Related Papers
On Allegory: Some Medieval Aspects and Approaches
K P Clarke
This collection of essays focuses on the ubiquity of the allegorical imagination in pre-modern western culture, and participates in a recent wave of resurgence of interest in the complex practices and ideas usually defined by the word 'allegory'. The contributors study the impact of the allegorical imagination on the production, reception and interpretation of literature, as well as its function as a tool of philosophical and theological enquiry, and its role in shaping the visual arts. Essays focus on subjects as varied as the general theories on allegory, allegory's relation to the human imagination, its usefulness or even inevitability as a human mode of cognition and its potential for the encoding of meanings that may be political, historical, religious and amorous. They discuss canonical figures such as Petrarch, Boccaccio, Boethius, Hans Memling, Pico della Mirandola, King James I and John Donne, but extend to include neglected but equally important figures such as Stephen Hawes or Thomas Usk as well as thematic approaches less concerned with issues of authority and authorship. As such the collection is a testimony to the variety, complexity, and adaptability of 'allegory' at the heart of medieval western civilisation.
“Art and Text” in S.Harrison (ed.), A Companion to Latin Literature, Oxford (Blackwell) 2005, 300-318
Jas Elsner
The Cambridge Companion to Allegory
2010 •
Rita Copeland
Arctos 42
2008 •
Eeva-Maria Viitanen
The Book of Selected Readings 2023/ International Visual Literacy Association
The Age of Allegory
2023 •
Sara Benninga
This paper examines the uses of allegory in early modern and contemporary art. I discuss allegory as a poetic and visual means, creating a multiplicity of meanings, and positing the image as a ruin. Referencing previous discussions of allegory by Walter Benjamin (1963, 2010), Peter Burke (1997), Craige Owens (1980), among others, I discuss the reliance of allegory on iconographical precedents and its fragmentary nature. These points are exemplified through paintings from the 17th century, by Peter Paul Rubens and Diego Velazquez, and contemporary artworks by Joseph Beuys and Francis Alÿs.
Through a Glass Darkly: Allegory and Faith in Netherlandish Prints from Lucas van Leyden to Rembrandt
On the Work and Reward of Allegory
2019 •
James Clifton
Tybout R.A. (2011), Images, Inscriptions and Interpretation, Mnemosyne 64: 115-130.
Rolf Tybout
A recent collection of papers focusing on the relationship between inscriptions and the images they accompany postulates a great variety in subjective 'reader/ viewer response' and underlines discrepancies between texts and images. Inscriptions are believed to complicate rather than elucidate representations and to have been set up to pose challenges to readers. However, many of the examples selected are exceptional in one way or another. As a rule inscriptions intend to provide authoritative information to readers prepared to accept it as such. Inscriptions anchor floating images, investing the general with the specific and consequently serving an hermeneutic purpose. The ambit of 'reader/viewer response' tends to be inversely proportional to the amount of inscribed text, though with exceptions admitted: its room is potentially enlarged, first with the lapse of time, and secondly with inscriptions meant to be read in private space, especially in a sym-potic context. The reconstruction of responses to inscribed images should start from (more or less) contemporary sources rather than modern viewers' speculations. What is known of ancient reader/viewer reception in the domestic sphere (inter alia the ekphrasis of paintings in Lucian's De domo) suggests that texts may 116 De novis libris iudicia / R. Tybout / Mnemosyne 64 (2011) 115-139 have been subjected to several types of variatio and paintings may have elicited subject-orientated comments devoid of ingenious associations. Keywords epigraphy and art; inscribed images; 'reader/viewer involvement'; public and private space; ekphrasis; symposion
Journal of Hellenic Studies 132
Review of R. Copeland and P.T. Struck (eds.), The Cambridge Companion to Allegory (Cambridge University Press, 2010)
2012 •
Ian Fielding
LIMÓN BELEN, M. y ESPAÑA CHAMORRO, S. (2023), “Verses for Eternity: The Carmina Latina Epigraphica in funerary contexts”, en N. Conejo Delgado (ed.), Il valore dei gesti e dei oggetti: monete e altri elementi in contesti funerari, All'Insegna del Giglio, Sesto Fiorentino, 225-229.
2023 •
Sergio España-Chamorro
With over 4,000 surviving documents, Latin inscriptions in verse are not only an important element of the Roman practice of epigraphy, they are also the sole poetic genre with a continuous attestation for over 1,000 years, from across the Roman Empire. Frequently produced by and for members of the lower social classes, they raise numerous questions regarding their production and reception, especially in relation to their prose counterparts. Since most of them are of a funerary nature (more than 80%), they are closely related to death and its contexts, being a popular option to commemorate the death of a loved one with a last farewell full of values and sentiment.
"Leonardo and Allegory," Oxford Art Journal 35 (2012): 433-55.
Joost Keizer
