Enchanted Isles, Fatal Shores: Living Versailles
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra (with additional events at the Australian National University and the University of Sydney)
17–18 March, 2017

Conference Website

On the occasion of the Versailles: Treasures from the Palace exhibition at the NGA, which brings major works of art from the Palace of Versailles to Canberra, this conference showcases the latest ideas about the lives of past people and objects, as well as the living culture of Versailles today.

Staged in Canberra, which like Versailles is a planned capital city, centre of government and culture, this is a unique opportunity to explore the enduring influence and resonance of Versailles, its desires and self-perceptions of modernity, from film to fashion to architecture. Gathering a generation of scholars whose work is shifting our perceptions of the art, culture and life of ancien-régime Versailles and its reception, this is the occasion for fresh and challenging research, and new perspectives on canon-defining works.

1664 is formative in the history of Versailles—the year a modest hunting lodge began to be transformed, to become a centre of art, fashion and power in Europe for more than a century. The dream of Versailles as an enchanted isle for the French aristocracy came to a grisly end with the 1789 revolution. Only two years later, the first fleet of British colonists came to settle on the east coast of Australia, on what Robert Hughes famously dubbed ‘the fatal shore’. Life at Versailles changed irreparably just as it would for those who lived in, and migrated to, Australia at the close of the eighteenth century.

Versailles was not the static creation of one man but a hugely complex cultural space, a centre of power, of life, love, anxiety and creation, as well as an enduring palimpsest of aspirations, desires and ruptures. The splendour of the castle, and the masterpieces of art and design it contains, masks a more sordid history. The conference’s theme, Enchanted isles, fatal shores, encourages examination of the tensions between splendour and misery, insiders and outsiders, display and privacy that framed life at Versailles.

Conveners: Mark Ledbury, Power Professor of Art and Visual Culture, University of Sydney; Robert Wellington, Lecturer, ANU School of Art Centre for Art History and Art Theory; and Lucina Ward, Senior Curator and coordinating curator for the exhibition, National Gallery of Australia

For conference enquiries email or phone +61 2 6240 6432

Call for papers

Conference conveners seek proposals to deliver 20-minute papers addressing the subject of the conference; those that address the key themes below are especially welcome.

Key themes:

• The ‘lives’ of Versailles: How did the various communities of artists, artisans, gardeners, courtiers and administrators who lived at the chateau work together?
• Virtual Versailles: How do we account for the unrealised ambitions for Versailles, the projects and aspirations that were not completed in the ancien régime?
• Adaptations and destructions: The history of the chateau is one of constant construction and renovation, but at what cost? How do we account for these losses? What role can digital technologies play in this process?
• Challenging period terms: The phases of design at Versailles take the name of the three kings with whose reigns they coincided, giving a false impression of their role in the creation of period style. Is it possible for a study of Versailles to recuperate a sense of individual artistic agency?
• The private and the public: Libellous pamphlets and personal memoirs provide a tantalising glimpse of what went on behind closed doors at Versailles, but can we speak of a material culture of private life in a chateau designed as a stage for the performance of monarchy? What can we retrieve about the private sexual desires and personal anxieties of the chateau’s inhabitants through its extant remains?
• ‘Le sale et le propre’: How does a study of hygiene transform our understanding of life at the chateau?
• Versailles and Paris: How was Versailles connected to the economic capital of France, and how did courtiers, artists and artisans live and work between the two places?
• Being there: High nobles would often be forced to live in tiny uncomfortable apartments in the ‘rats nest’ of Versailles, just to be close to the king. How did the presence and absence of courtiers and others at Versailles influence the works of art, furniture and fashions that they commissioned?
• Resonances of Versailles: What was the impact of Versailles in a broader geographic and historical context? What can we make of private mansions from the gilded age to the present that emulate the Versailles aesthetic?
• Versailles on film: Life at Versailles has proved to be an enduring inspiration for filmmakers and television show producers. What are the facts and fictions of period dramas that recreate life at the chateau, and what role do they play in sustaining a living history of Versailles?

Please send an abstract of 300 words and a short CV to the conveners at Versaillesconference@nga.gov.au by 30 October, 2016.

Othello’s Island 2017
The Fifth Annual Conference on Medieval, Renaissance and Early Modern Studies, Nicosia, Cyprus
CVAR, Nicosia, Cyprus (STC)
5-8 April, 2017 (with optional coach trip on 9 April, 2017)

Conference Website

We welcome applications to present papers at the 2017 edition of Othello’s Island. This will take place in Nicosia, Cyprus, in April 2017. We are interested in hearing papers on diverse aspects of medieval and renaissance literature, art, history, society and other aspects of culture, and these do not have to be specifically related to Cyprus or the Mediteranean.

It is worth looking at the range of papers from past conferences to see that previous speakers have covered topics ranging from slavery in medieval Cyprus and Malta, to the impact of Italian Renaissance art on Cypriot Byzantine painting, to the Anglo-Saxon epic Beowulf.

That said, given our location, Cyprus, the Levant and the Mediterranean do impact on the conference, not least because for anyone interested in medieval and renaissance history Cyprus is real gem, full of architectural and other material culture relating to the period. This includes museums filled with historic artefacts, gothic and Byzantine cathedrals and churches and a living culture that has direct links to this period.

Othello’s Island has developed a reputation as one of the friendliest medieval and renaissance studies conferences in the world today, and it is also genuinely interdisciplinary. In part this is due to the relatively small size of the event, which generates a true sense of community during the conference.

Full Papers (20 minutes plus questions)

If you are interested in giving a talk at the conference please submit a proposal for a paper. Standard papers are 20 minutes long, followed by 5 or 10 minutes for questions. The basic theme of the conference is mediaeval, renaissance and early modern art, literature, social and cultural history, but we are very open minded on the topic of papers, so please feel free to submit a proposal, or contact us first to discuss the idea.

Topics in the past have included art, medieval and renaissance literature, architecture and archaeology, religious experience and belief, relations between different religions and ethnic groups, slavery, the position of women, trade routes and even the influence on western Europe of medieval food from the middle east. We have also had papers looking looking beyond our core historical period, looking at the continuing use of medieval and renaissance history and imagery to justify colonialism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and the impact of Shakespeare on the Indian film industry.

Proposals for papers should comprise a cover sheet showing:

1. Your title (eg. Mr, Ms, Dr, Prof. etc.) and full name
2. Your institutional affiliation (if any)
3. Your postal address, e-mail address and telephone number
4. The title of your proposed paper

With this you should send a proposal/abstract for your paper of no more than 300 words and a copy of your CV/resume to info@othellosisland.org with the subject line OTHELLO 2017. All papers must be delivered in English and in person by the author of the paper. We cannot accommodate speakers wishing to present using Skype (or similar), or proxy presentations.

The deadline for submissions of proposals is 1 January, 2017. Early submission is strongly advised. We aim to have a decision on the acceptance of papers within four weeks of submission.