L'Agenda des Médiévistes

Call for papers: deadline 2 December 2024

Colour in the Choir. Polychromy on Late-Medieval and Renaissance Church Furniture

12th Ards Annual Conference on Current Research in Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture and Conference Iconostalla Misericordia International Leuven (BE), M Leuven, 21-23 May 2025.

The call for papers for our upcoming conference, focusing on polychromy on late-medieval and Renaissance church furniture, is now open. You can find the call for papers and submission guidelines here.

For this conference ARDS and Iconostalla Misericordia International are joining forces to put the focus on choir stalls and church furniture. Choir stalls were integral components of medieval churches, often commissioned by the administration of cathedrals, monasteries, parishes or even city councils or guilds. Choir stalls were part of the fixed and permanent church furniture often adorned with intricate carvings. While the bench ends predominantly depicted religious scenes, the carvings on the misericords and knobs often feature profane themes, such as fantasy creatures, human figures, animals, proverbs, and fables. Positioned at the religious heart of the church, these carvings served as expressions of the medieval worldview and represented significant and intricate artistic endeavors.

Research on choir stalls has primarily delved into their iconographic aspects, formal and stylistic analyses, and the interplay of religious and profane themes. In recent years, there has been a greater interest in the technical and production aspects of choir stalls. For instance, the 2016 Iconostalla Misericorida International conference in Greifswald explored the workshops that produced choir stalls. In Rijeka in 2018, the relationship between patron and maker was the subject of a colloquium.

An underexplored topic regarding choir stalls is the use of colour.This is partly because evidence of polychromy is scarce and often ambiguous, with many stalls having lost their original colours due to restoration practices in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Nonetheless, there are instances of choir stalls that exhibit traces of their original polychromy. With regard to colour on choir stalls, as well as on other church furniture such as pulpits and rood screens, several questions arise. Where are examples of painted choir stalls (and/or other church furniture) known and what archival data are available? What materials and techniques were used? Who were the artist and craftsmen for applying the colours, what does recent research learn us about collaborations between craftsmen of different guilds, such as the joiners guilds, the sculptor or masons guilds and the painters guild? How did or does the complicated relationship between colour and form, manifest itself in the commissioning, production, perception and use of choir stalls? Did the colours have purely aesthetic purpose, or did the paintings have also a functional one? How should the remaining traces of colours on choir stalls be restored/preserved?

This call for papers welcomes specific case studies that touch upon one or more of the topics outlined above, as well as papers providing a broader view on the subject. Your proposal can be (art-)historical, anthropological, historiographical, archaeological, or technical in nature. Multidisciplinary approaches are encouraged.

Source : HNA News

KU Leuven, 11 -12 September 2025

Traditionally, the history of canonical life in the Middle Ages is narrated through two foundational
periods of reform. On the one hand there are the Carolingian reforms, which resulted in the composition
of the Institutio canonicorum Aquisgranensis (816) as a rule of conduct for canons. On the other hand
there is the broad canonical reform movement of the second half of the eleventh century and the first
half of the twelfth century, which led to the emergence of a new type of canons, the canons ‘regular’
,
who inspired their way of life on the Rule of Saint Augustine. Past research has been heavily focused
on these two reform moments, whereas canonical life during the intervening period – from the late ninth
century until c. 1050 – has been largely underexposed. Although current scholarship does begin to pay
attention to the long tenth century, a general overview of canonical life is as yet lacking, and the
traditional opinion of a period of decline between two vibrant reforms is still prevalent. Recent scholarship on reforms in monastic milieus prior to the eleventh-century Church Reform has
convincingly demonstrated that the image of decline in the preceding period is largely the result of the
rhetoric of the eleventh-century reformers. There are reasons to believe that this is also the case for the
ordo canonicus and that the ardent eleventh-century innovators deliberately portrayed canonical life in
the preceding period in dark colours, without paying attention to prior attempts to improve the quality
of religious life.

The aim of this conference is to shed light on the nature of canonical life in the long tenth century so as
to challenge the paradigm of decline still persistent in scholarship on post-Carolingian canons. We
welcome papers on the following topics: 1) reforms or transformative processes in canonical milieus
and/or initiatives taken to guarantee the quality of canonical life in particular communities; 2) the search
for canonical identities and/or tensions between the vita canonica and the vita monastica; 3) the
procuring, diffusing and use of normative texts in canonical communities; 4) the representation of
canonical life in hagiographical and narrative sources; 5) the participation of canonical communities in
intellectual networks: the mobility of persons, objects and ideas or the interactions between religious
communities.

We invite paper proposals (max. 400 words) in English or French, accompanied by a (provisional) title
and a short biobibliographical note. Proposals should be submitted by December 20, 2024 via email to
brigitte.meijns@kuleuven.be and lene.tenhaaf@kuleuven.be.

Applicants will be notified in January 2025. Accepted papers will be awarded a 30-minute slot (20 min.
presentation + 10 min. for discussion). Afterwards, these papers can be submitted for a peer-reviewed
publication.

This conference is organized by Brigitte Meijns (KU Leuven), Anne Massoni (Université de Limoges),
Gert Partoens (KU Leuven), Matthieu Pignot (Université de Namur / KBR) and Lene ten Haaf (KU
Leuven).

La vie canoniale dans l’Europe occidental pendant le long Xe siècle: Réformes, Identités et réseaux intellectuels (fin IXe siècle – ca. 1050)

KU Leuven, 11 -12 Septembre 2025

Traditionnellement, l’histoire de la vie canoniale au Moyen Âge est racontée à travers deux périodes fondamentales de réforme. D’une part, il y a les réformes carolingiennes, qui ont abouti à la composition
de l’Institutio canonicorum Aquisgranensis (816) en tant que règle de conduite pour les chanoines.
D’autre part, le vaste mouvement de réforme canoniale de la seconde moitié du XIe siècle et de la
première moitié du XIIe siècle, qui a engendré l’émergence d’un nouveau type de chanoines, les
chanoines « réguliers », dont le mode de vie s’inspirait de la Règle de saint Augustin. Les recherches
passées se sont fortement concentrées sur ces deux moments de réforme, alors que la vie canoniale
pendant la période intermédiaire – de la fin du IXe siècle jusqu’à environ 1050 – a été largement sous-
exposée. Bien que la recherche actuelle commence à s’intéresser à ce long Xe siècle, une vue d’ensemble
de la vie canoniale fait encore défaut, et l’opinion traditionnelle d’une période de déclin entre deux
réformes vibrantes est toujours prédominante. Des études récentes sur les réformes dans les milieux
monastiques avant la réforme de l’Église du XIe siècle ont démontré de manière convaincante que l’image de déclin de la période précédente est en grande partie le résultat de la rhétorique des réformateurs du XIe siècle. Il est des raisons de penser qu’il en soit de même pour l’ordo canonicus et que les ardents innovateurs du XIe siècle aient délibérément dépeint la vie canoniale de la période précédente sous des couleurs sombres, sans prêter attention aux tentatives antérieures d’amélioration de la qualité de la vie religieuse.

L’objectif de cette conférence est de mettre en lumière la nature de la vie canoniale au cours du long Xe
siècle afin de remettre en question le paradigme du déclin qui persiste dans la recherche sur les chanoines post-carolingiens. Nous souhaitons recevoir des communications sur les sujets suivants 1) les réformes ou les processus de transformation dans les milieux canoniaux et/ou les initiatives prises pour garantir la qualité de la vie canoniale dans des communautés particulières ; 2) la recherche d’identités canoniales et/ou les tensions entre la vita canonica et la vita monastica ; 3) l’obtention, la diffusion et l’emploi de textes normatifs dans les communautés de chanoines ; 4) la représentation de la vie canoniale dans les sources hagiographiques et narratives ; 5) la participation des communautés canoniales à des réseaux intellectuels : mobilité des personnes, des objets et des idées, interactions entre les communautés religieuses.

Nous sollicitons des propositions de communication (max. 400 mots) en français ou en anglais, accompagnées d’un titre (provisoire) et d’une courte notice biobibliographique. Veuillez envoyer votre
proposition aux adresses suivantes : brigitte.meijns@kuleuven.be et lene.tenhaaf@kuleuven.be avant le
20 décembre 2024.

Les candidats seront informés en janvier 2025. Les communications acceptées se verront attribuer un
créneau de 30 minutes (20 min. de présentation + 10 min. de discussion). Ensuite, les articles pourront
être soumis pour publication.

Cette conférence est organisée par Brigitte Meijns (KU Leuven), Anne Massoni (Université de
Limoges), Gert Partoens (KU Leuven), Matthieu Pignot (Université de