Acts of Creation between Artistic Practice and Theological Discourse, 12th ‒ 14th Centuries

Research Seminar

Event canceled, new date to be defined!
Date: Mar 24, 2020
Time: 11:00 AM - 01:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
Speaker: Beate Fricke
Location: Villino Stroganoff, Via Gregoriana 22, 00187 Rom
Host: Bibliotheca Hertziana - Max-Planck-Institut für Kunstgeschichte
Contact: boehm@biblhertz.it

Acts of Creation between Artistic Practice and Theological Discourse, 12th ‒ 14th Centuries

In this talk, I explore essential differences between medieval and modern ideas about acts of creation, obscuring our retrospective view upon the medieval artist, his or her work, and his or her self-understanding. I analyze forms of artistic self-representation in illuminations of Genesis and of the creation of the cosmos according to writings by antique and medieval natural philosophers.

Furthermore, I attend to the relationship between ars (craft) and scientia (knowledge), the invention of new images and new modes of representation is key for the mediation of new knowledge generated by the “scientific revolution” which occurred entour the reception and integration of Aristotelian ideas and Arabic knowledge by Christian natural philosophers in the late medieval period (1255-1325).

Beate Fricke’s research focuses on the history of images, objects and places, using perspectives from philosophy, cultural anthropology, history of the sciences, economy and theology. She received her PhD in History of Art from the University of Trier (2005). Before joining the University of Bern (Switzerland) in 2017, she was Professor for Medieval Art and Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley. For her project Global Horizons in Pre-Modern Art she was awarded an ERC consolidator grant (2018-23, www.global-horizons.ch ). She is co-founder and editor of 21-inquiries.eu/en.

Scientific organization: Sietske Fransen