AAH2011 CONFERENCE

37th AAH Annual Conference

31 March - 2 April 2011
University of Warwick, Coventry


The following sessions might be of interest to members of this list.


'The Noblest Form Demands Strenuous Labour': Women Sculptors, 1600-present

Amy Mechowski Assistant Curator of Sculpture, Victoria and Albert 
Museum, South Kensington, London, SW7 2RL, UK. [log in to unmask]

Fran Lloyd, Associate Dean Research, Faculty of Art, Design & 
Architecture, Kingston University

Women sculptors have long occupied a precarious place within the 
academy, history of art and the art market. Traditional sculptural media 
have been historically regarded as involving an exertion, danger and 
outright messiness that was socially and physically inappropriate to 
women. As 'feminist art history' continues to be a highly contested term 
and the parameters which define 'sculpture' itself - in both form and 
practice - are consistently challenged, the question becomes: what might 
the past, present and future hold for women sculptors and their work? 
This session will explore the conditions under which the work of women 
sculptors has been produced, collected, exhibited and circulated. Some 
of the issues addressed by the session may include, but are not limited 
to: the changing place of sculpture in the decorative arts relative to 
women's art practice, the significance of scale and medium at specific 
historical moments, authorship and collaboration, the role of curators 
in defining frameworks for viewing sculpture, and the consumption of 
objects within public/private collections, blockbuster retrospectives, 
international exhibitions and commercial galleries.


Poster Session

Janet Tyson, 210 Parkhurst Ave, Spring Lake, MI 49456, USA. 
[log in to unmask]

Rosalind Ormiston, 73 Medfield Street, London SW15 4JY, UK. 
[log in to unmask]

The Poster Session encompasses a wide range of visually rich, generally 
non-linear explorations of research topics. The AAH 2011 Poster Session 
can serve a variety of purposes by allowing researchers to introduce 
aspects of a new project, to address projects in progress and provide 
succinct insight into their thought processes, or to summarise and 
explicate work that has been realised. It furthermore provides an 
opportunity for art historians to communicate visually their research 
into visual and material culture, and one for artists to engage the art 
historical community via a mode of presentation that mingles images, 
graphic devices and texts.


Venice and the Mediterranean World: Art and Society in the Stato Da Mar 
and its Neighbours

Donal Cooper, University of Warwick [log in to unmask]

Interest in Venice's cultural ties with the eastern Mediterranean has 
intensified in the decade since Deborah Howard's landmark publication 
Venice and the East (Yale, 2000). Recent exhibitions in London/Boston, 
Paris/Venice/New York, and now Istanbul have underlined the 
responsiveness of Venetian society to Islamic visual and material 
culture. Gentile Bellini's visit to Istanbul has become an emblematic 
moment of East-West cultural exchange. At the same time, our 
understanding of the Venetian sea empire in the eastern Mediterranean, 
the 'Stato da Mar', has been transformed by new research, emphasising 
both the diversity of the Serenissima's maritime territories and their 
interconnections. Traditionally seen as the poor relations of the 
Terraferma, the port cities of the Stato da Mar have emerged as vibrant 
centres of artistic and cultural interaction.

This session addresses the full range of visual culture in the Stato da 
Mar and its neighbours from the Fourth Crusade in 1204 to the end of the 
sixteenth century, asking how Venetian, Italian, Slavic, Greek, 
Albanian, Jewish and Muslim communities found visual expression in a 
range of media, from architecture to altarpieces, from reliquaries o 
domestic jewellery. It seeks to explore the visual articulations of 
Venetian rule, from the iconography of St. Mark to military 
fortifications, and asks how Venice's imperial and maritime concerns 
resonated in the metropole itself. Comparative contributions from 
Byzantine, Ottoman and Mamluk perspectives are especially welcome, as 
are those addressing Venice's rivals in the Mediterranean sphere, such 
as Genoa or Dubrovnik.


Same Difference: Material Cultures of Reproduction

Tara Kelly, TRIARC, Department of the History of Art., University of 
Dublin, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland. [log in to unmask]

Lisa Godson, GradCAM, National College of Art and Design, Thomas Street, 
Dublin 8, Ireland. [log in to unmask]

There is a long and wide-ranging history associated with the 
reproduction of objects and spaces, from ancient Roman copies in bronze 
of Greek marble statuary, to the reissue of a Bauhaus table lamp for the 
shop in the Museum of Modern Art, New York based on the original in the 
museum's collection, to recreations of sacred spaces such as exact 
replicas of the grotto at Lourdes at various sites. For this session we 
invite proposals from researchers working on reproductions. Key concepts 
that might be addressed include seriality and mass-production, artistic 
revival and reinterpretation, authenticity, accuracy and intent, canon 
formation, the non-auratic, cultural memory, functionality, and 
aesthetic, cultural and commercial valuations. Proposals about the 
techniques and manufacturing processes associated with reproductions are 
also welcome.

Of particular interest to us is how reproduction relates to concepts of 
materiality and immateriality in different cultures. This might be 
through a consideration of how exact reproductions relate to 
transcendence or how the removal of authorial agency affects 
understandings of materiality. We particularly welcome proposals from 
researchers working in material culture, history of design, 
architectural history and conservation, as well as art history.


The 'Pure Art of Sculpture': Giovanni Pisano and his Contemporaries

Peter Dent, University of Bristol, [log in to unmask] Jules Lubbock, 
University of Essex, [log in to unmask] Address: Jules Lubbock, 58 
Pilgrim's Lane, London, NW31SN, UK.

The inscription on Giovanni Pisano's pulpit in the cathedral at Pisa 
declares him to be 'endowed above all others with command of the pure 
art of sculpture.' It also challenges the viewer to judge his figures 
'according to the correct rules'. These powerful statements in the 
pulpit inscriptions are often taken as an almost unmediated expression 
of the sculptor's self worth, and Giovanni has more than once been 
described as the first modern artist. But how does this image of the 
'artist' compare with the status of other sculptors and other crafts? On 
what grounds might an art of sculpture be 'pure' and what might have 
been the correct rules for judging it? In this session we invite papers 
that, centring upon Giovanni Pisano, explore the status of sculpture and 
sculptors in late medieval Italy and in Europe, from all directions, 
ranging from the nature of the profession through to the reception of 
the sculptural object. To what extent did sculptors fashion a distinct 
identity and how did contemporaries conceptualise sculptural imagery? We 
are particularly interested in contributions that explore objects, 
practices and attitudes that work the boundary with other forms of 
visual representation, as well as those which approach these questions 
through methodologies developed in the study of other periods.


Ephemera: Art and Obsolescence

Katie Scott The Courtauld Institute of Art. Somerset House, Strand, 
London WC 2R ORN, UK. [log in to unmask]

Richard Taws (McGill University) [log in to unmask]

Ephemera index a category of things the endurance of which was not 
envisaged, things that in principle history would never know. Ephemera 
address themselves to the present, live for the moment, take shape, 
arguably, in performance and primarily engage the senses. Less concerned 
with the category of 'ephemera', with the definitions by which 
instances, in defiance of their nature, are accessioned in the archive, 
this session will explore the time, space and modalities of the 
ephemera/. It will raise questions about the relationship between the 
ephemeral and modernity (is there a pre-modern ephemeral?), about the 
ephemeral and Western culture (is the ephemeral a meaningful category 
outside the West?), about the phenomenology of ephemera (does it 
privilege sound or touch rather than vision?) and about the ephemeral 
and the aesthetic (is rubbish art?). How do ephemera help us make sense 
of the relation between past, present and future time? How are we to 
take account of the impact of seemingly insignificant, fleeting or 
infinitesimally small events or objects on much wider processes of 
historical change? We welcome proposals for papers that consider these 
issues from a range of historical and geographical perspectives.


Pageantry and the Allegorical Tradition

Ariel Samuel Plotek, Assistant Curator, San Diego Museum of Art, 1450 EI 
Prado San Diego, CA 921 0, USA. [log in to unmask]

Conceived in rhetorical terms as an extended metaphor, a mode of speech 
in which one thing stands for another, allegory has always invited 
interpretation. This session explores the relationship between allegory 
and pageantry, from the Middle Ages to the Modern era. Associated with 
both secular and religious rituals, the Medieval pageant dressed-out its 
allegorical processions with costumed performers, wheeled floats, and 
other forms of mobile scenery. Alongside the literal, emblematic logic 
of these programs, the civic pageant was often possessed of a complex 
allegorical meaning. Drawing on literary antecedents and ancient myths, 
these narratives also involved the intersection of performance and 
poetics in a publicly enacted dialog. Looking back to the seasonal 
holidays and saints' days of the late Middle Ages, the pageant movement 
in England (closely tied to the cause of female suffrage) staged 
fantastical festivals and processions at the turn of the century. In the 
field of state-sponsored propaganda, the organisers of France's 
revolutionary festivals (beginning with no less a pageant master than 
Jacques-Louis David) fashioned their own ephemeral monuments: plaster 
personifications and papier-maché floats. In contrast to the epic 
allegories of academic painting, these carefully choreographed 
performances also involve time, both in terms of duration (the limited 
life of the ceremony) and in relation to space (the path of the 
procession). This session seeks papers on the art of pageantry, and its 
underlying allegorical structures.


Europe and the Middle East: Interdisciplinary and Transcultural 
Perspectives before 1500

Christiane Esche-Ramshorn, Department of History of Art, University of 
Cambridge, 1-5 Scroope Terrace, Trumpington Street, Cambridge, CB2 1 PX, 
UK. [log in to unmask]

The Middle East, as an area where intertwined cultures, religions and 
peoples have always mixed, is a fruitful region for interdisciplinary 
and comparative study. But while art historians almost exclusively focus 
on the 'borders' of Europe, Byzantium and the Near East, the Middle 
Eastern Muslim and (Oriental) Christian Arts have not been integrated. 
Their manifold links with the west are hardly acknowledged or addressed 
in western art historian scholarship. This panel discusses the question 
of how to adequately address the methodological problems regarding the 
culturally mixed Middle East and many historical and artistic links with 
both east and west. What categories in regard of comparative analysis 
should we use in order to characterise Middle Eastern arts (Timurid and 
Turkoman) and their relationship with western arts within the culturally 
mixed framework of the ethnic groups of the Middle East? The panel 
invites papers regarding artistic transfer, cultural heritage, dogma, 
coexistence of religions, cultural identity and survival (ambassadors, 
translators, pilgrims, merchants) in terms of exchange between the major 
cultural blocks (Latin/Byzantine Christianity and Islam). Aspects of 
identity in the Middle East, of religious coexistence and dogma and the 
many links between the multi-faith Middle East and the west (for 
example, the crucial role of the Vatican and its missionaries, of 
Venice, and the Armenian Diaspora in medieval Italy, and trade links 
between Middle East and Europe) will be discussed. Graduate students are 
especially warmly welcomed to submit abstracts.


Theorizing Wax: on the Function and Meaning of a Disappearing Medium

Allison Goudie and Hanneke Grootenboer History of Art Department, 
University of Oxford, Littlegate House Oxford OX1 1PT. 
[log in to unmask]

Much work still needs to be done to provide adequate theoretical 
frameworks within which to place the vast array of objects and artifacts 
made of wax. The history of wax has been a history of disappearance, 
partly due to the perishable quality of the material. Whereas recent 
years have witnessed more scholarly attention to wax as a sculptural 
medium, as demonstrated by the excellent publication of Ephemeral 
Bodies: Wax Sculpture and the Human Figure edited by Roberta Panzanelli 
in 2008, much remains unexplored.

This session's twofold aim is to broaden the study of the function and 
meaning of wax, as well as seek ways of finding alternative art 
historical approaches by taking rare and marginalised wax artifacts as 
point of departure, for which current methodologies developed for 
portraiture or sculpture do not suffice. We welcome historical papers on 
wax objects of any time period, as well as papers which explore, on the 
basis of concrete examples, theoretical and methodological approaches 
that account for the specificity of wax's inconsistency (malleable, 
perishable, approximate to the human skin, metamorphic), its paradoxical 
nature (water resistant as well as soluble, its proximity to both 
lifelikeness and death), and/or the particularity of its usage 
(anatomical model, sculptural prototype, portraits, ex votos).


Visualising Absence: Art and the 'Ruin' AAH Student Session

Peter Stilton, Department of History of Art, University of Bristol, 43 
Woodland Road, Bristol, BS8 1 UU. [log in to unmask]

Antoinette McKane (University of Liverpool/Tate Liverpool) 
[log in to unmask]

In 1962, a performance of Benjamin Britten's War Requiem marked the 
consecration of the new St. Michael's Cathedral in Coventry. Designed by 
Basil Spence as a replacement for the original 14th century structure, 
devastated in the Blitz, the new Cathedral rose as a Modernist symbol of 
Britain's reconstruction. Spence's design incorporated the ruins of the 
old Cathedral's shell alongside the new in a stark juxtaposition of 
historical and contemporary. Here, the remembrance of tradition, 
history, and sacrifice is invested in a symbolic dialogue between ruin 
and reconstruction; a new world rises phoenix-like from the fragments of 
the old.

Ruins have played a significant role in many aspects of visual culture. 
As a powerful link to our past, graphic evidence of change, and a 
sobering vision of possible futures, the idea of decay and 
disintegration as the inevitable path of history has continually shaped 
societies' contemplation of themselves and others. This session will 
explore the idea of the 'ruin' within the visual arts in the widest 
possible sense. Topics for discussion could include:
•	art and absence
•	art and destruction
•	art and memory
•	art and reconstruction
•	art and excavation

 From the reclamation of a fragmented Antique past in quattrocento Italy 
to the abandoned landscape of Chernobyl; from Smithson's Partially 
Buried Woodshed to Michael Landy's recent Art Bin, ruins and the sense 
of absence they suggest have presented fascinating case- studies for art 
historians. This session aims to suggest new frameworks that consider 
the ruin as a trope of significant cultural influence.

If you would like to offer a paper, please email the session convenor(s) 
directly, providing an abstract of no more than 250 words, your name and 
institutional affiliation (if any).

If you do not receive acknowledgement of receipt of your submission 
within two weeks, please post a paper copy, including your full contact 
details.

Please do not send paper proposals to the conference convenor.

Deadline: 8 November 2010.