IMC 2011: Sessions
Session 313: Representing Poverty: Charitable Piety and Holy Models, II
Monday 11 July 2011, 16.30-18.00
| Sponsor: | Giotto's Circle, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London |
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| Organiser: | Federico Botana, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London |
| Moderator/Chair: | Jessica N. Richardson, Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC |
| Paper 313-a | Charity, Chastity, and Competing Values: The Benedictine Chapel of the Hospital of San Giacomo al Colosseo, Rome (Language: English) Index terms: Art History - General, Hagiography, Monasticism, Religious Life |
| Paper 313-b | Constructing the Image of Poverty: The Pictorial Legends of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary (Language: English) Index terms: Art History - General, Hagiography, Religious Life, Women's Studies |
| Paper 313-c | Rethinking the Icon of Lazarus at the End of the Middle Ages: The Narrenshiff Woodcuts and Two Other Contemporary Images (Language: English) Index terms: Hagiography, Printing History, Religious Life, Sermons and Preaching |
| Abstract | From administering hospitals to visiting prisoners and feeding the hungry, a sense of collective obligation permeated medieval life. Holy figures, either recently deceased or long dead, reinforced these objectives and served as models for charitable behaviour. The papers in this panel explore how images contributed to this process. Questions considered by our speakers include: In what ways did images of exemplary individuals serve as a means of advertising corporate activities? How did representations of actions such as distributing alms and clothing the poor reflect or reinforce behavioural norms within a given community? In what ways did they serve also as a means of inciting participation? The papers will address the ways in which monastic, mendicant and lay communities used images of the life and good deeds of holy figures to direct their charitable aims, and the extent to which such artistic commissions might have been directed at the poor themselves. |