The 2023 SUNY New Paltz Undergraduate Art History Symposium, a highly-recognized conference for undergraduate students in the discipline, has accepted papers by three art history students at the Lamar Dodd School of Art. Andrew East, Gabriela Jones, and Sophie Johnson will present their research at the virtual symposium, which will take place via Zoom from April 13 - 16. To register for individual sessions and to read more about research presented by East, Jones, and Johnson, see below.

The SUNY New Paltz Undergraduate Art History Symposium began as the brainstorm of two students serving as the co-presidents of the College’s Art History Association in the fall of 2018. Within a few short years, it has grown into a multi-day virtual event featuring the work of a hundred talented students from institutions across the globe. 

This year, the symposia's keynote speaker is Dr. Aaron M. Hyman, Assistant Professor of the History of Art at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Hyman’s keynote address is connected to his current research, which is his next book entitled Formalities: The Visual Potential of Script in Art of the Early Modern Spanish World. This project examines the unusual quantity of written words on works of art created between ca. 1540-1700 across the transatlantic Spanish Empire.

Presentations

Presentation screen captures courtesy of the author, Andrew East.

Andrew East, “Cupid Carries a Whip: Vinegar Valentines in Post-Civil War America” | Thursday, April 13 5:00 pm, Session 1

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Humiliation had its place in Reconstructionist politics, in discouraging advocates of Black suffrage and citizenship rights. Incidents of public humiliation, such as whippings, are well-recorded in the United States, yet little scholarship acknowledges other incidents that were less severe as well as non-public. I argue that one manifestation is a vinegar valentine from 1865 entitled Abolitionist. Comic or “vinegar” valentines were grotesque offspring of the Valentine that proliferated in the late-1850s. Published in catalogs and purchased by anonymous individuals, these cards included a crude caricature and a poem to mock their nineteenth-century recipients. Abolitionist, however, shows an oddly vivid rendering of an abolitionist man with racist and anti-Reconstruction arguments embedded within the image.

My paper makes an object lesson of this vinegar valentine, arguing that it was produced at a time when Northern publishing companies competed for a commercial audience. As a result, Valentine’s Day became a more commercial and multipurpose event. In addition, this activity is inextricably linked to improvements in the U.S. postal system, which were brought about by the Civil War. In my investigation, I incorporate two characteristics of crowd behavior psychology—anonymity and impersonality. Why is the imagery of Abolitionist so striking in comparison to earlier examples? I argue that the impersonality of their making and the anonymity of their delivery allowed for vinegar valentines to progress into a more pictorial and racist medium. When handicraft was made unnecessary, so were opportunities for self-reflection. With Abolitionist, I hope to consider it within the timeline of Reconstruction as well as acknowledge the cruelty at the heart of this nineteenth-century activity.

Gabriela Jones

Icon of Saint Peter the Apostle, sixth century, encaustic on wood panel, 92.7 cm x 60.5 cm x 2.7 cm, Monastery of Saint Catherine on Mount Sinai, Egypt (Artstor, ITHAKA). 

Gabriela Jones, “Making the Sacred Familiar: Analyzing the Icon of Saint Peter at Mount Sinai” | Friday, April 14, 1:30 pm, Session 4

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 In the monastery of Saint Catherine on Mount Sinai is a sixth century icon of Saint Peter the Apostle. Unknown to Byzantinists until its rediscovery during the mid-1900s, this icon has since become the subject of robust analysis. Scholars speculate that the icon was produced in a workshop in Constantinople and then gifted to the monastery. The artwork communicates Saint Peter’s roles as eldest apostle, first pope, keeper of the keys to Heaven, and supreme spiritual authority on Earth. The impact of this image lies in its dyadic push and pull of authority and approachability. The painting draws the viewer closer yet also creates a sense of impossible distance. It masterfully projects both power and pathos, absence and presence, matter and spirit.

Oulpios the Roman’s descriptions of prophets and saints (including Saint Peter) developed into a complex visual language that allowed for easy identification of figures in Byzantine art. Saint Peter was consistently depicted as older with a closely cropped light gray beard and hair. Aristotle posited that one’s physical appearance reflects their soul. He uses the phrase “morphe kai to eidos” to describe the duality between matter and spirit. Applying this theory, the facial type is the “matter” of the figure shown and the “spirit” is the saint’s spiritual presence. In Byzantium, it was believed these facial types were not a result of nature’s randomness, or even a saint’s true physiognomy, but resulted upon a saint’s entrance into Heaven. Icons of saints–unlike images of pagan deities–seek to connect viewers with the being who is worshiped. In this way, they act as an intermediary to the prototype, a once-mortal saint now granted eternal life in paradise. His expression is weary, yet not defeated, consummate of a spiritually enlightened individual, especially one entrusted to lead God’s church.

Sophie Johnson

Lorenzo Lotto, Venus and Cupid, 1520s, oil on canvas. 92.4 x 111.4 cm, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Sophie Johnson, “Something Borrowed: The Adoption of Venus Iconography within Sixteenth-Century Marriage Portraiture, as seen in Lorenzo Lotto’s Venus and Cupid” | Sunday, April 16, 1:30 pm, Session 11

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Lorenzo Lotto’s painting Venus and Cupid is a rarity for the way that it embraces themes of marriage portrait-types, classical iconography, and the role of a wealthy woman in the Cinquecento period. Dated around 1520, it was likely commissioned to commemorate the marriage of a wealthy couple in Bergamo. Unlike a typical marriage portrait however, this one takes a twist. Venus appears to be somewhat mismatched; although her body could be that of a goddess, her face is highly individualized, leaving many scholars and myself to believe that this is in fact an image of the bride. In keeping with the previous scholarship, I argue that Lotto’s Venus and Cupid is not simply an image of Venus, but it is a marriage portrait of a wealthy Bergamese or Venetian woman. This painting highlights how female portraiture in the Cinquecento was starting to break the mold from portraying strictly idealized forms to images where the presence of the individual is pushed forward. Venus and Cupid is also noteworthy in how it confronts the issue of nudity in female portraiture. Support for these arguments will be made through analysis of the composition and the themes of marriage and beauty found within it, by examining Lotto’s history as a portrait artist, and through comparison to other works, both contemporary and ancient. These images will highlight the juxtaposition between the misplaced nature of a relatively recognizable woman within a typically idealized, mythological setting found within Lotto’s uncommon marriage portrait.