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A fabric medallion from a 5th century clavus band from the Egyptian city of Antinopolis, now on display at the Musee des Antiquites in Rouen, depicts a winged putto figure with the inscription kair...

Kurt Forster's recent book, Il metodo di Aby Warburg published by Ronzani in 2022. All scholars who have participated to the collective reading—Barbara Baert, Victoria Cirlot, Georges Didi-Huberman, Micheal Diers, Andrea Pinotti, Ianick Takaes—have responded, with their personal in depth reading of the book.

This article was inspired by Georges Didi-Huberman’s keynote lecture “Que ce qui apparait seulement s’apercoit” delivered in 2015 at Charles University in Prague during the “Dis/Appearing” conference organized by the Internationales Kolleg fur Kulturtechnikforschung und Medienphilosophie (IKKM, Bauhaus Universitat Weimar). Didi-Huberman’s lecture consisted of various reflections concerning the meaning of the image as instances of flaring up and fading away. During his talk, Didi-Huberman used evocative images – recollections – which he had collected over the years; impressions while walking in the streets, melancholic musings about love, and thoughts gathered from literature en route. From this, the article identifies seven cases through which Didi-Huberman has conceptualized images; the nymph, the butterfly, the passer-by, the surface, the dance, the silence, and sophrosyne. These cases attest to the influence of Aby Warburg on the writing of Didi-Huberman and, taken together, identify what these...

A stain is the evidence of something that was. It is a trace. A stain may be something quite ordinary: the ink stain on my index finger; the mark of your fingers on this book. A stain may also be embarrassing: lipstick on a cheek; sweat rings under the arms; a bloody discharge. A stain may be forensically incriminating. A stain may be kept for sentimental reasons. Moreover, every stain has its own particular texture. Texture denotes the consistency of a surface and the sensory, often tactile imprint that is left on it. The stain may be absorbed in the thing that supports it; then again, it may stay on the surface, something separate. Every stain is unique.In this article the author deals with seven factors that make the stain into a powerful model for rethinking the visual: the stain as prototype and prefiguration; the stain as relic; the stain of Veronica; the stain as a psycho-energetic symptom; the stain as pars pro toto for the womb; the stain and le desir mimetique; and finally, the stain as ...

The representation, evocation and articulation of the element of wind in the visual arts is suggestive of fundamental and complex patterns underlying the relationship between the anthropology of the senses and their sedimentation in the visual medium. The blowing of the wind as such is invisible; its dynamic quality is detectable merely indirectly, by the movement of things – swaying trees, waving grass, fluttering textiles – and hence its representation requires an artistic translation of effects as well as affects. The wind is a natural phenomenon that impacts on all of the body’s senses: it is tactile, produces sound, carries scents; it is like a cosmic breath that stirs, envelops and penetrates our beings. The wind not only embraces, but can also destroy.

This chapter takes as its starting point a specific image type that occupies a complex position in the iconology of the decapitated head: the caput Iohannis in disco , or head of St John the Baptist on a platter, for the sake of brevity identified by the German term Johannesschussel . Toward the end of the Middle Ages the Johannesschussel had in many cases come to constitute an Andachtsbild related to the iconography of Christ. The chapter distinguishes between four levels at which the fusion between John and Christ can be interpreted: the relationship between word and image, the absorbing gaze, the apotropaion and the senses, and finally the phenomenological tension between head and face. In an early sixteenth-century drawing by Guercino, which depicts angels worshipping Veronica’s sudarium , we see a peculiar “iconogenetic” resonance between John and Christ. The chapter addresses the phenomenological tension between head and face, platter and veil. Keywords: Andachtsbild ; apotropaion ; gaze; Johannesschussel ; senses

The early sixteenth-century Enclosed Gardens or Horti Conclusi of the Augustinian Hospital Sisters of Mechelen in Belgium, form an exceptional world heritage collection from the late medieval period. Most Enclosed Gardens have been lost to the ravages of time, with this loss exacerbated by lack of both understanding and interest. No fewer than seven Enclosed Gardens, however, were preserved until the late twentieth century in their original context: the small community of Augustinian nuns in Mechelen. Like sleeping beauties, they remained secluded in the sisters’ rooms as aids to devotion. Their centuries-long slumber has recently given way to a new phase of lively debate and active scholarship, as these popular retables are now considered unique testimonies of female spirituality in the sixteenth century. Their remarkable pictorial vernacular provides new insights into life, thought and devotion in female convent communities. They testify to a cultural identity connected with strong mystical trad...

As depictions of the Holy Spirit appearing to Christ’s followers and filling them with speech, images of Pentecost engage critical themes in medieval visual culture: the relationship between image and epigraph (titulus), and the visualization of ruach (pneuma, spiritus) and the senses. This article examines two miniatures of Pentecost in Ottonian manuscripts, the Codex Egberti (ca. 980) and the Benedictional of Archbishop Robert (late tenth century). These case studies show two differing visual interpretations of Pentecost in the context of the Ottonian debate concerning “spiritual seeing” and demonstrate the ways that artists invoked the senses other than sight in order to create images of mystical experience.

Il tabernacolo del Beato Chiarito, ora conservato presso il Museo ‘J. Paul Getty’ di Malibu (Los Angeles) ed attribuito a Pacino di Bonaguida (ca. 1302-1340) e unico nel suo genere, tanto in relazione alla sua iconografia quanto in relazione all’utilizzo di diverse tecniche pittoriche. L’opera presenta una concezione di visione che si attiva nel rapporto tra l’opera d’arte e lo spettatore. Tale rapporto e singolarmente performativo e ricettivo nei confronti dell’esperienza mistico-visionaria attraverso la combinazione di tre livelli di significato: anzitutto la mediazione di tecniche visive, tanto iconografiche che comunicative; in secondo luogo il ruolo assunto dall’Eucaristia; e, infine ma non meno importante, l’approccio integrato nei confronti della sensibilita, con la sinestesia tra vista e gusto.

Die eingefassten Gärten oder horti conclusi der Augustiner-Schwestern von Mechelen in Belgien stammen aus dem frühen 16. Jahrhundert und bilden einen außergewöhnlichen Teil des spätmittelalterlichen Kulturerbes. Aufgrund von mangelndem Verständnis und Interesse sind die meisten eingefassten Gärten verloren gegangen. Nicht weniger als sieben dieser Gärten sind allerdings bis in das späte 20. Jahrhundert in ihrem ursprünglichen Kontext erhalten geblieben: Der kleinen Gemeinschaft der Augustiner-Schwestern in Mechelen. Gleich ›schlafenden Schönheiten‹ sind sie in den Zellen der Schwestern als Hilfestellung bei der Andacht verborgen geblieben. In meinem Beitrag stelle ich diese Gärten vor als eine Symbolisierung des Paradieses und der mystischen Unio, als ein Heiligtum der Verinnerlichung, als eine Sublimierung des sensorium (insbesondere des Geruchs), als Gartenbau, der im Prozess der Entstehung Sinn gewinnt und als ein Paradigma des Nests., The early sixteenth-century Enclosed Gardens or horti conclusi of the Augustinian Hospital Sisters of Mechelen, Belgium, form an exceptional part of late medieval world heritage. Most Enclosed Gardens have been lost, through the ravages of time exacerbated by lack of understanding and interest. No fewer than seven Enclosed Gardens, however, were preserved until the late twentieth century in their original context: the small community of Augustinian nuns in Mechelen. Like ›sleeping beauties‹, they remained secluded in the sisters’ rooms as aids to devotion. In this paper I discuss these gardens as a symbolisation of Paradise and the mystical union, as a sanctuary for interiorisation, as a sublimation of the sensorium (particularly smell), as horticulture that gains meaning in the making process and as a paradigm for the nest.

Der Fleck behauptet seine Autonomie als farbiger Punkt oder Fläche, die sich vom Hintergrund abheben. Er existiert in und durch sich selbst. Der Fleck sagt uns, was es heißt, das Medium der Sichtbarkeit zu sein. Daher ist jeder Fleck ein Metabild, ein besonderes Bild, das etwas über das Bild als Phänomen aussagt. Diese Eigenschaften machen den Fleck zu einem Paradigma des visuellen Mediums per se. In diesem Essay werde ich fünf Faktoren vorstellen, die zu diesem einflussreichen Mo- dell geführt haben: Der Fleck als Prototyp, Veronikas Fleck, das psycho-energetische Symptom, die Tarnung Echos und schließlich der Fleck als le désir mimétique., The stain asserts its autonomy as a spot or patch of colour different from the ground. It exists in and of itself. The stain tells us what it means to be the medium of visibility. Hence, every stain is a Metabild, a particular image that explains something about the image as a phenomenon. These properties make the stain a paradigm for the visual medium per se. In this essay I will deal with five factors that could have led to this powerful model: the stain as prototype, Veronica’s stain, the psycho-energetic symptom, Echo’s camouflage and finally, the stain as le désir mimétique.

The textual and visual tradition of the story of the woman with the haemorrhage (Mark 5.24b-34parr), the so-called Haemorrhoissa, is related in a specific way to Christ's healing miracles but also to conceptions of female menstrual blood. We notice that with regard to the specific 'issue of blood' of the Haemorrhoissa, there is a visual lacuna in the specific iconography that developed around the story from early Christian times: in the transposition from text to image, there is no immediate depiction of her bleeding. However, the early medieval reception of the story also became an important catalyst for uterine taboos, menstruation and tits relation to magical healing, understood as a system of health practices. In this context, the dissemination of the motif in everyday material culture clearly points to a deep-rooted connection to uterine and menstrual issues. The paper considers both expressions and their-anthropologically framed-relation to this female 'issue of blood', which the Haemorrhoissa came to embody and epitomise literally, as well as figuratively.

In this article I start from a particular passage in the New Testament that will touch on biblical threads and paradigms related to textile. Mark 5:24b-34, Luke 8:42-48, and Matthew 9:19-22 tell the story of the healing of the "woman with an issue of blood," the Haemorrhoissa. This story (and its Nachleben in commentaries and iconographies) pulsates with a delicate energy relating to textile, cloth, and the magical impact of touch. I will firstly investigate upon those textile-related dimensions by situating the passage in what I term its narrative, iconic, and anthropological space. This will finally lead to a hypothesis on the origin of the medieval assimilation of the Haemorrhoissa to the Veronica, the woman who carried the imprint of Christ's face. © 2011 Berg. ispartof: Textile: the journal of cloth and culture vol:9 issue:3 pages:308-351 status: published

The Johannesschussel is an image type that sprang from both text and relic. It is also an image type that presents death. This death is not an ordinary death; it is the mother of all deaths: the decapitation of the last of the prophets and the forerunner of the martyrs. The frontal display of the pieces and the invitation to eye-contact show important analogies with the phenomenon of the Andachtsbild. During the fifteenth century, when the cult of the Johannesschussel reaches its apogee, the subject begins to appear also in a pictorial form. Idol becomes icon; Johannesschussel reaches vera icon. The growing reciprocity between the cults of John and Christ at the end of the Middle Ages is mirrored in the reciprocity of the media. This ultimate step – the exchange of medium – was the necessary ‘sacrifice’ for a complete in utroque. The Johannesschussel would now become the flat re-presenting (and not plastically presenting) image of death. So, by the end of the medieval and early modern periods, the two men...

Nel periodo paleocristiano nasce un’iconografia della guarigione della heamorrhoissa, ovvero della donna emorragica (Marco 5:24b-34 par). Nel passaggio dal testo all’immagine si sprigiona un’energia profonda che riguarda il tatto, lo sguardo e lo spazio. Le caratteristiche iconografiche diventano sensori di vasta portata. La donna emorragica diventa dopotutto, nella cultura visiva del medioevo, la figura esemplare per meglio comprendere i tabu riguardanti l’utero in rapporto con la magia e i tabu sul sangue.

Since early-Christian time an iconography has developed around the Haemorrhoïssa which is related to the conventions of Christ's miracles of healing. In the transition from word into image, an intense energy is released with regards to touching, the gaze and space. These iconographical characteristics become sensors of a far broader range of topics, for in the Middle Ages the Haemorrhoïssa was also the bearer of patterns of sensitivity for uterine taboos which were connected to magic, textile and types of stones.