Orientalism of the Mediterranean shore: art and place from Tunis to Marseille. This project focuses on new ways of thinking about how art links North Africa and Europe. Researching the images of Tunis, Algiers, Granada and Marseille in painting and photography (between 1880-1950) will lead to high-level outputs; beginning with a 2014 exhibition on Wassily Kandinsky and Gabriele Münter as Orientalists.
Visual cosmopolitanism, national identity and imperialist ambitions in garden spaces. Visual cosmopolitanism is an ideal created through the global movement of art forms. This project will contribute to current debates about the globalisation of art by tracing the concept back to artistic practices and aesthetic theories of the enlightenment through a focus on experience within the eighteenth-century garden.
Artists as collectors of Islamic Art, 1850-1910. The aim of this project is to generate a new understanding of patterns of collecting and interpreting the arts of the near east through the first cross-cultural comparative study of Ottoman and Orientalist artists as collectors in the 19th century. By mapping transcultural networks of artists, dealers and collectors traversing Ottoman, Russian, Polish, French and British cultures, this study reveals international exchanges that have been occluded ....Artists as collectors of Islamic Art, 1850-1910. The aim of this project is to generate a new understanding of patterns of collecting and interpreting the arts of the near east through the first cross-cultural comparative study of Ottoman and Orientalist artists as collectors in the 19th century. By mapping transcultural networks of artists, dealers and collectors traversing Ottoman, Russian, Polish, French and British cultures, this study reveals international exchanges that have been occluded by studies of Orientalism narrowly focused around single national histories. This project reveals the myriad ways treasures from the Islamic world were being transformed in the 19th century from their prior local religious and cultural functions into exoticism in the West and cultural patrimony in the East.Read moreRead less
Nineteenth-Century climate change: atmosphere, culture and romanticism. To understand and adapt to climate change, we need to understand its cultural history. Nineteenth-century Britain witnessed a crucial episode in this history, when air became central to art and science, and culture was reconceived as climatic. This new link between culture and climate allowed social changes to be seen as having climatic effects.
Art, theatre and community in eighteenth century France. This project explores networks of creativity and innovation binding visual artists and the theatrical world in eighteenth century France. It argues for a community-based understanding of relationships between artists and theatre people, and that these intricate knots of creative agency have tangible effects on the course of art and drama.
Human kind: transforming identity in Australian and British portraits 1700-1900 in the National Gallery of Victoria. The National Gallery of Victoria's outstanding collection of Australian and British portraits, spanning the Enlightenment and the dawn of Federation, say much about this nation's cultural evolution within a global context. This project will produce the first interdisciplinary study of these portraits, enabling their online publication and extensive educational programs.