Colloque : Nature & the Arts in Early Modern Naples.

Gaspare Vanvitelli, Vue de Naples, XVIIIe siècle, huile sur toile, Florence, Palazzo Pitti, Galleria Palatina.

Type : colloque.
Date : jeudi 17 et vendredi 18 septembre 2015.
Lieu : Antisala dei Baroni, Castel Nuovo, Naples.

From Iacopo Sannazaro’s lyric evocation of the Campania landscape in his Arcadia to Giambattista Vico’s attempts to anchor human civilisation in man’s existential confrontation with the forces of nature, the literary, visual and scientific culture of early modern Naples is deeply grounded in the city’s natural environment. Ever since Jacob Burckhardt wrote dismissively of «das prunkliebende Neapel», the city’s culture has been characterised as both derivative and excessive. Foregoing such evaluations, this interdisciplinary conference sets out to develop an alternative account. Involving historians of art, literature and the sciences, it will explore moments of confrontation and convergence between art and nature in Naples, as well as their relation to contemporary debates in the sciences. In doing so, the conference aims to lay bare a unique cultural situation where literature, art and science meet and interact in their shared adherence to an equally unique geological context.

Programme

Jeudi 17 septembre 2015

9h15 : Saluti introduttivi.

10h15 : Carlo Vecce (Napoli): «Maestra Natura»: La rappresentazione della natura nell’Arcadia di Sannazaro.

11h: Pausa caffè.

11h30 : Tanja Michalsky (Roma): «Body» and «Site» of Naples: The Aesthetic Concept of the City and Its Natural Surroundings in Early Modern Descriptions.

12h15 : Christof Thoenes (Roma): «La vita infinita di questa impareggiabile città»: Arte e natura in piante e vedute dal XV al XIX secolo.

13h : Pausa pranzo.

15h : Harald Hendrix (Roma): The Tripergola Case and the Changing Balance between Nature and Culture in Sixteenth-Century Descriptions of Naples.

15h45 : Sean Cocco (Hartford): Seeing Eruptions in Chiaroscuro: The Interpretation of Contrasting Light and Darkness in the Early Scientific Description of Vesuvius.

16h30 : Sergius Kodera (Vienna): Between Stage and Laboratory: Giovan Battista della Porta’s Spectacular Experiments and Courtly Culture.

Vendredi 18 septembre 2015

9h30 : Frank Fehrenbach (Hamburg): Le fontane di Napoli.

10h15 : Heiko Damm (Mainz): Painting as Necromancy: Luca Fa Presto Pays Homage to Velázquez.

11h : Pausa caffè.

11h30 : Joris van Gastel (Hamburg): Naples: A Porous Baroque.

12h15: Helen Hills (York): Silver and Excess: The «Nature» of Naples and Spanish Colonialism.

13h : Pausa pranzo.

15h : Sabina de Cavi (Córdoba): Nature and Architecture in the Neapolitan Travel Book of Monsignor Giovan Battista Confalonieri (1561–1648).

15h45 : Oreste Trabucco (Napoli): La città e i musei: Immagini di Napoli e collezioni naturalistiche tra Cinque- e Seicento.

16h30 : Maria Toscano (Napoli): Scientific Knowledge and Artistic Practice: The Presence of Art in Scientific Collections and Artists’ Scientific Interests.

17h15 : Chiusura del convegno.

17h45 : Aperitivo.