance, Maria Theresa of Austria, Catherine II, and Sophia Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz—to a specific consideration of Isabel de Farnesio’s own collecting activities, this symposium invites reflection on female artistic agency in the Modern Age and its impact on the circulation of works, the promotion of artists, and the consolidation of new narratives of power.
As complementary activities, the meeting will include the screening of a documentary dedicated to Isabel de Farnesio and a visit to the exhibition El Prado en femenino III. The exhibition explores the legacy this queen passed on, underscoring how her work in the field of artistic promotion definitively contributed to enriching the Museum’s collection. With this initiative, the Museo del Prado consolidates an essential line of work that explores the actions of these queens who made possible an essential part of the legacy that we are fortunate to continue to admire today.
m o n d a y , 9 m a r c h
9.30 Registration
10.00 Introductions
• Alfonso Palacio (Museo del Prado)
• Cristina Hernández Martín (Women’s Institute)
• Noelia García Pérez (University of Murcia)
10.30 Empress Maria Theresa and the Politics of Habsburg Imperial Art — Michael Yonan (University of California)
11.15 Power and Paint: The Patronage of Women Artists at the Court of Catherine II — Rosalind Polly Blakesley (University of Cambridge)
12.30 Sophia Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz: How a Queen Promoted Both Art and Female Artists in English Society — Heidi A. Strobel (University of North Texas)
16.00 Round table | Isabel de Farnesio: A Queen Consort in the Exercise of Power
Moderator: Carlos González Navarro (Museo del Prado)
• María de los Ángeles Semper (University of Barcelona)
• Giulio Sodano (Università della Campania Luigi Vanvitelli)
• Pablo Gestal (Sorbonne Université, Centre Roland Mousnier)
17.00 Round table | The Patronage of Isabel de Farnesio: State of the Art
Moderator: Ana González Mozo (Museo del Prado)
• Ángel Aterido (Complutense University of Madrid)
• Antonio Iommelli (Farnese Palace Museums)
t u e s d a y , 1 0 m a r c h
10.00 Isabel de Farnesio en las colecciones del Museo del Prado — Noelia García Pérez (University of Murcia)
10.45 Round table | The Construct of the Image of the Queen: From Molinaretto to Van Loo
Moderator: Noelia García Pérez
• Sandra Antúnez (Complutense University of Madrid)
• Andrés Úbeda (Museo del Prado)
• Mercedes Simal (University of Jaén)
12.00 Round table | From Christina of Sweden to Isabel de Farnesio: Collections of Classical Sculpture
Moderator: Ana Martín (Museo del Prado)
• Manuel Arias (Museo del Prado)
• Juan Ramón Sánchez del Peral (Museo del Prado)
• Mercedes Simal (University of Jaén)
16.00 El boceto de Santa Ana enseñando a leer a la Virgen: La sustracción y retorno del boceto de Murillo del Museo del Prado — Benito Navarrete (Complutense University of Madrid)
16.45 Screening of the documentary
17.15 Viewing of the exhibition The Female Perspective III
Cambridge Material Culture Workshop, Lent 2026
The Material Culture Workshop schedule for the current term:
Cambridge Material Culture Workshop, Lent 2026
We’re delighted to share our Lent 2026 term card. Each of the four sessions will meet online and in-person at St. John’s, Cambridge, starting at 5pm. For more information, please contact Tomas Brown (tbnb2@cam.ac.uk) or Sophia Feist (stcf2@cam.ac.uk). In addition to our talks this term, the Material Culture Workshop is hosting an exhibition tour of Tudor Contemporary at the Heong Gallery, Downing College, on Friday, 13 March, led by curator Dr. Christina Faraday and artist and academic Dr. Jane Partner. This is sign-up only, so send us an email if you’d like to attend.
Monday, 9 February
• Jordan Mitchell-King (De Montfort), The Significance of Getting Dressed for Elite Women in the 18th Century
• Charlotte Stobart (Cambridge), Technological Embodiment: Examining Experiences of Calliper Usage among British Polio-disabled Individuals, 1950–2025
Friday, 20 February
• Laura Granda-Mateu (Edge Hill), Binding Worlds: Women’s Albums and Transnational Material Practices
• Ella Gaskell (York), Sanctified Materiality and the Dormition Icon in Post-Iconoclastic Byzantium
Monday, 9 March
• Joe Clarke (Cambridge), Sa(l)vage Anthropology: Wynfrid Duckworth and the Lost Cambridge Anatomy Museum
• Charlotte Wood (Cambridge), Natural Objects of Affection: Emotion, Materiality, and the Care of Museum Specimens in the Making of Wildlife Conservation Mentalities in Colonial East Africa
Friday, 20 March
• Cecilia Eure (Cambridge), Alternative Means of Decorating in Poor and Labouring-Class British Homes, 1600–1800
• Emma Piercy-Wright (Exeter), Small Trifles, Big Ideas: Mother-of-Pearl Trinkets as Enlightenment Transcripts
Online Conversation | Reflecting on Turner in 2025
Registration for this HECAA Great Conversation (open to non-HECAA members) is available here:
Turner in 2025: Reflecting on the Anniversary Year’s Exhibitions
With Chloe Wigston Smith, Richard Johns, Lucinda Lax, and Melissa Gustin
Online, 23 January 2026, 12.30 EST / 5.30 GMT
J.M.W. Turner, The Wreck Buoy, first exhibited in 1849, oil on canvas, canvas: 93 × 123 cm (Liverpool: Walker Art Gallery).
Joseph Mallord William Turner was born in 1775. To mark 250 years since his birth, a number of anniversary exhibitions were organized across the United Kingdom and the United States in 2025. Some contextualized Turner with other notable contemporaries; others focused on specific aspects of his career or mined collection holdings. This roundtable will bring together four curators of three Turner anniversary exhibitions to ask them to reflect on their exhibitions and ponder together what it means to exhibit Turner today.
• Melissa Gustin is Curator of British Art at the National Museums Liverpool, and curator of Turner: Always Contemporary at the Walker Art Gallery.
• Lucinda Lax is Interim Head of the Curatorial Division and Curator of Paintings and Sculpture at the Yale Center for British Art, and curator of J.M.W. Turner: Romance and Reality.
• Richard Johns is Senior Lecturer in the Department of History of Art at the University of York. Along with Smith, he was a co-curator of Austen and Turner at Harewood House.
• Chloe Wigston Smith is Professor in the Department of English at the University of York and Director of its Centre for Eighteenth-Century Studies. Along with Johns, she was a co-curator of Austen and Turner at Harewood House.
Join us on Friday, 23 January 2026 at 12.30pm EST / 5.30pm GMT for this HECAA Great (Zoom) Conversation. The event is open to current and prospective HECAA members; so please share widely in your networks.
Online Talks | Patricia Ferguson, Ivan Day, Neil Buttery, and Paul Crane
From the Museum of Royal Worcester:
Museum of Royal Worcester | Online Winter Talk Series, 2025–26
The Museum of Royal Worcester is thrilled to present another season of fascinating online talks to keep the winter blues at bay. Curl up with a warm drink and join us as we explore art, food, and history with three brilliant speakers.
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Ivan Day | Frozen Delights: A History of Porcelain and Ice Cream
Wednesday, 21 January 2026, 6pm
Ice Pail, 1776, William Davis Factory (Museum of Royal Worcester).
During the eighteenth century, ice cream became the ultimate show-off luxury for adorning a fashionable dinner table. As a result, new items for serving this novelty dish started to appear on the market. The challenge was to produce an attractive container which could be displayed centre stage on the sideboard or table, but which was also capable of preventing the ice cream from melting. These specialised three-part vessels first appeared in France in 1720s, where they were called seaux à glace—ice cream coolers. They employed a mixture of ice and salt to refrigerate their contents. By the 1770s the fashion for these beautiful vessels became an aristocratic craze, and nearly every European manufactory was producing them. In England, the Worcester factory played a leading role in developing some of the finest of these vessels. Ivan Day will guide us through the development of ice cream coolers and ice cream cups, with a focus on the marvellous examples produced at Worcester. Book here»
Ivan Day is one of the UK’s most celebrated food historians, broadcasters, writers, and curators, specialising in the reconstruction of period kitchens and historic table displays. His work has been exhibited in many institutions worldwide, including the Museum of London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Getty Research Institute. His publications include Cooking in Europe, 1650–1850 and Ice Cream: A History.
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Neil Buttery and Paul Crane | Sugar, Slavery and Empire / The Evolution of Worcester Sucriers
Wednesday, 4 March 2026, 6pm
A rare early Dr Wall Worcester Sucrier and Cover with Flame finial, ca. 1753. A unique example retaining its cover, the shape derived from silver. Ex Rous Lench collection Worcestershire.
Join food historian Neil Buttery and ceramics expert Paul Crane in a presentation discussing the role of sugar and the associated enslavement of African peoples in the growth and development of the British Empire and Worcester Porcelain in the eighteenth century. Neil will explore how the reach of the ‘sugar-slave complex’ was all-pervading, influencing the sale and evolution of fancy goods, especially those associated with the tea table, which, of course, included porcelain. As a case study, Paul will focus on the evolution of the sucrier in the first fifty years of Worcester Porcelain. Book here»
Neil Buttery is a multi award-winning food historian, author, podcaster, and chef. He hosts The British Food History Podcast and co-hosts A is for Apple: An Encyclopaedia of Food & Drink. His publications include A Dark History of Sugar, Before Mrs Beeton: Elizabeth Raffald, England’s Most Influential Housekeeper, Knead to Know: A History of Baking, and The Philosophy of Puddings. Dr. Buttery has recently collaborated with the Museum of Royal Worcester on projects to deliver narratives on the history of food and porcelain to wider communities. His permanent display “Dr. Wall’s Dinner” at MoRW recently won the Food on Display Award at the British Library Food Season Awards in 2025.
Paul Crane is an independent historian and consultant to the Brian Haughton Gallery, London. He is a descendant of Dr. John Wall (1708–1776), who founded the Worcester Porcelain Manufactory in 1751. Paul presently sits as a Trustee of the Museum of Royal Worcester, formerly the Dyson Perrins Museum in the city of Worcester. He also is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, an independent historian and researcher, and a Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Art Scholars.
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Patricia Ferguson | Exploring the Rococo through Chelsea’s Gold Anchor Vases
Tuesday, 2 December 2025, 6pm — A recording is available here»
Vase (one of a pair), Chelsea Porcelain Factory, ca. 1762 (New York: The Metropolitan Museum, 1970.313.2a, b).
Of all design styles, Rococo was perhaps the most rebellious—ornate, theatrical, and a true ‘style without rules’. Emerging in France in the 1720s–30s, it featured curved, asymmetrical motifs drawn from nature, especially the acanthus leaf, and marine-inspired forms that gave rise to its name, from rocaille (‘rock’ or ‘shell’). Its greatest achievements appeared in the decorative arts—furniture, silver, and ceramics. By the 1750s–60s, English porcelain factories like Worcester and Chelsea embraced Rococo, even as taste was shifting toward Classical order. Worcester adapted Rococo silver shapes for tablewares, but Chelsea—under Flemish silversmith Nicholas Sprimont—produced some of the boldest Rococo porcelain in Europe, rivaling Meissen and Sèvres. This talk explores Chelsea’s gold anchor period (ca. 1758–64), its spectacular vases, its rivals, and its enduring legacy.
Patricia F. Ferguson is a ceramic researcher, a former curatorial consultant at the Victoria and Albert Museum and the British Museum, she is an advisor on ceramics for the National Trust and other heritage organizations. Her publications include Pots, Prints, and Politics: Ceramics with an Agenda, from the 14th to the 20th Century (2021); Ceramics: 400 years of British Collecting in 100 Masterpieces (2017); and Garnitures: Vase Sets from National Trust Houses (2017).
Study Day | Relevance and Reception of Anton Raphael Mengs
From ArtHist.net and Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte:
Die ‘allgemeine Erwartung besserer künstlerischer Zustände’:
Relevanz und Rezeption von Anton Raphael Mengs
Online and in-person, Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte, Munich, 28 January 2026
Organized by Steffi Roettgen and Ulrich Pfisterer
Anton Raphael Mengs, Self-Portrait, 1773, oil on panel 28 × 22 inches (Munich: Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen, Neue Pinakothek).
Dem steilen Aufstieg von Anton Raphael Mengs (1728–1779) zu einem der, wenn nicht dem berühmtesten Maler Europas ab der Mitte des 18. Jahrhunderts entsprach der nicht minder steile Absturz in der allgemeinen Wertschätzung bereits wenige Jahre nach seinem Tod. Das Kolloquium untersucht die Faktoren, die sowohl die Relevanz als auch die wechselhafte Rezeption von Mengs zu verstehen helfen. Für eine differenzierte Einschätzung scheint es dabei wichtig, deutlicher als bislang geschehen zwischen den Wirkungsbereichen von Ästhetik, Antike(nrezeption), Akademie und Kunsttheorie zu unterscheiden.
Die Teilnahme ist kostenlos. Die Veranstaltung wird parallel via Zoom übertragen. Dem Zoom-Meeting können Sie unter folgendem Link beitreten. Das Mitschneiden der Veranstaltung oder von Teilen der Veranstaltung sowie Screenshots sind nicht gestattet. Mit der Teilnahme akzeptieren Sie diese Nutzungsbedingung.
Konzeption
Steffi Roettgen (LMU München)
Ulrich Pfisterer (Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte)
p r o g r a m m
14.00 Ulrich Pfisterer (ZI) — Begrüßung und Einführung
14.15 Session 1
Moderation: Steffi Roettgen (LMU München)
• Gernot Mayer (Universität Wien) — Auf der Jagd nach Mengs: Die Rezeption von Anton Raphael Mengs im Spiegel transnationaler Netzwerke
• Susanne Adina Meyer (Università di Macerata) — Zwischen Malerei und Philosophie: Anton Raphael Mengs im Spiegel römischer Kunstzeitschriften des 18. Jahrhunderts
• Andrés Úbeda de los Cobos (Museo del Prado, Madrid) — Mengsianus Methodus, or the Limits of a Strict System of Thought
15.45 Kaffee
16.15 Session 2
Moderation: Hubertus Kohle (LMU München)
• Susanne Müller-Bechtel (Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg) — Antike – Rezeption – Modell: Anton Raphael Mengs’ Studien des menschlichen Körpers
• Roland Kanz (Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn) — Casanova als Mengs-Adept
• Steffi Roettgen (LMU München) — ‘Ikonen‘ mit Verfallsdatum: Zum Einfluss der Kopien auf Mengs’ Nachruhm
17.45 Pause
18.00 Session 3
Moderation: Ulrich Pfisterer (ZI)
• Tilman Schreiber (Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena) — Anton Raphael Mengs als ‘(Neo)Klassizist’: Überlegungen aus heuristischer Perspektive
• Michael Thimann (Georg-August-Universität Göttingen) — Der kalte Weg: Mengs unter den Romantikern
19.00 Abschlussdiskussion
Online Seminar | Casts Collections across Time and Borders
From ArtHist.net:
Plaster and Bronze Legacies: Rediscovering, Preserving, and
Teaching with Casts Collections across Time and Borders
Online, 25 November 2025, 14.00–18.00 (CET Paris/Rome/Berlin)
Organized by Sarah Coviello, Valeria Paruzzo, and Giuseppe Rizzo
The Research & Development Committee of the Society for the History of Collecting is happy to announce the online seminar Plaster and Bronze Legacies: Rediscovering, Preserving and Teaching with Casts Collections across Time and Borders, the second of the cycle Unveiling Hidden Histories, Creating New Narratives: The Collections of Teaching Institutes. Attendance is free. Please register in advance here.
p r o g r a m m e
14.00 Introduction — Sarah Coviello, Valeria Paruzzo, Giuseppe Rizzo (The Society for the History of Collecting)
14.15 Session 1 | Origins and Early Histories of Cast Collections
• Tanja Kilzer (University of Trier) — The Plaster Cast Collection of the University of Bonn: Lost Works and Major Classical Sculptures in Plaster since 1818
• Jelena Todorović (University of the Arts Belgrade) — Bronze Casts with a Curious History: How a Collection of Bronzes from 1930s Became a Teaching Tool at the Faculty of Fine Arts Belgrade
• Rebecca Yuste (Columbia University, New York City) — Classicism in Mexico: Plaster Casts at the Royal Academy of San Carlos, 1791
15.15 Session 2 | Past and Present of a Fragile Heritage
• Linca Kucsinschi (Jean Moulin University, Lyon 3) — Reviving Classical Antiquity: The Gypsothèque of the University of Bucharest
• Ioana Rus-Cacovean and Tereza Pop (University of Art and Design in Cluj-Napoca) — The Collection of Classical and Hellenistic Plaster Casts of the University of Art and Design in Cluj-Napoca, Romania
• Flaminia Ferlito (IMT School for Advanced Studies in Lucca) — Provenance Studies of Sacred Art in Post-unitary Timeframe: Oronzo Lelli and the Plaster Casts Collection of the Liceo Artistico di Porta Romana in Florence
16.30 Session 3 | Contemporary Uses and New Narratives
• Milena Gallipoli (Museo de la Cárcova, Universidad Nacional de las Artes, Buenos Aires) — Reframing America within ‘Universal Art History’: The Collection of Mesoamerican Plaster Casts and Visual Resources at the Museo de la Cárcova (Buenos Aires, Argentina)
• Emy Faivre (Université Marie & Louis Pasteur, Besançon), Arianna Esposito (Université Bourgogne Europe, Dijon), and Sophie Montel (Université Marie & Louis Pasteur, Besançon) — Sharing Collections for Teaching Purposes (Museums, Art Schools, and Universities): Viewpoint of Preserving and Present-day Learning Practices from France
• Giulia Coco (Galleria dell’Accademia di Firenze e Musei del Bargello) — Enhancement, Research, and Inclusion at the Galleria dell’Accademia di Firenze e Musei del Bargello: The New Acquisition of Venus Entering the Bath by Luigi Pampaloni for the Plaster Casts Collection
17.15 Roundtable Discussion and Networking: Towards a Shared Framework for Cast Collections in Teaching
Working Wood in the 18th C. Conference at Colonial Williamsburg
From the press release for the 2026 Working Wood in the 18th Century Conference:
Working Wood in the 18th Century Conference at Colonial Williamsburg
Online and in-person, Williamsburg, Virginia 22–25 January 2026
The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation will host its annual Working Wood in the 18th Century Conference January 22–25, 2026. Offered both virtually and in-person, this year’s conference, United We Sit: Exploring Early American Chairs, will center around six different chairs that spotlight a multitude of topics and techniques drawn from early America’s rich woodworking traditions. A limited number of in-person and virtual attendance scholarships are available to students and emerging professionals in relevant positions or programs.
Conference highlights include a presentation by esteemed chairmakers Elia Bizzarri and Curtis Buchanan on Windsor chairmaking techniques with a focus on hand-powered production rates and Elia’s research into early 19th-century Massachusetts chairmaker Samuel Wing. Celebrated cabinetmaker and carver Ray Journigan will demystify and recreate one of pre-Revolutionary Philadelphia’s rococo masterpieces, a heavily carved side chair made in Benjamin Randolph’s shop for the Cadwallader family. Historical interpreter and woodworker Jerome Bias will take us into the antebellum world of Thomas Day’s North Carolina shop where complex race relations intertwine with the collision of the handwork tradition and the coming machine age as he explores a curvaceous and veneered mahogany side chair. Scholar Daniel Ackermann, director of Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens, will deliver an opening keynote on a group of mid-18th-century Annapolis chairs.
From Colonial Williamsburg, master cabinetmaker Bill Pavlak will demonstrate the design and structure of Campeche chairs, a form with ancient roots that became fashionable on the east coast in the early 19th century by way of Mexico, New Orleans, and Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. Master joiner Brian Weldy will explore a Boston baroque armchair with complex turnings, sculpted arms, and Russia leather upholstery. Conservator of upholstery Sarah Towers will walk attendees through the fundamentals of making a traditional slip seat. Apprentice joiner Laura Hollowood will demonstrate weaving a rush seat with traditional materials and senior curator of furniture Tara Chicirda will provide an overview of different period approaches to seats by showing off several examples from the Colonial Williamsburg collection. Journeyman cabinetmaker John Peeler will explore some of the planes and planecraft required for period chairmaking. Director of Historic Trades and Skills Ted Boscana will offer a banquet talk that pulls back the curtain on nine decades of Trades at Colonial Williamsburg to glimpse where we’ve been and where we’re headed.
The majority of conference activities will take place at the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg, located at 301 South Nassau Street. A variety of exclusive pre-conference activities are available for in-person registrants, as are special room rates at Colonial Williamsburg hotel properties. In-person registration is $400 per person through December 1 and includes presentations, opening reception, continental breakfasts on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, coffee and refreshment breaks, and a conference reception and dinner Saturday evening. Virtual-only registration is $150 per person and includes access to all presentations through the conference streaming platform. Both in-person and virtual-only registration include a seven-day ticket voucher to Colonial Williamsburg’s Art Museums and Historic Area, valid for redemption through December 31, 2026. Registration and payment in full are required by January 2 for in-person attendance and by January 22 for virtual attendance.
Details are available here»
Working Wood is sponsored by the Society of American Period Furniture Makers, Early American Industries Association, and Lie-Nielsen Toolworks, Inc.
Conference | Rethinking Carlo Maratti (1625–1713)
From ArtHist.net and KNIR:
Rethinking Carlo Maratti (1625–1713): Patronage, Practice, Reception
Royal Netherlands Institute, Rome, 20–21 November 2025
Organized by Giovan Battista Fidanza, Guendalina Serafinelli, and Laura Overpelt
Carlo Maratti (1625–1713) stands as one of the most significant painters of late Baroque Rome—celebrated in his own time as the natural heir to Raphael and Carracci and the leading painter of the Eternal City. Maratti’s extraordinarily long and successful career linked the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, shaping academic practice, taste, and artistic institutions well beyond his lifetime. His activity as painter, restorer, collector, ‘principe’ of the Academia di San Luca, and head of a large and international workshop placed him at the centre of Rome’s artistic and cultural networks.
Despite this prominence, Maratti’s reputation in art history has long oscillated between admiration and neglect. While traditional scholarship often portrayed him as the embodiment of academic classicism or as a symbol of stylistic decline after Bernini and Cortona, more recent research has begun to reassess the complexity of his artistic persona and his impact on the European art world. Yet, major questions remain regarding his patronage, his practices, his economic strategies, his workshop organisation, and his reception.
Marking the 400th anniversary of Carlo Maratti’s birth, this international conference seeks to offer a critical reassessment of the artist and his legacy. Bringing together established scholars and emerging researchers, it provides a forum for exploring new perspectives on Maratti’s art, practice, and influence. Special emphasis is placed on the study of unpublished archival materials, newly identified documents, and analytical approaches that shed light on the dynamics of patronage, artistic production, restoration, collecting, and reception.
The conference will take place in person at the Koninklijk Nederlands Instituut Rome (KNIR). Presentations will be given in English and Italian. A keynote lecture by Dr Arnold Witte (University of Amsterdam) will conclude the first day of the conference and can be attended remotely via Zoom. The conference is organized by Giovan Battista Fidanza and Guendalina Serafinelli (Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata) and Laura Overpelt (Royal Netherlands Institute in Rome). It is supported by the Royal Netherlands Institute in Rome and the PhD Program of National Interest in Cultural Heritage at the Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata, with the patronage of the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana.
In-person participation is free of charge, but places are limited. Please RSVP by 18 November 2025 by sending an email to info@knir.it. Kindly specify which part(s) of the conference you plan to attend, if not the entire programme. Zoom registration for the keynote lecture is available here.
t h u r s d a y , 2 0 n o v e m b e r
10.15 Welcome and Opening Remarks
• Susanna de Beer (Deputy Director of the Koninklijk Nederlands Instituut Rome); Lucia Ceci (Vice Chancellor for Communications and Head of the Dipartimento di Storia, Patrimonio culturale, Formazione e Società – Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata); Tullia Iori (Vice Chancellor for Education – Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata); Don Mauro Mantovani S.D.B. (Prefect of the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana)
• Introduction by Guendalina Serafinelli (Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata) on behalf of the organizers
11.00 Session 1 | Barberini Patronage
Chair: Isabella Aurora (Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana)
• Giovan Battista Fidanza (Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata) — Carlo Maratti and His Workshop for Cardinal Carlo Barberini: Reconstructing the Significance of a Relationship
• Olga Arenga (Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata) — Prince Maffeo Barberini and Carlo Maratti: New Documents in Microhistorical Perspective
• Sara Carbone (Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata) — Francesco Reale in the Workshop of Carlo Maratti: Professional History in the Service of the Barberini Family
13.45 Session 2 | Transregional Patronage and Institutions
Chair: Loredana Lorizzo (Università degli Studi ‘G. d’Annunzio’ Chieti – Pescara)
• Andrea Spiriti (Università degli Studi dell’Insubria) — Maratti, the Omodei Family, and the Lombard National Church of SS. Ambrogio e Carlo al Corso in Rome: Problems and Reflections
• Laura Facchin (Università degli Studi dell’Insubria) — ‘Del signor Carlo Maratta, stimato da molti il primo che sia oggidì in quell’arte’: Reassessing the Master’s Relationship with Painting in the Savoy State
• Isabella Salvagni (Independent Scholar) — Carlo Maratti e l’ Accademia di San Luca
15.20 Session 3 | Reception and Historiography
Chair: Donatella Livia Sparti (Syracuse University)
• Guendalina Serafinelli (Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata) — Niccolò Maria Pallavicini’s Ambition, the Cult of Carlo Maratti, and Bellori’s Legacy
• Laura Overpelt (Koninklijk Nederlands Instituut Rome) — A Netherlandish Perspective on Carlo Maratti: Hoogewerff and Beyond
17.00 Keynote available remotely via Zoom
Chair: Laura Overpelt (KNIR)
• Arnold A. Witte (Universiteit van Amsterdam) — Cardinals Commissioning Carlo Maratti: Shifts in Ecclesiastical Patronage around 1700
A recent biography of Maratti states that “at the turn of the century, political and economic factors caused official and aristocratic patronage to decline,” which reflects Francis Haskell’s more generic assumption of a general wane of the Roman artistic climate occurring around 1700. This keynote lecture will consider how this presumed downturn in ecclesiastical patronage in the late Seicento affected the artistic milieu in Rome and particularly how Maratti’s late career was determined by this shift.
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9.30 Session 4 | Maratti as Entrepreneur
Chair: Karin Wolfe (British School at Rome)
• Alessandro Agresti (Independent Scholar) — Nell’atelier di Carlo Maratti: Struttura, funzione e allestimento di una quadreria (con un inventario inedito del 1701)
• Adriano Amendola (Università degli Studi di Salerno) & Cristiano Giometti (Università degli Studi di Firenze) — Per un ampliamento dei committenti: Le finanze di Carlo Maratti
• Paolo Coen (Università degli Studi di Teramo) — Maratti and the Art Market: New Reflections
11.25 Session 5 | Restoration Practices
Chair: Maria Grazia D’Amelio (Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata)
• Donatella Livia Sparti (Syracuse University) — The Restoration of the Loggia Farnesina Revisited (Without Bellori)
• Simona Rinaldi (Università degli Studi della Tuscia) — Materiali e tecniche nei restauri pittorici di Carlo Maratti
• Lotte van ter Toolen (Rijksuniversiteit Groningen) — From Restoring Reputations to Meddling with Memorials: Reflections on Carlo Maratti and the Pantheon
12.40 Concluding Remarks
Online Talk | Naming Rights: The Case of Mai/Omai from Polynesia
From YCBA:
Naming Rights: The Case of Mai/Omai from Polynesia
with Jessie Park, Catherine Roach, and Edward Town
Online and in-person, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, Thursday, 13 November 2025, 12pm ET
Sir Joshua Reynolds, Study for the Portrait of Mai (‘Omai’), ca. 1774, oil on canvas, 64 × 56 cm (New Haven: Yale University Art Gallery).
This event marks the return to public view of Sir Joshua Reynolds’s Study for the Portrait of Mai (‘Omai’), on loan from the Yale University Art Gallery. The first person from Polynesia to reach Britain, the sitter in Reynolds’s painting sought a military alliance and instead became a celebrity among Europeans, due in part to a public persona he crafted and enacted. The man now known as Mai bore many names over his lifetime. He came to fame in Britain as ‘Omai’ or ‘Omiah’, a British misunderstanding of a Tahitian honorific that he reportedly bestowed on himself. What should we call him, and his representations, today? Can this case study offer deeper insights into the ethics of naming pictures? And how might we thoughtfully narrate the stories of historical figures of color whose lives are known nearly exclusively through European visual and textual sources?
Join the livestream here»
Jessie Park is Nina and Lee Griggs Assistant Curator of European Art, YUAG. Catherine Roach is Graduate Program Director and Associate Professor of Art History in the School of the Arts, Virginia Commonwealth University. Edward Town is Assistant Curator of Paintings and Sculpture, YCBA.
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