Review: Jurkowlaniec and Herman, eds. The Reception of the Printed Image in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries (London: Routledge, 2021), in HNAR: https://hnanews.org/hnar/reviews/the-reception-of-the-printed-image-in-the-fifteenth-and-sixteenth-centuries-multiplied-and-modified/) (original) (raw)

Research Project “Communities of Print in Early Modern Europe”

Actual Problems of Theory and History of Art

The paper discusses the international multidisciplinary research project "Communities of Print: Using Books in Early Modern Europe", launched by Manchester Metropolitan University (UK) in 2016. The project united the leading scholars specialising in art history, early modern history and literary studies, as well as librarians and archivists. The project "Communities of Print" explores early modern books not just as a medium for distributing information, but as material objects of Renaissance visual culture and art. It focuses on the visual and social impact of the books on various communities and examines their usage in communal settings. The paper also briefly outlines the presentations made at the first conference organised within the project in June 2016 in Manchester. They concerned such topics as the public availability of monastic and private libraries in early modern culture, book trading networks in Europe, the attribution of ownership marks and annotations, usage of medieval manuscripts and their role in early modern book collections, reading practices and access to printed material, and the evolution of anti-Catholic imagery in the early modern Protestant print. Finally, the paper observes some implications of the project, which stem from the close cooperation of researchers of art, history, literature and practitioners-librarians and archivists,-such as refining the knowledge and understanding of early modern books as the objects of visual culture.

Nina Lamal, Jamie Cumby and Helmer Helmers (eds.) Print and Power in Early Modern Europe (1500–1800) (Leiden: Brill, 2021).

2021

Print, in the early modern period, could make or break power. This volume addresses one of the most urgent and topical questions in early modern history: how did European authorities use a new medium with such tremendous potential? The eighteen contributors develop new perspectives on the relationship between the rise of print and the changing relationships between subjects and rulers by analysing print’s role in early modern bureaucracy, the techniques of printed propaganda, genres, and strategies of state communication. While print is often still thought of as an emancipating and disruptive force of change in early modern societies, the resulting picture shows how instrumental print was in strengthening existing power structures. Contributors: Renaud Adam, Martin Christ, Jamie Cumby, Arthur der Weduwen, Nora Epstein, Andreas Golob, Helmer Helmers, Jan Hillgärtner, Rindert Jagersma, Justyna Kiliańczyk-Zięba, Nina Lamal, Margaret Meserve, Rachel Midura, Gautier Mingous, Ernesto E. Oyarbide Magaña, Caren Reimann, Chelsea Reutchke, Celyn David Richards, Paolo Sachet, Forrest Strickland, and Ramon Voges.

Printing Images in Antwerp. The Introduction of Printmaking in a City. Fifteenth Century to 1585

Studies in Prints and Printmaking, 1998

This book discusses the production and consumption of printed images in an urban environment in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, up to 1585. The story begins in the fifteenth century. At some point - no one knows exactly when - prints were suddenly being offered for sale in Antwerp. Initially they may have been brought from other cities by merchants and travellers, but at length the first printmaker established himself in the city. In the sixteenth century Antwerp fast developed into one of the main centres of printmaking in the western world. The author explores the complex way in which the printed image secured a place for itself in the urban fabric. He reconstructs the different traditions from which the print producers evolved, and explains how existing institutions in the city related to the new medium. He traces the way in which the traditional guilds tried to bring practitioners of this ‘singular skill’, as it was labelled in 1452, into their ranks, and shows how the government tried to gain control of the new medium. He discusses the interplay between printmakers seeking strategies to market their wares, and a public confronted with an interesting array of cheap new products.The reader is given an impression of the variety of prints produced, which have thus far received little attention in art history. Archival research has generated a good deal of detailed new information on the prices of prints, the numbers of impressions made, the costs of printing and colouring, and so forth.

Placing Prints: New Developments in the Study of Early Modern Print, 1400-1800, The Courtauld Institute of Art, 12-13 February 2016

Traditionally, the history of printmaking has fallen in the space between art history and the history of the book. Often ‘reproductive’ and multiple in nature, prints have long been marginalized in art historical scholarship in favour of the traditional ‘high’ arts. The inherent complexities in the manufacture and sale of print, often involving multi-faceted networks of specialist craftsmen, artists, publishers and sellers, has also led to much confusion. Not knowing how prints are made has affected our ability to understand the medium and its aesthetic qualities. However, recent scholarship has opened up new avenues for placing prints in Renaissance and Early Modern Europe. From the techniques applied in the making of prints to the individuals involved in their production, distribution and use, current research is continuing to shape our understanding of this complex field. This two-day conference, in collaboration with Print Quarterly, aims to showcase new developments in the study of prints, challenging and developing traditional approaches. It is organized around a series of panels dedicated to different themes and is accompanied by a pop-up display in the Courtauld's Prints and Drawings Study Room: 'Courtauld Prints: The Making of a Collection'.