[1]
The Medici and the Seas: Things on the Move and Grand Ducal Tuscany

From: Francesco Freddolini <francesco.freddoliniuregina.ca>

The Medici Dukes and Grand Dukes always engaged with a network of diplomatic, political, artistic and cultural relations that projected their interest—and fostered the circulation of people, things, and ideas—on a European, and even global scale. Identifying the maritime connections as a privileged means of encounter and mobility, this interdisciplinary session aims to explore multifold trades of luxury goods and cultural exchange triggered by the Medici family. In particular, we seek to discuss maritime routes, and the ports—the loci of connection—as networks for projecting localities on a global scale, and where material histories of mobility (of objects, people, and know-how), transcultural exchange, and cross-cultural collecting arise.

The three key discourses explored in this panel include:

The Materiality of Exchange:
1. How did foreign objects arrive in Florence? Where did they come from?
Where did objects created and manufactured in Florence go?
2. How were the objects shipped, stored, handled, preserved, or even
transformed throughout the travels? How did the creation and expansion of
the port of Leghorn fostered such exchanges?
3. Who were the merchants, courtiers, intermediaries involved?

Intercultural Networks:
1. Was the mobility of objects and artists towards markets and patrons only
a unidirectional trajectory or did it develop as a multidirectional
circulation of things and technical/artistic knowledge (for example in the
case of pietre dure works exported to Portuguese and Mughal India, after
importing raw materials from these areas)?
2. The circulation of knowledge and information of foreign/exotic objects
(for example through books, manuscripts, avvisi).
3. How did the mobility and agency of objects influence the visual culture
in Medici Florence, and in the cultural milieus of their commercial and
diplomatic partners?

Political-Diplomatic Framework:
1. How the Grand Dukes positioned themselves in relation to maritime
exchanges, and what was the political gain?
2. How did the commercial routes based in Leghorn created a network of
relations, and tensions, within the Mediterranean Sea, with Islam, and on a
global scale?
3. The role of the Cavalieri di Santo Stefano in creating a Mediterranean
identity for the Medici family and the Tuscan nobility shaped by a network
of cultural, religious and military exchanges.

By exploring the multifold and complex relation between the Medici court and the sea(s) we aim to contribute to the material history of mobility and cultural transfer, and to a better understanding of the relations between local and global cultures in the early modern period. Within the three areas of inquiry proposed above, papers may explore Mediterranean or global artistic/material/cultural connections between Grand Ducal Tuscany and other cultures, and/or may focus on material histories of maritime mobility and cross-cultural exchanges. We also welcome papers investigating specific objects or categories of objects, the Medici family and their cross-cultural collecting and patronage, or case studies investigating families of courtiers, diplomats, merchants, and/or intermediaries that fostered the network of international exchanges of luxury goods through maritime relations.

Please send abstracts (no more than 150 words) and a short CV (300-word maximum) to Francesco Freddolini (francesco.freddoliniuregina.ca) and Marco Musillo (Marco.Musillokhi.fi.it) no later than May 25, 2015.

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[2]
From theory to practice:
Lomazzo’s aesthetic principles reflected in the art of his time

From: Rebecca Norris <rebeccamnorrisgmail.com>

Giovan Paolo Lomazzo (1538-1592) was the leading art theorist of late Cinquecento Milan, author of the influential Trattato dell'Arte della Pittura, Scoltura et Architettura (1584) and the Idea del Tempio della Pittura (1590), among other critical texts. As the abbot of the Accademia della Val di Blenio, his aesthetic principles contributed to lively debate within this artistic circle comprised of over hundred members including Annibale Fontana, Aurelio Luini and Scipione Delfinone. Yet, the extent to which Lomazzo’s doctrines were applied by his colleagues is still to be defined. Is it possible to pinpoint correlations between his theory and their artistic output? And how, and how far, were his technical suggestions followed? This conference session proposes to investigate the influence of Lomazzo’s art theory on his contemporaries working in drawing, painting, print?making, sculpture, architecture and the decorative arts.

By 15 May 2015, please send your paper title, abstract (150-word maximum), keywords, and a brief Curriculum Vitae (300-word maximum) to both organizers Rebecca Norris <rn290cam.ac.uk> and Lucia Tantardini <lt303cam.ac.uk>.

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[3]
At Odds: Art and Ambivalence in the Renaissance World

From: Lindsay Alberts <lhalbertsgmail.com>

The concept of the Renaissance embraces notions of rupture and change. The Europe of 1600, home to the astronomical theories of Galileo, and the dramatic art of Rubens and Bernini, would scarcely have been recognizable to Chaucer, Petrarch, or Aquinas in 1300. Often characterized as innovative, the rapidity of change during these three centuries also fostered conditions for doubt and hesitation. In this environment, excitement for and resistance to new directions of Renaissance thought and life coincided. What role did art play in shaping, easing, or expressing these contradictory feelings? Seeking to further alternative narratives of the Renaissance, this panel encourages discussion of art’s power to reveal and navigate ambivalences in political, religious, intellectual and social arenas.

We invite papers exploring the idea of ambivalence in artistic production during this period of transition from the medieval world to the early modern. To submit, please send an abstract (150 words, maximum) and a one-page CV to both organizers, Lindsay Alberts (lalbertsbu.edu) and Elizabeth Pugliano (puglianobu.edu). The deadline for submissions is May 25, 2015.

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[4]
Souvenirs of the Siege of Vienna, 1529/936

From: Jennifer Nelson <jlnelsumich.edu>

Though perhaps anti-climactic as a military confrontation in the long history of tensions between the Ottoman and Holy Roman Empires, the brief Siege of Vienna of 936 AH/1529 CE had a significant impact on cultural production in both empires and beyond. From the diaries of Süleyman’s campaigns (ruzname) to the city map of Nikolaus Meldemann and Sebald Beham, from the mercenary praise-songs of Hans Sachs to later Ottoman miniatures representing Vienna surrounded by exterior encampments, cultural responses to this event infused its historical specificity with long-durée sacrohistorical and global narratives. Our panel seeks to generate a visual, material, and literary microhistory of the event through examination of a variety of media, especially artifacts and texts that have not received extensive scholarly attention. These may include but are not limited to visual objects (for example, print, calligraphy, textile, and paint), numismatic artifacts, songs, chronicles, even printed sundials.

How did such cultural responses, particularly immediate ones, interpret the siege and its political, religious, and ethnic stakes? How do they compare with near-contemporary objects from other contexts, like the well-known 1532 headdress made by Venetian goldsmiths for Süleyman, or Matrakçi Nasuh’s account of Süleyman’s eastern campaign in 1536? To what extent can media-specific rhetorics of representing the Other as enemy be put into dialogue with one another? And what role did these texts and artifacts have in conditioning more durable histories?

One of the aims of this panel is to bring together different scholarly traditions regarding the siege; another is to create a broader view of this landmark conflict’s influence. To these ends we seek contributions across disciplines, especially research that incorporates perspectives from outside the Holy Roman Empire.

Please send an abstract (150-word maximum) and a brief curriculum vitae (300-word maximum) to Jennifer Nelson (jlnelsumich.edu) and Allison Stielau (allison.stielaugmail.com) by May 20.

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[5]
Vasari on Technique: Matter and Making

From: David Young Kim <daviksas.upenn.edu>

In contradistinction to the biographical portion of the Lives, Giorgio Vasari’s “Introduction to the Three Arts of Design” has received relatively scant attention. This double session revisits the Introduction’s thirty chapters devoted to the materials and creative processes involved in the production and reception of a wide range of media, from stained glass to mosaics, gold ground to intarsia, painting on canvas to damask work. The aim of this session is to incorporate the Introduction into the larger corpus of scholarship on Vasari, early modern art theory, materiality, and pictorial composition.

Papers discussing the Introduction’s characterization of the so-called minor arts are particularly welcome. Please submit a 150-word abstract and a 1-page (300 word) CV to David Young Kim (daviksas.upenn.edu) by May 25, 2015.

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[6]
Printed Images in Cinquecento Florence

Lia Markey <lia.markeygmail.com>

Despite its centrality to conventional narratives of early modern Italian art, sixteenth-century Florence’s place within the evolving history of printmaking remains, in many respects, nebulous. Who produced engravings and woodcuts within the sixteenth-century city? In an environment saturated with artists and craftsmen, why were so many Florentine print designers - including Vasari and Stradano - sending their drawings to northern Italy and even beyond the Alps for production? Who constituted the public for prints within the city and how were the products of the press collected and displayed? We seek new research that explores print design, production and collection in the vibrant and rapidly changing artistic environment of sixteenth-century Florence. Studies may examine particular Florentine printmakers, designers, publishers and collectors or explore themes including seriality, invention, developing technology, emerging markets, or the materiality of the printed image.

Please send a 150-word abstract and 300-word CV to organizers Lia Markey (lia.markeygmail.com) and Sean Roberts (robeseangmail.com) by Wednesday, May 6th.