Creativity and Invention in Antiquarian Drawings (1400–1600).

An upcoming workshop to be held at the Ashmolean Museum will center on the creativity and invention of Early Modern drawings of antiquities, which are still too often understood as accurate, archaeological “documents” for the appearance and survival of ancient artifacts. In the past two decades, a wealth of new scholarship has called attention to issues such as artistic agency, creativity, context, technique, patronage, and purpose, in short, issues relevant to Renaissance antiquarian drawings as artworks in their own right. Bringing together international speakers and interdisciplinary participants, the conference aims to re-consider the particular aims and functions of this type of drawing, using the riches of the Ashmolean’s own collection as a point of departure.

Program

Thursday 05.09.2024

14:00–14:30 Jennifer Sliwka (Oxford), Cammy Brothers (Boston), and Kathleen Christian (Berlin)
Introduction

14:30–15:00 Giovanni Santucci (Pisa)
Accumulation, Hybridization and Invention in Giovanni Battista Montano’s Antiquarian Drawings

15:00–15:30 Coffee Break

15:30–16:00 Michael Waters (New York)
Architects, Antiquarians, and Enduring Invented Antiquities in the Sixteenth Century

16:00–16:30 Marzia Faietti (Bologna)
The Space of Antiquity in Amico Aspertini. Memory and its Rejection

16:30–17:00 Discussion

Friday 06.09.2024

10:15–10:45 Carolyn Yerkes (Princeton)
Ancient Siege and the Early Modern Landscape

10:45–11:15 Elizabeth Merrill (Ghent)
Francesco di Giorgio’s Antiquarian Empiricism

11:30–12:00 Coffee Break

12:00–12:30 Clare Guest (London)
Essence and Mode: the Sophistic Presence in Antiquarian Aesthetics

12:30–13:00 Robert Gaston (Melbourne)
Historiographic Misprision: Pirro Ligorio’s Antiquarian Drawing and the Conflict of Scholarly Disciplines

13:00–14:15 Lunch, for speakers and registered attendees

14:15–14:45 Anna Rebecca Sartore (Ghent)
The Libro Capponi and Antonio da Sangallo the Elder’s Inventiveness in Drawings after the Antique

14:45–15:15 Tatjana Bartsch (Rome)
Drawing Antiquities with the Eyes of the Painter. Maarten van Heemskerck in Rome

15:30–16:00 Coffee Break

16:00–16:30 Kathleen Christian (Berlin)
A Census of Supposed Testimonials of Direct or Indirect Observations of Possibly at Least Partially Antique Works of Art and Architecture Known in the Renaissance

16:30–17:00 Cammy Brothers (Boston)
Archaeology, Antiquarianism, and the Art Historian

17:00–17:30 Discussion

The conference is free and all are welcome, but pre-registration is required. To register, email ashmolean.conference.2024gmail.com. More information on census.de.

The conference is organized by Cammy Brothers, Professor of Architectural History, Northeastern University; Kathleen Christian, Professor of Early Modern Art and Director of The Census of Antique Works of Art and Architecture Known in the Renaissance, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin; Jennifer Sliwka, Keeper of Western Art, Ashmolean Museum of Art and Garlick Professorial Fellow, Balliol College; and Catherine Whistler, Emeritus Research Fellow, St. John’s College.

The workshop is generously funded by the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung, the Humboldt University in Berlin, the Oxford Berlin Research Partnership / Berlin University Alliance, and Northeastern University.