Apologies for cross-postings.
From Kristin Noreen
*CALL FOR PAPERS*
*42nd International Congress on Medieval Studies*
Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan
May 10-13, 2007
Please send 1 page abstracts by September 15, 2006 via email to:
Kirstin Noreen: [log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
*Sacred, Corporate, and Civic Spaces in Italian Art and Architecture*
Sponsor: Italian Art Society
Organizer: Kirstin Noreen (Loyola Marymount University)
*Session I. Confraternity Headquarters*
Chair: Phil Earenfight (Dickinson College)
The late Middle Ages in Italy witnessed the widespread emergence and rapid
development of confraternities (compagnia, scuole). These lay pious
brotherhoods were designed to provide members with the opportunity to serve
god and their fellow citizens by singing devotions (laudese), performing
acts of mercy (charitable), or self-mortification (flagellant). A
confraternity’s location within the city, proximity or access to
neighboring institutions or important sites and rituals, architectural
design, building materials, and decorations could help to shape how the
confraternity identified itself publicly and served the citizenry. This
session seeks papers that address such factors and shed further light on
how confraternities prior to 1500 conveyed their identity through their
architecture - or lack thereof. Papers that consider confraternities in
lesser studied regions of Italy are particularly welcome.
*Session II. Monastic Communities*
Chair: William Hood (Oberlin College)
This session focuses on communities of religious - monks and nuns, friars
and sisters - as audiences for monumental works of art. Our interest is
not so much in the concerns of lay patrons, however closely associated they
may have been with the community. Rather, we seek to understand how the
particular ethos of a specific religious community inflected the creation
of works of art designed to embody monastic ideals.
*Session III. Hospitals and Acts of Mercy*
Chair: Eunice Howe (University of Southern California)
In early Christianity, spiritual and physical healing were intertwined,
nourished by charitable acts. Medieval hospitals continued the tradition
of healing the soul as well as the body through an ever-expanding set of
practices. These sites did not belong to the modern category of the
therapeutic institution. Hospices, monastic foundations, asylums and other
kinds of institutions took various forms and functioned in a multiplicity
of ways. This session considers how art and architecture defined such
institutions, and seeks contributions from a wide chronological and
geographical spectrum.
*Session IV. Civic Spaces*
Chairs: Alick M. McLean (Syracuse University in Florence); Barbara Deimling
(Syracuse University in Florence)
In his 1936 “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” Walter
Benjamin differentiated between the use of art in his vision of a Marxist
society and that of a fascist one. Fascists render politics aesthetic,
whereas one should really be politicizing art. This session seeks papers
addressing a similar polarity between politics and art in the civic spaces
of Italy’s city republics. To what degree were piazzas, streets, monuments
and rituals aesthetic props for urban governments? Were they used as
instruments for political enfranchisement or disenfranchisement?
*
*
*Please send 1 page abstracts by September 15, 2006 via email to:*
*Kirstin Noreen: [log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>*
Additional information on the Italian Art Society can be found at
http://faculty.vassar.edu/jamusacc/IAS/iashome.htm
Barbara Wisch has organized a session under the auspices of IAS for the **
*Sixteenth Century Conference, Salt Lake City (Oct. 26-Oct. 29)*
*Recreating the Holy Land in Italy*
Since the site of Salt Lake City was in large part selected by Brigham
Young, the “modern Moses,” for its resemblance to the parched earth of the
Holy Land and the salty waters of the Dead Sea, this session will explore
other recreations of the Holy Land in Renaissance Italy. Rome as the New
Jerusalem, Urbino as a new Bethlehem, and Florence as both a new Nazareth
and Jerusalem will be elucidated in multimedia permanent and ephemeral
works of art, ritual, and theater.
Chair: Barbara Wisch, SUNY Cortland
Organizer: Barbara Wisch, SUNY Cortland
Sponsor: Italian Art Society
Talks:
*“Recreating Jerusalem at St. Peter’s and the Vatican”*
Margaret A. Kuntz
Drew University
*“Recreating Bethlehem in Urbino: Federico Brandani’s Presepio in the*
*Oratory of San Giuseppe”*
Marietta Cambareri
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
*“Nazareth and Jerusalem: Recreating Place in the sacre rappresentazioni of*
*Florence and Rom*e”
Nerida Newbigin
University of Sydney
*Renaissance Society of America,* Miami, FL - March 22-24, 2007**
*The Afterlife of the Renaissance in Fascist Italy*
Affiliate sponsor: The Italian Art Society
Chairs: Perri Lee Roberts, University of Miami
Roger J. Crum, University of Dayton
Speakers:
Nancy M. Thompson, St. Olaf College, "Commemorating the Fallen in the
Madre Italiana Chapel in Santa Croce"
Terry Kirk, The American University of Rome, "Michelangelo in the Eye of
the Fascist Architect"
D. Medina Lasansky, Cornell University, "Performing Politics:
Perfecting the Sienese /Palio/ during Fascism"
Cristelle Baskins, Tufts University, "The Renaissance as Montage in Luis
Trenker's /Condottiere /(1937)"
ABSTRACTS:
*“Commemorating the Fallen in the Madre Italiana Chapel in Santa Croce”***
*Nancy M. Thompson***
*St. Olaf College*
In 1923, the Florentine committee for the celebration of the fallen,
headed by the conservative critic Ugo Ojetti, decided to erect a
monument to the soldiers lost in World War I in one of the transept
chapels in the Franciscan church of Santa Croce. Not without debate,
the commission to create the image of the Madre Italiana on the model of
Michelangelo’s Vatican /Pietà/ went to Ojetti’s preferred sculptor,
Libero Andreotti. This paper argues that the placement of the monument
inside Santa Croce rather than in an outdoor, public piazza marked a
deliberate decision on the part of the committee to associate the new
fascist glorification of the Italian warrior with the rich religious and
political history of the church, which in the period of the Risorgimento
in particular became a symbol of the greatness of the new nation of Italy.
*“Michelangelo in the Eye of the Fascist Architect”***
*Terry Kirk***
*The American University of Rome*
Between Michelangelo’s four-hundredth birthday (1875) and the
four-hundredth anniversary of his death (1964), the reception of his
architectural oeuvre passed through a remarkable arc of development.
This paper examines the historiography of scholarly and professional
understanding of Michelangelo’s architecture, particularly the dome of
Saint Peter’s, from the late 19th to the mid 20th century. It will
focus specifically on those Italians who felt a certain proprietary
entitlement to his legacy. In this period we find him celebrated as a
model Risorgimento nationalist hero, then framed by a charged racial
argumentation during the Fascist era, only to be overturned by opposing
but no-less significant post-war interpretations. In each era,
Michelangelo can be read as a barometer of concerns among scholars and
architects regarding current trends in architecture, the role of the
artist in society and theories of artistic inspiration, and the impact
of history studies beyond the confines of academic disciplines. My aim
is not to chronicle for ridicule the distortions that characterize
instrumentalized intellectual work under totalitarian regimes, but to
reveal patterns of reception that may help us to gain our bearings on
the relevance of studying Michelangelo’s architecture today.
*"Performing Politics: Perfecting the Sienese */*Palio*/* during
Fascism" ***
*D. Medina Lasansky***
*Cornell University *
The Sienese /palio/ is widely considered to be one of the most unique
and continuously surviving Italian Renaissance festivals. And yet, it
was not until the 1920s, under the guidance of Siena's first Fascist era
/podestà/,/ /that the event was endowed with a fully developed
Renaissance character. At that moment each element of the /corteo/ and
race/ /was scrutinized and re-designed so as to create, in the terms of
its producers, a stylistically-coherent event datable to 1430-1480. New
costumes were made, the event was re-choreographed, and a series of
period-style military and corporate elements were introduced. It is
this version of the /palio/, styled during the 1920s, that continues to
thrive today. This talk will analyze the Fascist era redesign of the
/palio/, arguing that the festival served as a catalyst for a variety of
permanent urban and cultural renewal programs undertaken during the
regime. Along with the redesign of the /palio/, Siena's local leaders
supported the restoration of the city's built environment and the
celebration of the patron Saint Catherine. It will become clear that
the refashioning of the /palio/ represented a significant civic
undertaking that harnessed local energy, talent, and administrative
skills. Many of those active in the Fascist-period design were the same
individuals involved in other civic initiatives intended to celebrate
the Renaissance, underscoring the extent to which the image of
Renaissance Siena was a totalizing project.
*"The Renaissance as Montage in Luis Trenker's */*Condottiere */*(1937)"***
*Cristelle Baskins***
*Tufts University*
Luis Trenker's /Condottiere/ (1937) is a bio-pic about Giovanni delle
Bande Nere, the father of Cosimo I de’Medici. It won the Coppa d'Oro in
Venice for its portrayal of Italian art and architecture. Yet, Trenker
plays fast and loose with the locations. He uses many well-known works
of art that have gone unnoticed by film historians, while ignoring other
obvious choices that might have suited his subject. Scholars have argued
that Trenker was profoundly affected by the annexation of the South
Tyrol and the forced Italianization of his native region into the Alto
Adige. The avoidance of Tuscan locations and selective use of Florentine
art and architecture allowed Trenker subtly to critique the very figure
that the film seems to celebrate, Giovanni delle Bande Nere, as well as
his alter ego Benito Mussolini, and Italian nationalism.
Dr. Joyce Kubiski, Associate Professor
Italian Art Society - Membership Coordinator/Treasurer
School of Art
Western Michigan University
1903 W. Michigan Avenue
Kalamazoo, MI 49008-5332
269.387.2452
http://artuser.art.wmich.edu/www/programs/arthistory/arthistorysite/index.html
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