FAH1206H: Artistic Localities in the Early Modern World

The "global" turn in the discipline of art history too often eliminates the locality — the specific and sometimes not well-known places where art is made — from its purview in favour of geographically expansive narratives focused on circulation and reception of works made in localities. As a counterpoint to these narratives, this seminar explores ideas of artistic localities in Italy and China during the early modern period. Its principal focus is on questions of place and cultural geography, but it also necessarily examines the relationship of place to artistic exchange in networks of various sizes (those small walled cities, those of metropolitan centers, and those of "global" reach). To address methodological concerns, we will critically review existing literature on artistic geography, from period sources to contemporary works.

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