The Meanings of Erasure

Sponsoring Organization(s)

Special Session

Organizer Name

Elina Gertsman

Organizer Affiliation

Case Western Reserve Univ.

Presider Name

Elina Gertsman

Paper Title 1

The Deliberate Erasure of Medieval Churches

Presenter 1 Name

Janet T. Marquardt

Presenter 1 Affiliation

Smith College

Paper Title 2

Revision and Revisionism in Matthew Paris's Maps of the Holy Land

Presenter 2 Name

Asa Simon Mittman

Presenter 2 Affiliation

California State Univ.-Chico

Paper Title 3

"No voy-de wordes": William Caxton and Chaucer's House of Fame

Presenter 3 Name

Charles Wuest

Presenter 3 Affiliation

Southern Methodist Univ.

Paper Title 4

Consuming Priapus: The Medieval Women of Antwerp and Their Distasteful Pagan Magic

Presenter 4 Name

Nancy J. Kay

Presenter 4 Affiliation

Merrimack College

Start Date

16-5-2015 10:00 AM

Session Location

Fetzer 1035

Description

Recent scholarly interest in whiteness, emptiness, and material destruction that pervade medieval visual culture demonstrate a shift in focus: where art historians have historically focused on figuration, they now turn to the instances of material absence. This session will explore the notion of erasure and its function in transforming the object being partially or completely defaced, expunged, rubbed out. How does erasure augment and subvert the meanings of the original image? What does it tell us about the process of engagement with medieval material culture? Does erasure ever equal silence, or does it announce itself as a loud presence on manuscript pages, stone exteriors, and wood and canvas surfaces? And what of the erased word: how does that compromise or transmute the complex text-image relationships?

Elina Gertsman