The European Visual Culture Seminar was established in 1993 by David Marshall as the ‘Baroque Group’ with staff and students from the Art History department of the University of Melbourne. Over the years it has broadened its focus to include any aspect of European visual culture. It welcomes staff and students from Melbourne University, La Trobe University and other academic institutions as gallery curators and interested members of the public.
The range of research interests is extremely wide and reflects the diversity of European art history, from the Middle Ages to the 20th century. Subjects include – but are not limited to – patronage, portraiture, landscapes and frescoes, architectural and garden history, issues of attribution and discussions of theory.
The EVCS prides itself on its approachable culture that encourages extended discussion of papers in an informal, friendly and supportive environment, in which speakers can share their research and obtain thoughtful and in-depth feedback.
The seminars take place once a month during semester, usually on a Monday evening at 6.30 pm, currrently in the Jim Potter Room, Old Physics Building, the University of Melbourne, Parkville Campus. Click here for a map. Afterwards everyone is welcome to join us for dinner in Lygon Street.
The EVCS is open to staff and students of all academic institutions, as well as interested members of the public.
If you would like to be added to the email list to receive information on upcoming seminars click here. If you are interested in giving a paper, please contact the convenor, Mark Shepheard, by email.
Convenor
Co-Convenor
Upcoming Papers
Mark Shepheard, ‘Pompeo Batoni and his Roman Sitters: Portraits of the Sforza Cesarini’.
This paper examines Pompeo Batoni’s two portraits of members of the Sforza Cesarini family: the portrait of Duke Gaetano II in Melbourne and that of a woman traditionally identified as Gaetano’s wife, which hangs today in Birmingham. It readdresses the question of the identity of the sitter in the Birmingham portrait, and explores the social function of portraiture within the Sforza Cesarini’s extensive art collection and the likely place of Batoni’s two portraits within that collection.The paper concludes with a discussion of Batoni’s portraits of Roman sitters and questions the oft-repeated view that the paucity of such portraits was the result of the low esteem in which portraiture was traditionally said to be held in eighteenth-century Italy.
This paper is the result of research carried out at the British School at Rome with the support of the Melbourne-Rome Scholarship and in collaboration with Sabrina Norlander-Elisasson, assistant director of the Swedish Institute in Rome.
Date: Monday 16th April, 6:30pm.
Venue: Jim Potter Room, Old Physics Building, University of Melbourne, Parkville.
All Welcome.
Drinks and nibbles provided (gold coin donation appreciated). The seminar will be followed by dinner in Lygon St. Please RSVP Mark Shepheard if you plan to join us for dinner.
Past Papers
Callum Reid ‘Annibale Carracci’s Holy Family at the National Gallery of Victoria’
Date: Monday 5th September, 6:30pm.
Venue: Room 150 Elisabeth Murdoch Building, University of Melbourne, Parkville
All Welcome
For a list of Past Papers click here.
