CFP: The Study of Renaissance Inventories

From H-ArtHist:

CALL FOR PAPERS

Deadline: 16 May 2008

Renaissance Society of America Annual Meeting
19-21 March 2009
UCLA & The Getty Museum, Malibu

The Study of Renaissance Inventories

In light of the efflorescence of scholarly interest in early modern collecting, this panel will examine the historical documents that provide us with some of the most salient information about collections' contents and organization. Inventories have long been used by scholars to assess the size and composition of collections, to track the provenance of objects and to better understand the tastes of a particular patron. We contend that the study of inventories can, in addition to opening new avenues of investigations into collecting practices, also incite practical and methodological questions pertinent to the study of Renaissance art, science and culture. The sorts of inventories we foresee examining include inventories of palaces, libraries, collections, studioli, Kunstkammern, ships, etc. Among the questions this panel seeks to ask are: How did inventories function? What can inventories tell us about the storage, display and movement of objects? How can we track the exchange of objects between collections through the study of inventories? How can we translate the language of inventories? We welcome case studies of individual inventories as well as papers that examine methodological concerns bearing on the study of various inventories.

Please send a 150 abstract, paper title and CV to both Jessica Keating
( j-keating@northwestern.edu) and Lia Markey (lmarkey@uchicago.edu ).
Deadline: 16 May 2008
Speakers must be members of RSA at the time of the Conference.

Comments

Popular Posts