Tag: collecting practices

Call for Papers: Arts Special Issue — Art Markets and Digital Histories

Published on by Gretchen Simms

Arts Special Issue: Art Markets and Digital Histories

Deadline: Jun 15, 2018

A Special Issue of Arts will investigate the promises and pitfalls of current digital methods in studying the history of art markets. New technologies are becoming integral to research in the humanities and social sciences and this invites a reflection on the use of these methods and techniques in art market studies. Our aim is to explore the different strategies that scholars employ to navigate and negotiate digital techniques and data sources, particularly when combining different datasets and types. Furthermore, the wealth of digitized historical data on objects and agents in art markets is rapidly expanding, and this data is increasingly published as Linked Open Data. Two recent historiographical trends make the use of Linked Data particularly relevant to art market studies.

First of all, the history of art markets has since long been studied through economic, social, and cultural lenses. While some scholars opt for the one or the other, others try to integrate them through the topics of, for instance, intermediaries, market mediation, and valuation processes. Open access to digital assets from art museums, archives, and libraries provide the opportunity, in the form of linked data and combined sources, to test cross-overs between research domains and thereby expand our understanding of art markets as socio-cultural as well as economic phenomena. But translating the promise of Linked Data into actual conceptual leaps in the field requires careful design of data models and methodologies.

The second trend also concerns the boundaries of the art market, but on a spatial level. The geographical reach of historical art market studies has been extended beyond Europe and the United States to include Latin America, Asia, the Middle East, and Australia. At the same time, scholars have developed increasing interest on themes such as cross-border trade and networks, global vs. national vs. local, and migration and mobility patterns. In theory, digitization and linked data provide excellent opportunities for advanced cross-border and comparative analyses, but in practice it has proven difficult to systematically link or compare data across borders and languages.

For this issue, we seek contributions that present a historical research question relevant to art market studies. We are particularly interested in contributions that reach out to other domains (be they time, place, or societal), and that place emphasis on combining and using multiple sources or data types (linked or not linked). There are no limitations as to place or time, as long as the papers are explicit on their research processes with regards to data, techniques and methods. Continue reading “Call for Papers: Arts Special Issue — Art Markets and Digital Histories” →

CONF: Collections and Collecting Ancient, Byzantine and Medieval Art – 23 March 2017

Published on by Art Market Studies

Christie’s Education invites you to join their one-day conference, 23 March, London

Collecting Ancient and Medieval art attracts both academic and public curiosity because the objects (and structures) in question are not only often extremely rare, but also have fascinating histories. The ability to possess a piece of our past has allowed collectors throughout the centuries to create a continuity between that past and their present. This conference will explore the history of Ancient, Byzantine and Medieval collections, how they were originally formed, how objects survive and in what contexts, and how certain collections themselves live on. It will also address how the collections of the past may be reflected in the way that we approach collecting today, the theoretical and the historical framework of collections, how they are currently presented, as well as some of the controversies in the field. Equally, the problems and issues underlying the collecting of Ancient and Medieval art, and the knowledge required to authenticate them will be discussed.

PROGRAM

LOCATION

Christie’s Education London
153 Great Titchfied Street
London, W1W 5BD

TICKETS

Adult Ticket Price: £22
Student Ticket Price: £11
Click here to purchase conference tickets

CfP: 73rd annual SECAC Conference, Columbus, OH, 25-28 Oct 17

Published on by Art Market Studies

Call for papers for the Southeastern College Art Conference http://www.secacart.org/conference

The Columbus College of Art & Design (CCAD) in Columbus, Ohio, is hosting the 73rd annual SECAC Conference, October 25-28, 2017.

The call for paper proposals is available. The deadline is April 20 at midnight EDT.

The Collectors’ Impulse: Conspicuous Consumption or Philanthropy?

In his 1899 book, Theory of the Leisure Class, economist Thorstein Veblen coined the still-useful phrase, “conspicuous consumption,” meaning the pursuit of status via goods such as art works. More recently, Pierre Bourdieu argued that taste is inextricably linked to social standing. Most often one must possess wealth to amass noteworthy collections, but is collecting more complicated than status seeking or gaining cultural capital?  What if the consumer creates a museum with his or her art collection, such as Isabella Stewart Gardner, Henry and Arabella Huntington, and more recently, Eli Broad has done? Is this primarily creating institutions to solidify and enhance their cultural capital? Should others with great collections feel obligated to share them with the public or is it acceptable to keep them hidden until they are ready to sell? To what degree is a collection left to the public conspicuous consumption, philanthropy, or something else altogether? This panel seeks perspectives on collecting practices, past or present. Who is or was collecting and why? What aspects of collecting motivate one to share a collection with strangers (or not)? How should museum-goers react to private-turned-public collections?

Contact: Dr. Leanne Zalewski

Transatlantic Exchange between the US and Ireland

Transatlantic Exchange: Ireland and the United States in the 20th Century

This panel seeks papers that focus on transatlantic cultural exchange between Ireland and the United States during the twentieth century. Americans who traveled to Ireland, many compelled by familial connections, developed rich relationships with Irish artists that led to cultural exchange between the two countries, while tumultuous political circumstances in Ireland prompted Irish artists to leave their homeland. For example, Irish painter John Yeats and Irish American art collector John Quinn facilitated cultural exchange during the early decades of the twentieth century, particularly in that Yeats was the father of three of the most influential cultural figures in Ireland: writer W.B. Yeats; Ireland’s celebrated painter Jack Yeats; and textile designer Lily Yeats. After solidifying his connection with Quinn, Yeats went on to establish close ties to American artists John Sloan and Robert Henri.
This panel seeks to explore these and other examples of Irish/American transatlantic cultural exchange.

  • What impact did the American presence in Ireland have on Irish art?
  • Conversely, how have American artists been impacted by their experiences in Ireland?
  • What exhibitions document these exchanges?

These are but a few questions that we hope to answer on this panel.

Session Chairs: Cynthia Fowler, Emmanuel College; James Swensen, Brigham Young University

Contact: fowlecy@emmanuel.edu ; james_swensen@byu.edu

For more information:
https://secac.memberclicks.net/assets/documents/secac/conference/secac-2017-call-for-papers.pdf

Source: 2 Panels/Sessions at SECAC 2017 (Columbus, 25-28 Oct 17). In: H-ArtHist, Feb 20, 2017.

CFP : Private Collecting and Public Display: Art Markets and Museums

Published on by Art Market Studies
Frederick MacKenzie, The National Gallery when at Mr J.J. Angerstein's House, Pall Mall, 1824-34, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Frederick MacKenzie, The National Gallery when at Mr J.J. Angerstein’s House, Pall Mall, 1824-34, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London

CALL FOR PAPERS : Private Collecting and Public Display: Art Markets and Museums

University of Leeds, 30th-31st March 2017

Deadline for Abstracts: Tuesday 1st November 2016

 

Keynote Speaker: Dr. Susanna Avery-Quash, Senior Research Curator (History of Collecting) at the National Gallery, London

This two-day conference investigates the relationships between ‘private’ collections of art (fine art, decorative art and antiquities), and the changing dynamics of their display in ‘public’ exhibitions and museums. This shift from ‘private’ to ‘public’ involves a complex dialectic of socio-cultural forces, together with an increasing engagement with the art market. The conference aims to explore the relationship between the ‘private’ and ‘public’ spheres of the home and the museum, and to situate this within the scholarship of the histories of the art market and collecting. Continue reading “CFP : Private Collecting and Public Display: Art Markets and Museums” →

CONF: Creating Markets, Collecting Art, 14-15 July, London

Published on by Art Market Studies

Christie’s Education Conference 2016

Celebrating 250 years of Christie’s, 14-15 July 2016

To commemorate the anniversary of the foundation of Christie’s auction house in 1766 a two-day conference will be held at Christie’s King Street, St James’s. Organised by Christie’s Education, and celebrating 30 years of the Christie’s Education Trust, the theme of ‘Creating Markets, Collecting Art’ has been chosen to reflect a progressive, collaborative and cross-disciplinary approach to the study of works of art. The conference is designed to explore the interrelationship between commerce, collecting and the idea of the ‘academy’ and how this has evolved over time.

Confirmed keynote speakers at the Conference include Professor Craig Clunas, University of Oxford and Dr Inge Reist, Director of the Center for the History of Collecting, The Frick Collection and Frick Art Reference Library.

Continue reading “CONF: Creating Markets, Collecting Art, 14-15 July, London” →

From Refugees to Restitution: The History of Nazi Looted Art in the UK in Transnational and Global Perspective”

Published on by Art Market Studies

From Refugees to Restitution: Nazi Looted Art in the UK (Cambridge, 23-24 Mar 17)

University of Cambridge, March 23 – 24, 2017
The deadline for CfPs has now expired.

In recent years, the subject of looted art and the restitution of cultural property has come to the fore of historical enquiry and public consciousness alike. While popular recollections of this politically sensitive subject often display a certain lack of historical accuracy, a growing number of historians, art historians and legal scholars have devoted their energy to investigating the nuances and complexities of the phenomenon across time and space. Parallel to this, experts based at local, national and international institutions such as ministries, museums, auction houses, archives, galleries or even private collectors have started adopting measures designed to prompt the art world to adopt fair practices for identifying, recovering and restituting looted art. The field, however, remains rather compartmentalized along national, institutional and professional lines and still displays a marked tendency to focus on specific cases or collections. Instead much could be gained by studying the phenomenon in a broader comparative perspective and by exploring the tangible links to some of the central themes of 20th-century history: revolution, persecution, displacement, war, migration and genocide.

The Program is available here

Continue reading “From Refugees to Restitution: The History of Nazi Looted Art in the UK in Transnational and Global Perspective”” →