Keywords of Mobility.
Paradigms of Movement in Premodern Material Culture

The history of art has been engaged with mobility for centuries. Movement, with its limits and potentials, constitutes in several ways a founding principle of the discipline, and its fascination or rejection stands at the core of much of its narrative. But the recent (re)turn to mobility is rapidly reframing many assumptions about the discourses and practice of the discipline itself. How has art history and, more generally, the study of material cultures, absorbed and reacted to the mobility turn? What kind of theoretical frameworks has, does, and will the discipline, in its broader acceptance, foster and promote? How is mobility – whose intangible nature makes it a rather elusive object of study – embraced and developed in art historical projects?

More than a decade after Sheller and Urry’s call for a “mobility turn,” this workshop invites scholars of the premodern period to reconsider the role of art history and material studies in a de-sedentarized, mobile world. Our scope is to reflect and redefine a set of critical terms, whose use (and sometimes abuse) is central to current debates. In doing so, we do not intend to propose a “grand narrative” of mobility, but rather to explore a new set of questions, theoretical approaches, and ideas, in order to understand practices, meanings, forces, and impacts of movement in premodern art.

THURSDAY 6 June 2019
Norwegian Institute in Rome (Viale Trenta Aprile, 33)

9.30 Registration
9.45 Welcome
Christopher Prescott, Director of The Norwegian Institute in Rome

10.00 Introduction
Mattia Biffis, Oslo
Mobility what? Viewing movement tridimensionally

10.30
Yannis Hadjinicolaou – Hamburg
Flying: Falconry as an Image Vehicle

11.15 Coffee break

11.30–13.00
Bronwen Wilson – Los Angeles
The Itinerary, the Line, and the Limits of the Page

Hagi Kenaan – Tel Aviv
Visual Network: The Case of Graffiti

13.00 Lunch break

14.30 –16.00
Janina Wellmann – Lüneburg
Rhythm. A new episteme around 1800

Meha Priyadarshini – Edinburgh
Boats, Bales, and Ballads: The Material and Culture Practice of Transportation in the Early Modern Period

16.00 Comfort break

16.10 –17.45
Piers Baker-Bates – London
Travelling between the Viceroyalties: the Cosmopolitanism of Works of Art within the 16th century Hispanic World

Stefan Neuner – Berlin
The Ferryman and the Obsessed. Connectivity in Urban and Social Space in Venice ca. 1500 according to Vittore Carpaccio

18.00 Aperitivo

20.00 Dinner

FRIDAY 7 June 2019
Norwegian Institute in Rome (Viale Trenta Aprile, 33)

9.50 Welcome
Sam Hardy, The Norwegian Institute in Rome

10.15–11.45
Miriana Carbonara – East Anglia
Art and borders: a methodology

Federico Zuliani – Turin
Migrant Bibles: Relocating Objects and Beliefs in Early Modern Europe

11.45 Coffee break

12.00
Aron Vinegar – Oslo
On Habit’s Remainder and the Subject Matter of Inertia

13.00 Lunch break

14.30–16.00
Peter Gillgren – Stockholm
Siting: Mobility and Materiality

Ivo Van der Graaff – New Hampshire
The Architecture of Departure and Arrival in the Early Roman Empire

16.00 Comfort break

16.15
Tiffany Racco – Washington DC
The Performance of Speed: Luca Giordano’s Recurring Role as the Fast Painter

17.00 Concluding Remarks
17.30 Visit to the Fontana dell’Acqua Paola
20.00 Dinner