Art History Study Day a resounding success
The Art History Study Day was held at school on Saturday 27th February and was attended by over 40 parents, guests, staff and pupils. We were extremely fortunate to have a range of expert speakers who both informed and entertained us, with the added pleasure of an excellent Mayfield lunch.
Professor Maurice Howard, University of Sussex gave a lecture on ‘Jan Vermeer of Delft: his reputation and re-discovery’. Maurice Howard is Professor of History of Art at the University of Sussex. Professor Howard studied History at Christ's College, Cambridge and History of Art at the Courtauld and has lectured at Pennsylvania State University and St. Andrews. He was Chair of the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain, 1991-94 and Visiting Chair at the Centre for Renaissance Studies, University of Tours, France, in 2000. From 2005-2009 he has sat on the Advisory Council of the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art. In 2007 he was elected Director of the Society of Antiquaries of London, with responsibility for publications and research. Professor Howard has been closely involved with two major projects at the V&A Museum: the Gallery of European Ornament and the Tudor and Stuart sections of the British Galleries. Professor Howard has established a collaborative partnership with the National Trust, particularly at its properties The Vyne and Knole, and has published widely on Renaissance art and architecture.
Catherine Kinley, formerly Curator of Contemporary Art, Tate, discussed British contemporary sculpture in a lecture entitled ‘Impure Objects’. Catherine Kinley studied painting at St Martin's School of Art (now central St Martins) and at the Royal College of Art. She was a curator at Tate from 1978-2004, curating numerous exhibitions and displays of British and international art, and writing on painting, sculpture, installation, video and performance. Latterly, she headed the Tate team responsible for contemporary acquisitions. Since leaving the Tate Catherine has continued to work freelance and with Marco Livingstone has recently completed a monograph on the artist Peter Kinley which will be published by Lund Humphries in May 2010. Catherine is an Old Cornelian and we were delighted to welcome her back to the school.
Dr Tracy Anderson, University of Sussex, discussed ‘Faces, Fashions and Portraits’ using examples of Victorian painting. Dr Tracy Anderson is Associate Tutor in the Department of History of Art at the University of Sussex, where she took her degree, masters and doctorate with a thesis on the importance of royal imagery in forging the British Raj in India. Dr Anderson was a Paul Mellon postdoctoral research fellow and her work focuses on the art of the nineteenth century with a special interest in the visual cultures of imperialism. Dr Anderson’s recent research has focused on the portraiture of Governors and Viceroys of India during the Victorian period. Dr Anderson has lectured at the National Gallery and is currently working on the Royal Collection.
Dr Ben Thomas, Director of History and Theory of Art, University of Kent spoke on ‘Print Collecting and Curating’. Dr Ben Thomas is Director of History and Theory of Art at the University of Kent with responsibility for undergraduate programmes. Dr Thomas has taught at Oxford and Reading universities and on various American university summer programmes. In 2005 Dr Thomas founded the University’s Kent Print Collection, and the student module ‘Print Collecting and Curating’. The innovative aim of the Kent Print Collection is to give students the opportunity to put on museum-standard exhibitions, and to use the acquisitions budget to collect art. Dr Thomas’s current research is on The Artist and the Print, analysing the role played by prints in shaping the changing status and identity of the artist over the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Dr Thomas is also the co-organiser of a research network investigating Art Histories, Cultural Studies and the Cold War. Dr Thomas has curated exhibitions on Van Dyck and on the Paradox of the Mezzotint and has published widely on the Renaissance.
Professor Howard presented the History of Art Library with a copy of his book ‘The Tudor Image’ written for the Tate Gallery, and Dr Thomas kindly gave copies of the Kent Print Collection Catalogues; their generosity is much appreciated.
We were extremely fortunate to have a range of expert speakers who both informed and entertained us, with the added pleasure of an excellent Mayfield lunch.
