Renaissance Society of America-sponsored session at the College Art Association conference, New York, February 13–16, 2019
Artistic Biography in Early Modern Europe
Proposals due August 6
Early biographies provide crucial primary sources for our knowledge of early modern artists throughout Europe. Inspired by Pliny the Elder, regional loyalties, gifted artists, influential patrons, and each other, biographers from the mid-sixteenth through the eighteenth century produced a staggering variety of biographical collections – varied in terms of their approaches, criteria, scope, and artistic interests. Such authors as Neudörfer, Vasari, Van Mander, Sandrart, Houbraken, Malvasia, Baldinucci, and Palomino, among many others, produced biographical compendia that have supplied modern scholars with first-hand information on thousands of artists.
In recent years, a growing number of scholars have reexamined these texts, publishing edited and translated editions as well as critical studies. This session proposes to investigate some of the concerns that have arisen in these studies, including but not limited to:
- biographers’ differing methods and criteria;
- questions of reliability and intentional misrepresentation;
- the role and significance of anecdotes;
- the uses of ekphrasis;
- prejudices concerning women, foreigners, and specific artistic specializations;
- the reliance on primary sources;
- the influence of local literary and artistic traditions;
- and the narrative structure, critical vocabulary, and authorial goals employed.
We welcome papers that deal with these broader issues about biographical practices and how these have shaped the study of early modern artists. Send proposal and short c.v. by August 6th to Babette Bohn (Texas Christian University) – b.bohn@tcu.edu and Jeffrey Chipps Smith (University of Texas, Austin) – chipps@austin.utexas.edu.