Sculpture and Its Potency II: Speech, Song, Prayer
Sponsoring Organization(s)
Special Session
Organizer Name
Julia Perratore, Lloyd de Beer
Organizer Affiliation
Metropolitan Museum of Art, British Museum
Presider Name
Julia Perratore
Paper Title 1
Devotional Performance and the Opportunity for Play in Medieval Cloister Sculpture
Presenter 1 Name
Peter Scott Brown
Presenter 1 Affiliation
Univ. of North Florida
Paper Title 2
Singing, Shouting, Thundering: Voice in the Portal of Santa Maria de Ripoll
Presenter 2 Name
Matthew J. Westerby
Presenter 2 Affiliation
Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison
Paper Title 3
Speaking Statues
Presenter 3 Name
Kim Woods
Presenter 3 Affiliation
Open Univ.
Start Date
14-5-2016 3:30 PM
Session Location
Schneider 1155
Description
Do sculptures speak? Can they listen? Are they able to read, sing, and engage with other sculptures, or the architecture of their surroundings? If so, is this connected to their context and placement? How do these questions affect the way in which we view sculpture and its performativity? In seeking to answer these and related questions, this session will address the manifold ways in which sculpture could potentially address its viewers, and, by extension, listen. The interactive nature of much medieval art, and particularly sculpture, suggests that viewers’ engagement with mute three-dimensional images could extend to an imagined oral/aural exchange. Sculptural evocations of speech were carved onto the body, in the parted lips of the Virgin or the emphatic gesture of a saint. They could also be engraved across the unfurled banderole of a prophet or in the titulus of a capital. In other instances, a sculpture might seem to take part within a multisensory experience of space or ritual, as the figures of a narrative frieze might be activated by music. Alternatively, an image may simply stay silent and listen, as a cult statue might amid the prayers of the faithful. Impressions of speech in medieval sculpture have even carried over into historiography, as attested by the “speaking reliquaries” of the German tradition. The papers of this session may approach issues of speech and listening in a variety of ways, considering a wide range of sculptural forms, materials and techniques across the medieval period as a whole.
Julia Perratore
Sculpture and Its Potency II: Speech, Song, Prayer
Schneider 1155
Do sculptures speak? Can they listen? Are they able to read, sing, and engage with other sculptures, or the architecture of their surroundings? If so, is this connected to their context and placement? How do these questions affect the way in which we view sculpture and its performativity? In seeking to answer these and related questions, this session will address the manifold ways in which sculpture could potentially address its viewers, and, by extension, listen. The interactive nature of much medieval art, and particularly sculpture, suggests that viewers’ engagement with mute three-dimensional images could extend to an imagined oral/aural exchange. Sculptural evocations of speech were carved onto the body, in the parted lips of the Virgin or the emphatic gesture of a saint. They could also be engraved across the unfurled banderole of a prophet or in the titulus of a capital. In other instances, a sculpture might seem to take part within a multisensory experience of space or ritual, as the figures of a narrative frieze might be activated by music. Alternatively, an image may simply stay silent and listen, as a cult statue might amid the prayers of the faithful. Impressions of speech in medieval sculpture have even carried over into historiography, as attested by the “speaking reliquaries” of the German tradition. The papers of this session may approach issues of speech and listening in a variety of ways, considering a wide range of sculptural forms, materials and techniques across the medieval period as a whole.
Julia Perratore