Project Details
Projekt
Techniknarrative. Contextualising Artistic-Technical Procedures in the Early Modern Period
Applicant
Privatdozentin Dr. Henrike Haug
Subject Area
Art History
German Medieval Studies (Medieval German Literature)
History of Science
German Medieval Studies (Medieval German Literature)
History of Science
Term
since 2020
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 420353590
Narratives about the invention and further development of artisanal techniques are found in all cultures. They tell of a legendary hero who conceives an artistic-technical procedure through his or her ingenium or as a gift from the gods, of a natural phenomenon that is subsequently observed and imitated by people, and of accidents or catastrophes that lead to the development of new artistic processes. In case studies on glass and glass production, on weaving and printing, this project addresses the question of the role of narrative in the process of encountering and adopting specific technical procedures, their cultivation or rejection. In their different approaches, these areas of investigation are able to show how narratives of artistic-technical procedures are negotiated in religious, mythological, and economic contexts. In some cases they are linked with local craft traditions, in others with specific inventors – which makes it possible to situate technical progress in the here and now of a particular present. Thus, in the context of cultural narratives, a place or a time is referred to, and the artistic-technical procedure is used for social, political and economic positioning and reference. By recovering narratives of technique for art-historical analysis, manifold levels of the adoption and reception of artistic-technical processes are brought to light to which varied gestures of mastery or appreciation are immanent. And in the motifs of the genesis, migration and reinterpretation of technical procedures it becomes apparent how materialities and techniques are to be placed in reciprocal relation to one another and discussed in the context of a basic human situatedness within and reference to the world.
DFG Programme
Research Units
