Early Modern Ephemerality and Durability Conference

On 24/25 May, several of our network members are speaking at the following meeting; do come along if you can!

CRASSH @ Cambridge

Ephemerality and Durability in early modern Visual and Material Culture at CRASSH, University of Cambridge

Further details at: http://www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/events/2408/programme/

24 May (F):

Session 1

From Feathers to Stone to Skin: Ephemeral Materiality and the Case of Central Mexican Featherwork
Brendan McMahon (University of Southern California)

Respondent: Natalie Lawrence (University of Cambridge)

Chair: Professor Simon Schaffer (University of Cambridge)

Session 2

The Ephemeral Golden Age: Fernando de la Torre Farfán’s Ode to the Seville School
Ellen Dooley (University of Southern California)

Respondent:Dr José Ramón Marcaida (University of Cambridge)

Chair: Professor Jacob Soll

Session 3

Landscapes of War and Empire: The Case of William Wolfgang Römer
Nicholas Gliserman (University of Southern California)

Respondent: Katy Barrett (University of Cambridge)

Chair: Dr Richard Serjeantson

Session 4

Collecting the Crusade in Grand Ducal Florence
Sean Nelson (University of Southern California)

Respondent: Raymond Carlson (University of Cambridge)

Chair: Dr Jason Scott Warren (University of Cambridge)

Ephemerality and Print: Object sessions in the University Library, led by Dr Elizabeth Upper, Harriet Philipps, and Michelle Wallis (Please note that due to limitations of space this session is for invited participants only)

Keynote Lecture: Ephemeral Matter
Professor Peter Stallybrass (University of Pennsylvania)

25 May (Sat):

Session 1

Ephemeral Walls/Durable Memories: Sounding Out Architecture in Early Modern Italy
Dr Niall Atkinson (University of Chicago)

Conspicuously not for Consumption: Schauessen and Early Modern Court Culture
Dr Jessica Keating (University of Southern California)

Chair: Dr Mary Laven (University of Cambridge)

Session 2

Materiality, Ephemerality and Memory: Relics in Early Modern England
Professor Alexandra Walsham (University of Cambridge)

‘Natures nest of Boxes’: Thinking with Containers in Early Modern England
Dr Lucy Razzall (Cambridge):

Chair: Dr Melissa Calaresu (University of Cambridge)

Session 3

The Giant of Antwerp: Durability and Materiality in Early Modern Festival Culture
Professor Christine Göttler (University of Bern)

Preservation and Image-making in the Early Modern World.  The Case of the Bird of Paradise
Dr José Ramón Marcaida (University of Cambridge)

Chair: Dr Elizabeth Upper (University of Cambridge)

Session 4

Material Mimesis: Tracing Long-term Connections in Cross-cultural Renaissance Objects
Dr Marta Ajmar (V&A/RCA)

Matter in the Material Renaissance
Dr Ulinka Rublack (University of Cambridge)

Chair: Dr Alexander Marr (University of Cambridge)

other blogsites and picture libraries

British Library, Add. 39636, f.24

Until I started this site, I did not even know what a ‘blog’ was (one of my students took pity on me and explained carefully and slowly that it was short for ‘web-log’). I now discover, of course, that so many of the younger as well as my more mature historian colleagues run interesting blogsites. Furthermore, there are now some useful sites for academic historians searching for early modern images.  I list here some of the sites  I have found helpful. The list is selective and subjective, but I thought it might be of interest to some visitors to this site.

Blog/websites of colleagues with similar or cognate interests:

• Anita Guerrini (Oregon) – on early modern medical topics – check out her latest blog on the elephant!: http://anitaguerrini.wordpress.com/
• Monica Azzolini (Edinburgh) – a site on early modern astronomy/astrology: http://scienceofthestars.wordpress.com/
• Marie-Odile Bernez (Dijon) – a site on scientific illustrations generally (French/English) http://scientificillustrationdijon.blogspot.fr/
• Felicity Henderson on Robert Hooke’s diary:  http://hookeslondon.com/
• Evie Lincoln on visualizing Rome: http://www.stg.brown.edu:8080/exist/rome/index.html

Digitized Images Sites I have visited/found useful:

• British illuminated mss (their images are now mostly in the public domain): http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/welcome.htm
• Platter/Gessner drawings (as mentioned before):
  https://www.flickr.com/photos/bijzonderecollectiesuva/sets/72157632814218926/
• https://www.flickr.com/photos/bijzonderecollectiesuva/sets/72157632809370911/
• Jan and Maria Moninckx drawings for Jan Commelin:
  http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/cgi/i/image/image-idx?c=botanie;page=index;sid=d44a711aecd3e8dca7c341e56be383e1;tpl=p_moninckx.tpl
• Aldrovandi’s collection of drawings:
  http://www.filosofia.unibo.it/aldrovandi/pinakesweb/main.asp?language=it

Picture Libraries I have used/consulted:

• The Royal Society (London): https://pictures.royalsociety.org/home
• Wellcome Images (images for the banner and gallery on my blogsite are from them): http://wellcomeimages.org/
• The National Library of Medicine (Bethesda): http://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/ihm/index.html  and for anatomical tracts: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/historicalanatomies/browse.html
• Natural History Museum, London: http://piclib.nhm.ac.uk/
• British Museum (tick ‘images only’: http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/search_the_collection_database.aspx
• Victoria and Albert Museum: http://collections.vam.ac.uk/

These are all freely accessible. If you have institutional subscription, then searching in Artstor can also be useful.

When I try to locate a digitized image in a printed book (written in Latin), I use Dana Sutton’s Ur-site of all digitized books: http://www.philological.bham.ac.uk/bibliography/.

If I am looking for an image in an incunabula, I use http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/istc/.

(http://www.ubka.uni-karlsruhe.de/kvk_en.html is another way to look for digitized books).

Joint fellowship at V&A and MPIHS Berlin in art and knowledge

Nautilus goblet, Nicolaas van der Kemp, 1613/4, V&A

Here is another exicting opportunity for those intersted in art/knowledge!

The Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin  (Max Planck Research Group Art and Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe; Director: Prof. Dr. Sven Dupré) in collaboration with the Victoria and Albert Museum (contact: Dr. Marta Ajmar, Head of Postgraduate Programme, V&A/RCA History of Design, Victoria and Albert Museum, London) announces one postdoctoral fellowship for three months between January 1 and December 31, 2014.

The tenure of the fellowship is to be divided between the two institutes: the first and third months will be spent at the MPIWG, the second month at the V&A. The fellow will be offered research facilities at both institutions.

Outstanding junior and senior scholars (including those on sabbatical leave from their home institutions) are invited to apply. Candidates should hold a doctorate in the history of science and technology, the history of art and art technology or a related field (junior scholars should have a dissertation topic relevant to the history of science) at the time of application and show evidence of scholarly promise in the form of publications and other achievements.

Research proposals should address the history of knowledge and art up to the eighteenth century (with a preference for the period between 1350 and 1750), and may concern any geographical area within Europe, and any object of the visual and decorative arts. Projects related to on going projects at the Max Planck Research Group Art and Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe will receive preference. The proposal should make clear how the project would benefit from the resources and contribute to the research culture of the Victoria and Albert Museum. Visiting fellows are expected to take part in the scientific life of the Institute, to advance their own research project, and to actively contribute to the relevant project of the Max Planck Research Group Art and Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe.

The Max Planck Institute for the History of Science is an international and interdisciplinary research institute (http://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/en/index.html). The colloquium language is English; it is expected that candidates will be able to present their own work and discuss that of others fluently in that language. Fellowships are endowed with a monthly stipend between 2.100 ? and 2.500 ? (fellows from abroad) or between 1.468 ? and 1.621 ? (fellows from Germany), whereas senior scholars receive an honorary commensurate with experience. The Max Planck Institute for the History of Science covers the round trip travel costs from the fellow’s home institution and a round trip Berlin-London.

The Victoria and Albert Museum is the United Kingdom’s national museum of art, craft and design. It offers an encyclopaedic resource in its collections of the visual arts from Europe and Asia, of both historical and contemporary importance, and is a powerhouse of skills and expertise. Research relating to the arts and humanities takes place across the institution and is expressed in the form of gallery development, temporary exhibitions, books which range from the popular to the highly academic, journal articles, website material, conferences and colloquia. It supports collections-based research in all areas of art and design, ensuring that exhibition, publication and gallery projects are enhanced by the most relevant and up-to-date scholarship and benefit from appropriate academic partnerships and funding opportunities. The V&A houses the National Art Library, a major public reference library for art and design. Further outstanding expertise and resources relevant to the joint fellowship can be found in the V&A’s curatorial collections and Conservation department.  In close scholarly proximity to the V&A are other key ‘Albertopolis’ institutions dedicated to science, technology, art and design ? the Science Museum, the Natural History Museum, Imperial College and the Royal College of Art.

Many research projects are located in the Research department, which supports a wide number of exhibition research teams, a further group of scholars and the V&A/RCA Postgraduate Programme in the History of Design. It produces a number of publications and web-based outputs (Online Journal, Research Report, Research Bulletins) and oversees seminars and workshops to support the development of staff research and subject expertise. The Visiting Fellow will be based in the Research department and be expected to participate to the vibrant research culture of the department and the V&A/RCA History of Design community. S/he will be expected to contribute a research seminar during the period of the fellowship.

Candidates of all nationalities are encouraged to apply; applications from women are especially welcome. The Max Planck Society is committed to promoting handicapped individuals and encourages them to apply.

Candidates are requested to submit a curriculum vitae (including list of publications), a research proposal on a topic related to the project (750 words maximum), one sample of writing (i.e. article or book chapter), and names and addresses of two referees (including email) who have already been contacted by the applicant to assure their willingness to submit letters of recommendation if requested, to:

Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte
Max Planck Research Group Dupré ? postdoc fellowship
Boltzmannstr. 22
14195 Berlin
Germany

(Electronic submission is also possible: officedupre@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de)

by June 30, 2013. Successful candidates will be notified before July 31.

For questions concerning the Max Planck Research Group on Art and Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe, please see http://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/en/research/projects/MRGdupre or contact Sven Dupré (mailto:officedupre@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de); for administrative questions concerning
the position and the Institute, please contact Claudia Paaß (paass@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de), Head of Administration, or Jochen Schneider (jsr@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de), Research Coordinator.

For enquiries concerning the Victoria and Albert Museum’s component of the fellowship, please contact Dr. Marta Ajmar, Head of Postgraduate Programme, V&A/RCA History of Design, Victoria and Albert Museum (m.ajmar@vam.ac.uk).

For more information about the V&A and its resources, visit the website (http://www.vam.ac.uk/; http://www.vam.ac.uk/page/n/national-art-library/; http://collections.vam.ac.uk/; http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/c/conservation-department/; http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/r/research-department/; http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/m/ma-history-of-design/).

3 post-docs and visiting fellowships in the history of art and knowledge, MPI Berlin

Ms Sloane 3744, British Library (public domain)

The Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin (Max Planck Research Group Art and Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe; Director: Prof. Dr. Sven Dupré) announces

Three postdoctoral fellowships for up to three months between January 1 and December 31, 2014. Outstanding junior and senior scholars (including those on sabbatical leave from their home institutions) are invited to apply.

Candidates should hold a doctorate in the history of science and technology, the history of art and art technology or related field (junior scholars should have a dissertation topic relevant to the history of science) at the time of application and show evidence of scholarly promise in the form of publications and other achievements.

Research projects should address the history of knowledge and art up to the eighteenth century (with a preference for the period between 1350 and 1750), and may concern any geographical area within Europe, and any object of the visual and decorative arts. Also welcome are projects falling within the scope of the history of optics, colour and perspective, the history of alchemy, or the history of collecting, but those relevant to the writing of an epistemic history of art will receive preference.

Visiting fellows are expected to take part in the scientific life of the Institute, to advance their own research project, and to actively contribute to the project of the Max Planck Research Group Art and Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe.

The Max Planck Institute for the History of Science is an international and interdisciplinary research institute (http://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/en/index.html). The colloquium language is English; it is expected that candidates will be able to present their own work and discuss that of others fluently in that language. Fellowships are endowed with a monthly stipend between 2.100 € and 2.500 € (fellows from abroad) or between 1.468 € and 1.621 € (fellows from Germany), whereas senior scholars receive an honorary commensurate with experience.

The Max Planck Research Group Art and Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe is also accepting proposals for non-funded Visiting Fellowships from one month to a year. These are normally open to junior and senior post-docs who have external funding. For projects highly relevant to the research platform of this Max Planck Research Group, Sven Dupré will support a limited number of applications for funding at organizations such as Fulbright, DAAD, and the Humboldt Society.

Candidates of all nationalities are encouraged to apply; applications from women are especially welcome. The Max Planck Society is committed to promoting handicapped individuals and encourages them to apply.

Candidates are requested to submit a curriculum vitae (including list of publications), a research proposal on a topic related to the project (750 words maximum), one sample of writing (i.e. article or book chapter), and names and addresses of two referees (including email) who have already been contacted by the applicant to assure their willingness to submit letters of recommendation if requested, to:

Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte

Max Planck Research Group Dupré – Postdocs 2014

Boltzmannstr. 22

14195 Berlin

Germany

(Electronic submission is also possible: officedupre@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de) by June 30, 2013. Successful candidates will be notified before August 19, 2013.

For questions concerning the Max Planck Research Group on Art and Knowledge in Pre-Modern Europe, please see

http://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/en/research/projects/MRGdupre or contact Sven Dupré (officedupre@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de); for administrative questions concerning the position and the Institute, please contact Claudia Paaß (paass@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de), Head of Administration, or Jochen Schneider (jsr@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de), Research Coordinator.

Roger Gaskell on the early Royal Society, Houghton Library, 16 April

Robert Hooke, Micrographia (1665), Wellcome Images.

If you are in Boston this month, do think of attending the lecture by Roger Gaskell, who is delivering the Hofer Lecture at the Houghton Library (Harvard) at 5.30 pm on the 16th of April: A Peculiar Facility for Imagining: Visual Strategies in the early Royal Society

This lecture will examine scientific illustrated books by early fellows of the Royal Society of London (and their European counterparts) published in the 1660s and 70s. Making the printed book the focus of attention shows that different ways of using images is dependent as much on the circumstances of production as on the author’s scientific message. Robert Boyle hoped that readers with ‘any peculiar facility for imagining’ would not need images; his friends advised him otherwise.

In fact, if you are in the same place a week earlier on the 10^th, Nick Wilding, another historian of early modern science, is giving the 97th George Parker Winship Lecture:
 ‘Forging the Moon: or, How to Spot a Fake Galileo’.

Further details may be found at http://hcl.harvard.edu/info/exhibitions/index.cfm (and scroll done to ‘lectures’).

The Travels of Dr Martin Lister: a new internet resource

I was asked to write a post about a new website I created: Every Man’s Companion: Or, An Useful Pocket-Book: The Travel Journal of Dr Martin Lister.  http://listerstravels.modhist.ox.ac.uk/

In 1663, Martin Lister left his parents’ house in Burwell, Lincolnshire to study medicine in Montpellier. During his three years in France, he kept a detailed journal in an almanac published as Every Man’s Companion: Or, An Useful Pocket-Book, which is in the Bodleian Library. Another 25 pages of memoirs about Lister’s time in Montpellier also survive, as well as Lister’s correspondence (total of 1140 letters). Furthermore, Lister’s travel companion, Phillip Skippon, and his mentor, the botanist John Ray, published accounts of part of their travels.

As we’ve seen in previous posts, Lister was one of the more important doctors and virtuosi of his generation. He became a court physician to Queen Anne in 1702, contributed over fifty papers to the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society for which he served as vice-president, wrote nineteen books on medicine, antiquarianism and natural history, and was the first arachnologist and conchologist, as well as a chemist. He also wrote a best selling travel guide to Paris, edited a Roman cookbook, and was a friend of Robert Hooke, John Flamsteed, and Samuel Pepys.   Newton consulted Lister about some work he was doing in metallurgy.  Two species of orchids, a spider, and a wrinkle ridge system on the moon have been named in Lister’s honour.

Lister’s travel journal anticipates these accomplishments. Month by month, Lister noted the medical texts he consulted, and in his textbooks, he annotated the recipes given to him when he lodged with an apothecary. He described the personalities and works of luminaries he met in France including Nicolas Steno, Francis Willughby, and John Ray. The pocket book and his memoirs reveal that Lister performed a series of dissections with Steno, as well as going on natural history expeditions with Ray.

As his time in Montpellier was part of his education as a gentleman, Lister visited  gardens and libraries in Paris, and made observations of French manufacturing methods, wine (which he greatly enjoyed), literature and drama, and French rules of etiquette and fashion.  He sent his little sister Jane, who was living in Burwell, bottles of French perfume as well as instructions to learn the latest French dance, the courante.  We even have Lister’s draft of his good-bye letter to his first girlfriend, a lovely mademoiselle he met whilst in Montpellier.

With some assistance from the British Academy, I have created an interactive website housed on the Oxford server which maps stages of his journey from England to Montpellier and back via Paris, documenting them photographically along the way. The images and videos of landscape, natural history specimens, and museums and artifacts were conceived as a form of humanistic fieldwork, allowing us to reconstruct the mental world of the early modern virtuoso.

The website with his travel journal may be accessed at: http://listerstravels.modhist.ox.ac.uk/

The majority of Lister’s letters that I calendared are at ‘Early Modern Letters Online’. http://emlo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk

Anna Marie Roos

Fellowships at CRASSH, Cambridge and USC-Huntington

Here is a wonderful opportunity to carry out research at both Cambridge and California, on the topic of Early Modern Visual and Material Culture.

Deadline: 16 May 2013, noon UK time.

CRASSH at the University of Cambridge and the USC-Huntington Library Early Modern Studies Institute will be offering residential Fellowships in Early Modern Visual and Material Culture, to be held between January 2014 and September 2015 . The fellowships, which are open to post-doctoral scholars at all career stages, are part of the collaborative programme Seeing Things: Early Modern Visual and Material Culture.

Full details of the fellowships programme may be found at http://www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/page/1178/emsi-fellowships-2014-15.htm

8 three-year postdocs in Berlin

Berlin is one of the few places in Europe which has a vibrant and expanding academic culture. The following advertisement may be of interest to some of the visitors of this blog. Deadline 15/04/2013 – ‘visualisation of knowledge’ is one of the listed topics.

Eight three-year postdoctoral fellowships.

We are looking for postdoctoral fellows who will: actively work towards the establishment of the Berlin Center for the History of Knowledge; cooperate with the partner institutions in the areas of research and teaching to entrench the history of science in Berlin; and contribute their reflections on the relationships between the histories of knowledge and science.

The successful candidates will be expected to strengthen the internal links between the participating institutions by organizing working groups, colloquium or workshops, in addition to pursuing their personal research projects. A workplace will be provided at one of the participating institutions.

The announcement is intended for promising junior scholars with a record of excellent research in the history of knowledge. Candidates must hold a doctorate at the start of the fellowship. Proposed research topics should demonstrate an interest in theoretical questions and straddle the histories of knowledge and science. Examples might include the relationship of practical to scholarly knowledge, narrative knowledge, the visualization of knowledge, the history of interdisciplinary work or the penetration of science into daily life (and the reverse).

The monthly stipend is determined according to internal guidelines of the participating institutions and will approximate the fellowship rates of the Max Planck Society (for scholars from abroad: € 2,100 – € 2,500 for Fellows from Germany € 1,468 – € 1,621). Candidates of all nationalities are encouraged to apply; applications from women are especially welcome. The Max Planck Society is committed to promoting handicapped individuals and encourages them to apply.

The selection procedure is jointly organized by the participating institutions. Candidates are requested to submit a curriculum vitae (including list of publications), a research proposal on a topic related to the project (750 words maximum), two letters of reference (one of which should be from the candidates’s dissertation advisor), and certification of academic qualifications by April 15, 2013 to:

Max Planck Institute for the History of Science

Administration, Reference: “Postdocs Zentrum”

Boltzmannstr. 22

14195 Berlin

Applications can also be made by email to: tneuendorf@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de. If you have questions about the Berliner Cooperation in the History of Knowledge please contact Dr. Hansjakob Ziemer (hjziemer@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de) or see: www.wissensgeschichte-berlin.de.

Links to the scientists involved in this postdoc-program:

Prof. Dr. Lorraine Daston (MPIWG): http://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/de/mitarbeiter/members/ldaston

Prof. Dr. Jürgen Renn (MPIWG): http://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/de/mitarbeiter/members/renn

Prof. Dr. Sven Dupré (MPIWG/FU): http://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/de/mitarbeiter/members/dupre

Prof. Dr. Veronika Lipphardt (MPIWG/FU): http://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/de/mitarbeiter/members/vlipphardt

Prof. Dr. Peter Geimer (FU): http://www.geschkult.fu-berlin.de/e/khi/mitarbeiter-gaeste/professoren/geimer/index.html

Prof. Dr. Philipp van der Eijk (HU): http://www.klassphil.hu-berlin.de/avh-professur/alteversion/Personen/vandereijk

Prof. Dr. Philipp Felsch (HU): http://www.culture.hu-berlin.de/pf/

Prof. Dr. Gerd Graßhoff (HU): http://www.philosophie.hu-berlin.de/institut/lehrbereiche/wissenschaftsgeschichte

Prof. Dr. Anke te Heesen (HU):  http://www.geschichte.hu-berlin.de/bereiche-und-lehrstuehle/wissenschaftsgeschichte/personen/1684930

Prof. Dr. Hans Christian von Herrmann (TU): http://www.philosophie.tu-berlin.de/menue/fachgebiete/literaturwissenschaft/von_herrmann_hans-christian/

Prof. Dr. Friedrich Steinle (TU): http://www.philosophie.tu-berlin.de/menue/fachgebiete/wissenschaftsgeschichte/prof_dr_friedrich_steinle/

 

Original drawings for Gessner’s Historia animalium

Drawing of a hare from Ms III C 23, 48, © Amsterdam University Library. Please do not reproduce without permission.

Visitors of this blog will recall Florike Egmond’s fascinating account about how she discovered the original drawings for Conrad Gessner’s Historia animalium (1555-8) that were absorbed into Felix Platter’s collection. These drawings are kept at the Dept of Special Collections at Amsterdam University Library. Their digital images are now available to view at Flickr.

Part 1 (fishes and other aquatic creatures) https://www.flickr.com/photos/bijzonderecollectiesuva/sets/72157632809370911/

Part 2 (quadrupeds) https://www.flickr.com/photos/bijzonderecollectiesuva/sets/72157632814218926/

Florike’s Gulbenkian lecture on natural history drawings is also available here.

The Illustrated Scientific Book to 1800 at Rare Book School, University of Virginia

I will be teaching a course on the bibliography of scientific images at Rare Book School, University of Virginia, 29 July – 2 August 2013.  To be considered in the first round of admissions, applications should be submitted by 1 March 2013.

This course will consider the production, formal qualities, and function of images in scientific books. The focus will be on the ways that graphic technologies combined with the printing of verbal texts has affected the use of images in the creation and dissemination of scientific knowledge.  Students will learn the bibliographical analysis and description of illustrated books.

I intend the course to be of interest to all historians of early modern science who use printed sources, in the belief that a sound knowledge of the circumstances of the production of these books is essential to their interpretation.

For more on the course and Rare Book School please follow the link – there are a number of other courses that will be of interest to readers of this website.

http://www.rarebookschool.org/courses/illustration/i40/