What is the Self-Portrait of Thomas Smith about? In this dissertation I ask that question about a key work in the American art canon. In search of an answer I look for meaning in five outstanding details of the portrait: the subject's powerful blue eyes, the skull beneath his hand, the battle scene on the wall, the poem on the table, and his elegant lace cravat. I find that the painting presents a vivid description of seventeenth-century conflict and emotional as well as spiritual malaise. The artist emerges as an individual philosophically at odds with his peers and disdainful of their of values. Smith's Self Portrait, dated circa 1680, is generally acclaimed as the first known self-portrait painted in the colony and is recognized for its stylistic innovations: Baroque modeling and composition at a time and place when an earlier, linear style prevailed. The painting is also regarded as the first signed canvas in America. These assertions tend to brush aside some troublesome problems: (1) identity of the artist cannot be confirmed; (2) it is not entirely certain the portrait is, indeed, a self -portrait; (3) the signature may not belong to the artist; (4) it may not, in fact, have been painted by a man named Smith; (5) the date assigned to the portrait is conjectural; and (6) its provenance is almost entirely anecdotal. External documentation of this work is clearly unstable, but in spite of, or perhaps because of such uncertainties, when asked to speak for itself the painting is far more remarkable than canonical convention leads us to believe. Research for this painting inspires me to reconsider the question of intention, not in terms of what may have been in the artist's mind, but rather with regard to the intention of the work itself as it interacts with the intention of its observer. The concept of intentionality in this discussion is freed from the onus of intentional fallacy and offers instead a resilient, reflective way of thinking about meaning, especially with reference to the genre of self-portraiture.

This dissertation examines the ways in which Lydgate's Troy Book, both the textual and visual narratives, functioned in fifteenth-century England. As Henry V sought to legitimate his claim to the throne usurped by his father, he capitalized on the burgeoning sense of an English national identity by patronizing literature in the English vernacular as a means to glorify both nation and language. In an age in which genealogical claims were the most important indicator of a person's right to rule, Henry exploited the Trojan origin myth, which had circulated in England and other European communities since the early Middle Ages, not only to glorify England as an inheritor of Rome's imperial mission and to solidify the Lancastrian claim, but also to help solidify and renew the English claim to the French throne. The Troy Book was immensely popular in the fifteenth-century and was reproduced in at least twenty-three manuscripts, including fragments. Eight of these manuscripts received illustrations, and a basic visual program can be detected in each of them. However, two of these manuscripts are exceptional for the inclusion of illustrations beyond this basic program - London, British Library, MS Royal 18 d. ii (c. 1455-62) and Manchester, John Rylands Library, MS English 1 (c. late 1440s). Because the manuscripts were produced at different points in the fifteenth century, a careful examination of the images in light of contemporary historical events helps establish the patron's views and ambitions that may have helped shape the pictorial narrative. I will argue that the anomalous images in the Royal manuscript must be read in light of both the recently failed war with France and the current civil war between the houses of York and Lancaster and that these images represent aristocratic anxieties and desires for peace. This argument will culminate in an examination of the images in the Rylands manuscript, the most sumptuous of the Troy Book manuscripts, which includes sixty-nine miniatures. It was commissioned slightly earlier than the Royal manuscript during the waning fortunes of the Hundred Years War and conforms most closely to the purposes of the original text: to glorify Trojan origins and England by identifying Henry V with Hector, to act as a manual for chivalry and proper war practices, to emphasize the role of fortune in worldly events, and to provide moral instruction to both the aristocracy and the nobility. / A Dissertation submitted to the Program of Interdisciplinary Humanities in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester 2015. / April 16, 2015. / England, Geoffrey of Monmouth, Henry V, Lydgate, Troy / Includes bibliographical references. / David F. Johnson, Professor Directing Dissertation; Jack Freiberg, University Representative; David Gants, Committee Member; Svetla Slaveva-Griffin, Committee Member.

acase@tulane.edu / 1 / Emily C Floyd

This paper examines the Massacre of the Innocents attributed to Marten van Cleve, located at the Scheffler Palace in Stockholm, through a technical examination done in the spring of 2020. The results will be contextualized through the economic-historical context of 16th century Antwerp and its affiliated art market. By applying the theoretical approach put forward by Michael Yonan in his article “Materiality as Periphery”, the aim of this study is to investigate how van Cleve’s workshop customized its working methods of the Massacre of the Innocents to fit the dynamics of supply and demand. A thoroughly study on the correlation between the painting’s technical as well as visual features with its contemporary context within the open art market in Antwerp will be conducted in order to answer such question. One of the key ideas that will be followed throughout this study is the idea of the Massacre of the Innocents as a workshop production which cannot be understood through an examination of the artwork alone, but which requires to be viewed in relation to its characteristics as a serialized copy, mass produced for the market on spec. The paper concludes that the transferring technique of the motif, although reproduced numerous times, was not consistent with every figure’s and object’s contours, as many had been painted at first. As van Cleve’s workshop prolifically produced versions of the Massacre of the Innocents, its way of building many parts of the image in the painting phase may have been an intended act in the making of unique copies.

In this thesis the status of textile art will be examined through a discourse analysis of three books written about textile art history. I will also look at two Gothenburg based museum collections to examine what the representation looks like, if they differ from each other, and if that can be connected to the discourse analysis. This thesis aims to explore if it is the case that textile art described in the written texts I have examined provides an explanation for the way textile art is presented in museums today, and if so how. My conclusion suggests that as a female-dominated art form, in addition to textile art's categorisation as handicraft, affects how we regard textile art and its place in the museums.

In this essay called Searching for Language at the Frontiers of Pain. Lenke Rothman and possibilities and limitations of languages in front of phenomenon of pain, I investigate how experiences of pain and suffering is communicated through four artworks by artist Lenke Rothman (1929-2008). Having survived the Holocaust, she felt, like many other, that testimony of pain and suffering was impossible within the limits of language. Through a semiotic model for analysis, using Rothmans experiences of both physical and psychological pain as context for interpretation, I discuss how the artworks as visual instead of textual can communicate experience when language fails. With a theoretical starting point in phenomenological theories of pain as something that escapes conceptual definition, I show how the symbolic level in the artworks is able to expand meaning when it comes to the phenomenon of pain. It happens in the gap between words as describing an artworks as showing. / I denna uppsats analyseras fyra konstverk av Lenke Rothman (1929-2008) utifrån frågan hur de kan förmedla erfarenheter av smärta och lidande. Rothman upplevde precis som många andra förintelseöverlevare hur orden svek när hon skulle vittna om det hon varit med om och detta är min utgångspunkt för Rothmans sökande efter språk, både genom orden och genom konsten. När det verbala språket upplevs som bristande, hur kan hon ändå lyfta erfarenhet utanför sig själv genom det visuella som visar istället för att säga? Detta relateras till en fenomenologisk diskussion om smärta och lidande som fenomen i avsaknad av begrepp. Jag visar genom en semiotisk analys, med fokus på den symboliska dimensionen i verken, hur mening uppstår genom tolkningsakten. Min slutsats är att i de mellanrum som uppstår mellan kontext och verk, skapas ett rum där förmedling av smärtans fenomen möjliggörs.

Although later medieval St. Albans Abbey has long been renowned as a preeminent center for the writing of historical chronicles, previous studies have not acknowledged that the monastic community also had a sustained tradition of visually representing the house’s institutional history. This dissertation demonstrates that between the late eleventh and early sixteenth centuries, the monks of St. Albans depicted and evoked their abbey’s past in a large and diverse collection of artworks, ranging from illuminated manuscripts and pilgrim badges to monumental paintings and architecture. Monastic historical imagery was rarely produced during the Middle Ages, but the images and objects from St. Albans present a remarkably rich and complete account of the abbey’s history from the time of its illustrious origins through the eve of its dissolution. Using an interdisciplinary approach to contextualize these artworks within the monastery’s history and traditions, this study argues that the visual historiography of St. Albans served as a potent vehicle for the expression and self-fashioning of the abbey’s corporate identity and historical memory. As will be demonstrated, this vast corpus of imagery focuses on three fundamental elements of the monastery’s past: Saint Alban and his early cult, the eighth-century foundation of the monastery by King Offa of Mercia, and the house’s post-foundation history. Through these artworks, many of which have not previously received the attention of art historians, the monks of St. Albans documented, celebrated, and occasionally manipulated their abbey’s long and distinguished history, thereby providing a compelling justification for its continued prosperity and prestige. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Art History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester 2017. / November 9, 2017. / historiography, identity, medieval art, monasticism, St. Albans / Includes bibliographical references. / Richard K. Emmerson, Professor Co-Directing Dissertation; Lynn Jones, Professor Co-Directing Dissertation; David F. Johnson, University Representative; Kyle Killian, Committee Member; Stephanie Leitch, Committee Member.

Rapporten ämnar ge en grundläggande översikt över hur konstnärers personarkiv hanteras i det svenska arkivväsendet. Den är tänkt att utgöra ett underlag för vidare studier, där frågorna kan fördjupas och undersökas vidare. Rapporten utreder vart personarkiv efter svenska bildkonstnärer kan doneras, hur beslutsprocessen ser ur samt vilka problem som kan uppstå specifikt för konstnärers personarkiv. Med utgångspunkt i en kvalitativ fallstudie har material samlats in från åtta konst- och arkivinstitutioner. / <p>Rapport på avanceradnivå (masternivå)</p>

The thesis examines the reason behind the overtaking of Nynäs castle by the State Art Museums and how Nationalmuseum choose to stage the period rooms during 1984-2020 and how it relates to contemporary trends within museology. Furthermore, the thesis examines possible similarities in how the National Trust stages their historic houses. The thesis emanates from Emma Barker’s art historical approach to critical studies of the historic buildings owned by the Trust and discusses the possibilities and limitations of the historic house museums in the context of house museology. This thesis also discusses the differences between an ethnographic and an art museum in a historic house context and the function of the period room. The State Art Museum managed to receive funds for the acquisition of Nynäs collections through private donations and funds from the State. The original intention was to stage the interior rooms as it was found, and this approach partly resembles the staging of a house owned by the National Trust. This approach was questioned by Nationalmuseum during 2008 and they initiated a project of re-arranging the rooms which resulted in a chronological display. The display of the kitchen and service areas since the opening can relate to a rising interest in New Museology.

The thesis examines Marten van Cleve’s painting the Massacre of the Innocents from the Stockholm University Art Collection through a series of technical examinations that were conducted at Spökslottet in January 2020 (X-ray, UV, IRR). The aim of the thesis is to examine Marten van Cleve’s painting technique, style and composition by comparing the painting with five contemporary similar versions of the subject the Massacre of the Innocents. Moreover, the thesis compares the underdrawing of the painting from the Stockholm University Art collection with the drawing from the Göttingen University art collection that are similar in composition and signed by Marten van Cleve. Additionally, the thesis examines the relationship between preparatory drawings and underdrawings in the artists environment in order to learn more about Marten van Cleve’s painting process as well as gain insight into the practice of contemporary 16th-century Flemish artists.