Professor Wendy Bellion will discuss the research she undertook using American Antiquarian Society collections for her recent book Iconoclasm in New York: Revolution to Reenactment (fall 2019, out in paperback May 2020), which explores a history of material violence in Revolutionary New York. Bellion's work traces acts of political iconoclasm and the return of destroyed things in visual representations and civic performances. The webinar will also address more broadly the opportunities and challenges authors face when working with/reproducing visual media.
Is blindness the opposite of seeing? At the end of the nineteenth century in America, artworks and objects answered resoundingly: no. Join graduate student Kristen Nassif as she discusses how the loss or absence of sight mattered in experiences of making and understanding works of art between the 1870s and 1890s in the United States. In this presentation, Nassif will explore how maps, paintings, sculptures, and scientific models confronted viewers with questions about what it meant to see and not see. Her research uncovers how discourses of blindness intersected with works of art, contributing to and challenging understandings of disability in the Gilded Age.Kristen Nassif is a fifth-year doctoral candidate in the Department of Art History. She received her BA in art history, studio art, and biology from Colby College and her MA in art history from Tufts University. Her research focuses on nineteenth-century American art, visual culture and material culture. In particular, she is interested in the intersections between art and science, optics and vision.
Registration is required.
