Organized session: Seams of time. Medieval objects narratives and their temporalities.

In a series of sessions we aim to re-describe how the middle ages (c. 800 to c. 1500) dealt with different pasts, more specifically: with artefacts of preceding times.

We would like to discuss constructions and conceptions of temporality associated with the practice of using “old” objects for political and religious purposes. The phenomena we want to address have been discussed under various terms within the disciplines. On the one hand, there are historical conceptions such as renovatio, auctoritas or translatio. Modern concepts on the other hand, such as copy, quotation, adaptation, reception, or ‘retro-style’, with which the humanities try to grasp the conscious reflection of the past in their own present, are also part of our considerations.

In a DFG funded network we have been investigating these and other questions since Mai 2022 (https://zeitfugen.hypotheses.org). To grasp the various comparable phenomena, the network uses the ambivalent notion of the concept of ‘gaps’ or as we put it here ‘seams’ in time (Zeitfuge: the German allows a play with the ambivalent meaning of Fuge as fugue, gap, and connection), since it can be used to describe fractions and yet signify cohesion. We are interested in questions of aesthetic perception and appreciation expressed in the conscious actualization und constant visibility of the old and the potentiality that lay in the connections and adaptations thus created.

We encourage all interested art historians, literary scholars, historians, … to join us in one of the sessions and to apply with their paper proposal and a short CV to Henrike Haug (hhauguni-koeln.de), Patrizia Carmassi (carmassihab.de) or Anja Rathmann-Lutz (anja.lutzunibas.ch) no later than September 18.

If the sessions get accepted at Leeds (https://www.imc.leeds.ac.uk/imc-2023/) we will have a zoom call together with all participants in early spring 2023.

Please note that we have unfortunately no additional funding for the participation at the IMC Leeds, but there is the possibility to apply to the IMC Bursary Fund (https://www.imc.leeds.ac.uk/proposals/bursary/).