Academic Sessions: London 2003
The Prevalence of Print Culture: Communication Art in the 19th Century
Convenors:
Penny Wickson and Jason Shron, University of Birmingham Department of History of Art, The Barber Institute of Fine Arts,Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TS. Fax: 0121 414 2727
Abstract:
The printed image has informed popular understanding of all aspects of human development and interaction, from technology to travel, ethnicity to class consciousness. The print has been a news outlet, a means for distraction, an instrument of devotion, an ideological apparatus, a tool for hegemonic control. The dissemination of the printed image was at its greatest in the final years before photography came to dominate image reproduction. The falling costs of production and the increasingly literate and mobile population encouraged ‘bigger and better’ publishing enterprises in England and North America. In much of Europe, the printed image maintained its supremacy as the dominant means for visual communication, articulating thought and feeling among a population still largely illiterate. Around the world, prints provided widespread access to the popular ‘high art’ images of the day, as well as being valued as works of art in their own right. The impact of prints on public opinion and ways of perception was unmatched; the mobility and intelligibility of the medium allowed for widespread articulation of common ideas. While two aspects of this period in printmaking history have been extensively studied – caricature and posters by well known artists – the boom years of the printed image have not received their due attention in art historiography. In the days before photography, film and television, the print was the interdisciplinary art medium.
This session will examine the roles played by prints, illustrated journals and publishing projects in constructing visual identities towards the end of the print era.
Alison Walker (University of Ulster) The Noble Ragged Child in Victorian Evangelical Illustrated Children’s Literature
Susan Waller (University of Missouri, Saint Louis) Pifferari and La Fornarina in Paris: Constructions of Italian Peasants in Mid–19th Century French Print Media.
Dr. Meaghan Clarke, (University of Sussex) Black and White Devils: Print Culture in the 1890s
J.M. Mancini (University of Sussex) From the Christmas Card to the Avant–Garde: The Rise and Fall of Chromolithography in the 19th–Century United States.
Ruth E. Iskin (Ben Gurion University) Modernity’s Quick–Time Images: Posters in Print Culture, 1880 –1900.
Lia Yoka (University of Thessaly, Greece) Moments of Word and Image Interaction in Greek Cultural Journals
Matthew Plampin (London) A Stern and Just Respect for Truth: The Arundel Society’s Prints of the Arena Chapel, Padua.
Penny Wickson and Jason Shron, University of Birmingham Department of History of Art, The Barber Institute of Fine Arts,Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TS. Fax: 0121 414 2727
Abstract:
The printed image has informed popular understanding of all aspects of human development and interaction, from technology to travel, ethnicity to class consciousness. The print has been a news outlet, a means for distraction, an instrument of devotion, an ideological apparatus, a tool for hegemonic control. The dissemination of the printed image was at its greatest in the final years before photography came to dominate image reproduction. The falling costs of production and the increasingly literate and mobile population encouraged ‘bigger and better’ publishing enterprises in England and North America. In much of Europe, the printed image maintained its supremacy as the dominant means for visual communication, articulating thought and feeling among a population still largely illiterate. Around the world, prints provided widespread access to the popular ‘high art’ images of the day, as well as being valued as works of art in their own right. The impact of prints on public opinion and ways of perception was unmatched; the mobility and intelligibility of the medium allowed for widespread articulation of common ideas. While two aspects of this period in printmaking history have been extensively studied – caricature and posters by well known artists – the boom years of the printed image have not received their due attention in art historiography. In the days before photography, film and television, the print was the interdisciplinary art medium.
This session will examine the roles played by prints, illustrated journals and publishing projects in constructing visual identities towards the end of the print era.
Alison Walker (University of Ulster) The Noble Ragged Child in Victorian Evangelical Illustrated Children’s Literature
Susan Waller (University of Missouri, Saint Louis) Pifferari and La Fornarina in Paris: Constructions of Italian Peasants in Mid–19th Century French Print Media.
Dr. Meaghan Clarke, (University of Sussex) Black and White Devils: Print Culture in the 1890s
J.M. Mancini (University of Sussex) From the Christmas Card to the Avant–Garde: The Rise and Fall of Chromolithography in the 19th–Century United States.
Ruth E. Iskin (Ben Gurion University) Modernity’s Quick–Time Images: Posters in Print Culture, 1880 –1900.
Lia Yoka (University of Thessaly, Greece) Moments of Word and Image Interaction in Greek Cultural Journals
Matthew Plampin (London) A Stern and Just Respect for Truth: The Arundel Society’s Prints of the Arena Chapel, Padua.