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Patronage, Power, and Agency in Medieval Art

Edited by Colum Hourihane

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$35.00 | Paperback Edition
ISBN: 978-0-9837537-4-2

368 pages
8.5" × 11"
192 color/10 b&w illustrations
2013
Distributed by Penn State University Press for the Index of Christian Art, Princeton University

The Index of Christian Art: Occasional Papers

Patronage, Power, and Agency in Medieval Art

Edited by Colum Hourihane

Although the concept of patronage has long been central to medieval studies, it is still not well understood. In order to identify the person or institution responsible for the work, scholars have attempted to impose principles across a broad range of works to which they may or may not apply. In many cases this has prevented a full understanding of the work. As the essays in this volume demonstrate, the key to understanding patronage is to realize that a variety of contexts and situations may exist that prevent one definition from being imposed. The concept of patronage relates to issues such as gender, social and economic history, as well as the world of politics, and the many possible roles of the patron can range from paying for the work to designing it to using it. But we do not know what input the artist had, or how influential he or she may have been. The essays in this volume, from those that look at patronage from a theoretical perspective to individual case studies, highlight our need to look at the subject anew.

 

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Although the concept of patronage has long been central to medieval studies, it is still not well understood. In order to identify the person or institution responsible for the work, scholars have attempted to impose principles across a broad range of works to which they may or may not apply. In many cases this has prevented a full understanding of the work. As the essays in this volume demonstrate, the key to understanding patronage is to realize that a variety of contexts and situations may exist that prevent one definition from being imposed. The concept of patronage relates to issues such as gender, social and economic history, as well as the world of politics, and the many possible roles of the patron can range from paying for the work to designing it to using it. But we do not know what input the artist had, or how influential he or she may have been. The essays in this volume, from those that look at patronage from a theoretical perspective to individual case studies, highlight our need to look at the subject anew.

The contributors are Adelaide Bennett, Sheila Bonde, Jill Caskey, Robin Cormack, Anne Derbes, Aden Kumler, Claudine Lautier, Julian Luxford, Clark Maines, Nigel Morgan, Elizabeth Carson Pastan, Stephen Perkinson, Lucy Freeman Sandler, Corine Schleif, and Benjamin Zweig.

Colum Hourihane is Director of the Index of Christian Art, Princeton University.

Patronage

Power & Agency in Medieval Art

Contents

Preface by Colum Hourihane

Foreword by Elizabeth Carson Pastan

Notes on the Contributors

Introduction by Colum Hourihane

Jill Caskey

Medieval Patronage & Its Potentialities

Julian Luxford

The Construction of English Monastic Patronage

Elizabeth Carson Pastan

Imagined Patronage: The Bayeux Embroidery & Its Interpretive History

Sheila Bonde & Clark Maines

The Heart of the Matter: Valois Patronage of the Charterhouse at Bourgfontaine

Claudine Lautier

The Canons of Chartes: Their Patronage and Representation in the Stained Glass Cathedral

Anne Derbes

Patronage, Gender & Generation in Late Medieval Italy: Fina Buzzacarini and the Baptistery of Padua

Benjamin Zweig

Picturing the Fallen King: Royal Patronage & the Image of Saul’s Suicide

Nigel Morgan

What are they Saying? Patrons & Their Text Scrolls in Fifteenth-Century English Art

Robin Cormack

‘Faceless Icons’: The Problems of Patronage in Byzantine Art

Corine Schleif

Seeking Patronage: Patrons & Motions in Language, Art, and Historiography

Adelaide Bennett

Issues of Female Patronage: French Books of Hours, 1220-1320

Stephen Perkinson

Portraits & Their Patrons: Reconsidering Agency in late Medieval Art

Lucy Freeman Sandler

The Bohun Women & Manuscript Patronage in Fourteenth-Century England

Aden Kumler

The Patron-Function

General Index

Index of Manuscripts

Also of Interest

Also of interest book cover

Medieval Art in Motion

The Inventory and Gift Giving of Queen Clémence de Hongrie

Mariah Proctor-Tiffany

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