Pseudo-scripts. (Il)legibility & Ornamentation
Organisers
- José Gabriel Alegría - Bibliotheca Hertziana, Roma
- Tairan An - Princeton University
- Jane Boddy - Kupferstich-Kabinett, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden
- Francesco Caglioti - Scuola Normale Superiore
- Paolo Celi - Università degli Studi di Padova
- Mela Dávila Freire - Hochschule für Bildende Künste, Hamburg
- Regine Ehleiter - Universität Münster
- Flavio Fergonzi - Scuola Normale Superiore
- Sarah Flitti - Sorbonne Université, Paris
- Nan Han - 中央美术学院 (Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing)
- Michael Kiefer - Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg
- Charlotte Langersdorf - Royal College of Art London/Düsseldorf
- Giovanni Lusi - Scuola Normale Superiore
- Gregor Meinecke - Scuola Normale Superiore / Universität Hamburg
- Jakob Moser - Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften (Austrian Academy of Science)
- Kate Nesin - Department of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Art Institute of Chicago
- Luca Palozzi - Universtità di Pisa
- Isabel Ruiz Garnelo - UNED, Madrid
- Vera Simone Schulz - Leuhpana Universität Lüneburg/Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz
- Alex Dika Seggerman - Rutgers University-Newark
- Joanna Sikorska - Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie (National Museum in Warsaw)/Uniwersytet Warszawski (University of Warsaw)
- Marta Smolińska - Uniwersytet Artystyczny im. Magdaleny Abakanowicz (Magdalena Abakanowicz University of the Arts, Poznań)
- Pablo Violero Rodríguez - Universidad Complutense de Madrid
- Rebecca Wrighton - University of Rhode Island
- Yuefeng Wu - Johns Hopkins University
- Rabiu Yussuf - Ahmadu Bello University
Programme
Friday, 2 May 2025, 9:45–18:30
9:45
Greetings (Francesco Caglioti) & Introduction (Gregor Meinecke, Luca Palozzi, Vera-Simone Schulz)
The Iconicity of Arabic in Transcultural Contexts I
10:30–11:00
Rebecca Wrighton - University of Rhode Island
The Arabic Kāf: A Case Study in Epigraphic Patterns on Early Islamic Ceramics
11:00–11:30
Alex Seggerman - Rutgers University-Newark
Photographic (Il)legibility of Florence Pseudo-Arabic at the KHI Photothek in Florence
11:30–12:00 Coffee break
The Iconicity of Arabic in Transcultural Contexts II
12:00–12:30
Nan Han - Central Academy of Fine Arts, Shanghai
Between Legibility and Illegibility: Arabic Lettering in Neapolitan Panels
12:30–13:00
Michael Kiefer - University of Heidelberg
Inscribing the Emperor – The Semiotics of Pseudo-Kufic Ornaments on Middle Byzantine Items of Dress
13:00 – 14:30 Lunch break
The Aesthetics of Early Modern Mediality I: Bodies & Demons
14:30–15:00
José Gabriel Alegría - Stony Brook University/Bibliotheca Hertziana
The Dark Script of the Mystical Body: The Aesthetic Role of Inscription in the Mundus Archetypus (1574)
15:00–15:30
Jakob Moser - Austrian Academy of Science
Demonic Illegibility. Pseudoscript and Temptation in Bernardo Parentino’s St. Anthony. (Online)
15:30–16:00 Coffee break
The Aesthetics of Early Modern Mediality II: Artistic Signatures
16:00–16:30
Paolo Celi - University of Padua
Writing in Bronzino’s Paintings: A Paleographic Analysis of Models and Hidden Meanings
16:30–17:00
Joanna Sikorska - Department of Prints and Drawings, National Museum Warsaw/University of Warsaw
Early Printed Signatures. Between Self-Fashioning and Encryption
17:00–17:30 Coffee Break
Beyond Legibility: Asemic Writing and Cultural Critique
17:30–18:00
Charlotte Langersdorf - London/Düsseldorf
Writing at the Interface: Rethinking Interaction through Asemic Writing
18:00–18:30
Regine Ehleiter - Berlin/Centre for Advanced Study: Access to Cultural Goods in Digital Change, University of Münster
Between Reading and Viewing: The Asemic Writing of Mirtha Dermisache’s Artists’ Publications
20:00 Optional Dinner
Saturday, May 3, 2025, 10:00–17:30
10:00 – 13:00 Museo San Matteo
13:00–14:30 Lunch Break
Decoding Iberian Pseudo-scripts: Spirituality and Authorship
14:30–15:00
Sarah Flitti - Sorbonne Université Paris
“The Epigraphic Invention of the Sepulchre: Fifteenth-Century Altarpieces from the Crown of Aragon”
15:00–15:30
Isabel Ruiz Garnelo - Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia, Madrid
Script and Pseudo-Script in the Master of Alzira: spirituality, ornamentation, or a tool for identifying authorship? (Online)
15:30—16:00
Pablo Violero Rodríguez - Universidad Complutense de Madrid)
(Pseudo)scripts in the Iberian ornamentation in the Late Middle Ages
16:00–16:30 Coffee Break
Letters, Marks, and Meaning: Exploring Contemporary Art’s Inscriptions I
16:30 –17:00
Marta Smolińska - Magdalena Abakanowicz University of the Arts, Poznań
Epistemic Trauma: Illegibility as a Subversive Strategy Against Censorship in Eastern European Art of the 1980s. (Online, Berlin, CET)
17:00–17:30
Mela Dávila Freire - University of Fine Arts Hamburg
Eigenschriften and other “Blank Writing” Works by Irma Blank
Additional Online Dates
Friday, May 9, 2025, 14:00–17:00
Online
Transcultural Echoes I: Pseudo-Scripts and Visual Communication Across Eurasia
2 pm – 2:30 pm
Yuefeng Wu - Johns Hopkins University, Writing Mongol in Medieval Assisi: Picturing the Universal Church at the Basilica of San Francesco
2:30 pm – 3 pm
An Tairan - Princeton University, The Unnatural Brushstroke: Athanasius Kircher, Late-Ming Seal Scripts, and the Origins of Chinoiserie Pseudoscripts
3 pm – 3:30 pm Coffee break
Letters, Marks, and Meaning: Exploring Inscriptions in Contemporary Art II
3:30 pm – 4 pm
Jane Boddy - Saarlandmuseum Moderne Galerie, Saarbrücken, Rethinking Pseudo-Scripts: Material Messages of Ink and Form in Oskar Hollweck’s Drawings
4 pm – 4:30 pm
Kate Nesin - New York City/ Department of Modern and Contemporary Art, Art Institute of Chicago, Sense/Sensibility: A Typology of the Writing-Like in Cy Twombly’s Work
4:30 pm – 5 pm
Giovanni Lusi - Scuola Normale Superiore, Cy Twombly’s letters. Missives and Capitals
Saturday, May 17, 2025, 2:30 pm – 4:30 pm
Online
Transcultural Echoes II: Pseudo-Scripts across Afro-Eurasia
2:30 pm – 3 pm
Rabiu Yussuf - Ahmadu Bello University, Arabic (Pseudo-)Scripts in Nigerian Art: Tracing Mamluk Metalwork Influence on Metalwork Objects in Northern Nigeria
3 pm – 4 pm
Round Table Discussion: Arabic and Pseudo-Arabic Script in Contemporary Art in West Africa
4 pm – 4:30 pm Publication & Future Thoughts
Immagine: Abdoulaye Ndoye, Ahmed Baba, 2013, lives and works in Dakar, Senegal (The Newark Museum of Art, © Abdoulaye Ndoye)