Hispanic identity has been shaped during the last century by a conscious selection of historical periods of its history. After the loss of the last colonies of the former Spanish Empire at the end of the 19th century, the nation had hit rock bottom in political terms. To counterbalance this decline, writers, poets, essayists and scholars from the so-called generation of ’98 aimed for the restoration of the cultural splendor of the Spanish Golden Age, a period of flourishing in the arts and literature that spans from Philip II’s reign until the death of Charles II in 1700, the last of the Habsburg monarchs. This wish has been constant through the 20th century and is also connected with the rise of neobaroque aesthetics and postmodernism. Baroque has become a multifaceted concept and, nowadays, is more a space of reflection than a chronological or formal label. The lecture will explore the continuity of baroque art in Spanish contemporary culture such as art, photography, cinema, pop music, comics, cartoons, internet memes, football or television series, where the fascination with Spanish Golden Age is not only a matter of style or aesthetics but also political and identitary. From inspiration to appropriation, from art galleries to politics, baroque art is a powerful tool in contemporary Spain.
Salary Range: Competitive salary based on our professorial Pay Scales (starting at £64,606 and going considerably higher based on experience)
Working arrangements: The role is full time, but we will consider requests for flexible working arrangements including potential job shares.
Open date: 30 September 2019
Closing date:17 January 2020 at 12pm midday
Preferred start date: Successful candidates will ideally be in post by 01 September 2020.
We are seeking an outstanding academic leader and scholar in Spanish and Latin American Art and/or Visual Culture to direct the interdisciplinary Zurbarán Centre for Spanish and Latin American Art, a collaborative venture with The Auckland Project.
The Director will be an internationally recognised authority in
her/his field who will act as an intellectual entrepreneur, developing
academic contacts within Durham University, as well as nationally and
internationally, and work in close collaboration with The Auckland
Project’s forthcoming Spanish Gallery in Bishop Auckland – the central
impetus for the creation of the Zurbarán Centre – on research,
programming, and the development of joint initiatives. The Director will
be located in an appropriate academic department of Durham University
(Faculty of Arts and Humanities).
Auckland Castle, at the heart of The Auckland Project, is one of the
most important working episcopal palaces in Europe, the seat of the
Prince Bishops of Durham since the twelfth century. For more than 250
years, Auckland Castle has been home to the internationally significant
cycle of masterpieces from the Spanish Golden Age, Jacob and his Twelve Sons
by Francisco de Zurbarán, the inspiration for The Zurbarán Centre.
Financier Jonathan Ruffer set up Auckland Castle Trust in 2012 (now The
Auckland Project) to secure the future of the Zurbaráns in Bishop
Auckland.
Durham University formally established the Zurbarán Centre in October 2016. The Centre’s collaboration with the Spanish Gallery will provide an unusual opportunity to combine engagement with connoisseurship of a new permanent collection with scholarship of, particularly, Golden Age art, playing to Durham University’s established strengths in Spanish and Latin American studies. The Centre is an embedded part of Durham University located in Bishop Auckland, where the Director will be primarily based.
This represents an exciting opportunity to further the ambitions of both partner organisations to become the leading home for the study and appreciation of Spanish and Latin American art. Over the past three years, the Centre has fostered research in Spanish and Latin American art in a global context, with a special focus on the art of Medieval Spain, the Spanish Golden Age, Mexican national art, the 19th-century history of collecting, and Spanish and Latin American cinema and photography.
The visual arts in Spain have long been haunted by the spectres of six giants: El Greco, Ribera, Velázquez, Murillo, Goya and Picasso. Still today, these canonical figures tower over all others and continue to shape the story of Spanish art, which has been traditionally told in monographic form. Although the strength of the Spanish canon has informed different disciplines (literature, aesthetics, performing arts), given the recent ‘material turn’, the prosopographical dimension of the visual arts in Spain poses a disciplinary challenge. Similarly, following the ‘global turn’, the visual arts of Iberia pose a geographical challenge, intersecting with the Mediterranean, Arabic, Latin American, British and continental European worlds. The notions of ‘Spain’ and ‘Spanish art’, therefore, are necessarily nebulous and problematic, raising a host of questions: To what extent does Spanish art exist before the establishment of Spain as a nation state? To what extent is the art of the Habsburg and Bourbon empires a Spanish art outside Spain? What is the role of Spain in the wider canon of European art? Who has exploited the visual arts of the Hispanic world, geographically, politically and intellectually? These questions ultimately point to a tension between canons and repertoires; between centres and peripheries; and between consolidating the ‘core’ and expanding the ‘remit’ of the so-called Spanish school.
This conference will explode the disciplinary, material and geographical limits of Spanish art, inaugurating the Zurbarán Centre as a critical and innovative research institution for the study of Spanish and Latin American art in the twenty-first century. Papers will challenge the canonical construction of Spanish art, which can be traced back to writings from Palomino’s Lives of the Eminent Spanish Painters and Sculptors (1724) to Stirling Maxwell’s Annals of the Artists of Spain (1848), to more recent publications by scholars in the field. Papers will also probe the chronological, geographical and material boundaries of the ‘El Greco to Goya’ survey, interrogating the ways in which academics, curators, scholars and teachers narrate this material through various platforms, including publications, museum displays, exhibitions, lectures, gallery talks and academic courses. Speakers will address the various ‘terrains’ of Spanish art, from geographical constructions of Iberia as Europe’s frontier or edge, to exchange with all that lies beyond the Pillars of Hercules.
Nigel Glendinning and the Hispanic Research Journal: A Unique Voice in Spanish Cultural History Sarah Symmons (University of Essex)
11.05 – 11.20
Discussion
11.20 – 11.50
Tea & Coffee
11.50 – 12.50
Keynote Lecture: Passion and Prejudice:Attitudes to Spanish Sculpture in Nineteenth-Century Britain Holly Trusted (Victoria & Albert Museum, London)
13.00 – 14.00
Lunch
14.00 – 15.15
Session 2: Geographies Chair: Edward Payne (Durham University)
14.00 – 14.20
Beyond El Greco:The Travelling Artist between Italy and Spain—Artistic Translation and the Sixteenth-Century Hispanic Canon Piers Baker-Bates (The Open University)
14.20 – 14.40
Maestros españoles en Chile: Espacios y repertorios Marcela Drien (Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Santiago de Chile)
14.40 – 15.00
Geographic Limits and the History of the Spanish Avant-Garde Maite Barragán (Albright College, Reading PA)
15.00 – 15.15
Discussion
15.15 – 16.30
Session 3: Strategies Chair: Tom Stammers (Durham University)
15.15 – 15.35
Genaro Pérez Villaamil: Navigating Stereotypes Claudia Hopkins (University of Edinburgh)
15.35 – 15.55
Imaginary Architecture as Imagined Community: ‘The Market’ by Jenaro Pérez Villaamil Matilde Mateo (Syracuse University)
15.55 – 16.15
Hieroglyphs of Providence: Pelegrín Clavé and Isabella I of Castile Stefano Cracolici (Durham University)
16.15 – 16.30
Discussion
16.30 – 17.00
Tea & Coffee
17.00 – 18.00
Keynote Lecture Canons and Repertoires in Hispanic Art: What does StirlingMaxwell have to do with them? Hilary Macartney (University of Glasgow)
Friday 21 June 2019
9.30 – 10.00
Tea & Coffee
10.00 – 11.15
Session 4: Identities Chair: Giovanna Capitelli (Università Roma Tre)
10.00 – 10.20
El arte español más allá de la península ibérica:¿Qué significa ser un ‘artista español en la Nueva España’? Luis Javier Cuesta Hernández (Universidad Iberoamericana, Ciudad de México)
10.20 – 10.40
Constructing the Monuments of the Nation:Victor Balaguer and the Struggle to Shape Monasteries as Spanishness Josep-Maria Garcia-Fuentes (Newcastle University)
10.40 – 11.00
Thinking Spain from Barcelona:The Iconographic Repertoire of Spanish Art (1918–1922) Lucila Mallart (Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona)
The visual arts in Spain have long been haunted by the spectres of six giants: El Greco, Ribera, Velázquez, Murillo, Goya and Picasso. Still today, these canonical figures tower over all others and continue to shape the story of Spanish art, which has been traditionally told in monographic form. Although the strength of the Spanish canon has informed different disciplines (literature, aesthetics, performing arts), given the recent ‘material turn’, the prosopographical dimension of the visual arts in Spain poses a disciplinary challenge. Similarly, following the ‘global turn’, the visual arts of Iberia pose a geographical challenge, intersecting with the Mediterranean, Arabic, Latin American, British and continental European worlds. The notions of ‘Spain’ and ‘Spanish art’, therefore, are necessarily nebulous and problematic, raising a host of questions: To what extent does Spanish art exist before the establishment of Spain as a nation state? To what extent is the art of the Habsburg and Bourbon empires a Spanish art outside Spain? What is the role of Spain in the wider canon of European art? Who has exploited the visual arts of the Hispanic world, geographically, politically and intellectually? These questions ultimately point to a tension between canons and repertoires; between centres and peripheries; and between consolidating the ‘core’ and expanding the ‘remit’ of the so-called Spanish school.
This conference will explode the disciplinary, material and geographical limits of Spanish art, inaugurating the Zurbarán Centre as a critical and innovative research institution for the study of Spanish and Latin American art in the twenty-first century. Papers may challenge the canonical construction of Spanish art, which can be traced back to writings from Palomino’s Lives of the Eminent Spanish Painters and Sculptors (1724) to Stirling Maxwell’s Annals of the Artists of Spain (1848), to more recent publications by scholars in the field. Papers may also probe the chronological, geographical and material boundaries of the ‘El Greco to Goya’ survey, interrogating the ways in which academics, curators, scholars and teachers narrate this material through various platforms, including publications, museum displays, exhibitions, lectures, gallery talks and academic courses. Speakers are encouraged to address the various ‘terrains’ of Spanish art, from geographical constructions of Iberia as Europe’s frontier or edge, to exchange with all that lies beyond the Pillars of Hercules. Topics for discussion may include, but are not limited to:
What is ‘Spanish art’?
Who are the cultural stakeholders of Spanish art?
What are the discords between regional, national, anti-national and transnational narratives of Spanish art, for example in museum collections and displays?
How does Spanish art feature in diplomatic exchanges?
Collections of Spanish art as an ‘imprint’ of Spain, and the role of foreign collections in disseminating Spanish art as a distinct school
Spain at the intersection of Christian, Jewish and Islamic cultures
Copies, quotations and appropriations of Spanish art
Languages and literatures: strategies of describing, narrating and translating Spain in word and image
Performing ‘Spanishness’ in the arts, including music, theatre and film
Spanish discourses in aesthetics
Spanish art beyond Iberia
Mobility and portability of Spanish art
Travel and discovery: geographies, centres, peripheries and liminal spaces
Legacies: textual and visual responses to Spain abroad
Eschewing binaries: high and low, sacred and secular, medieval and renaissance
Specialists of Spanish arts, artistic communication and exchange, as well as experts of other regions are invited to discuss the role and definition of Spain in their own disciplines. Presentations may be delivered in English or Spanish. Please send paper titles and abstracts of no more than 250 words, together with a CV and 150-word biography, to Dr Edward Payne by 31 March 2019: edward.a.payne@durham.ac.uk.
CANONS AND REPERTOIRES:Constructing the Visual Arts in the Hispanic World, Durham University, 20–21 June 2019
The visual arts in Spain have long been haunted by the spectres of six giants: El Greco, Ribera, Velázquez, Murillo, Goya and Picasso. Still today, these canonical figures tower over all others and continue to shape the story of Spanish art, which has been traditionally told in monographic form. Although the strength of the Spanish canon has informed different disciplines (literature, aesthetics, performing arts), given the recent ‘material turn’, the prosopographical dimension of the visual arts in Spain poses a disciplinary challenge. Similarly, following the ‘global turn’, the visual arts of Iberia pose a geographical challenge, intersecting with the Mediterranean, Arabic, Latin American, British and continental European worlds. The notions of ‘Spain’ and ‘Spanish art’, therefore, are necessarily nebulous and problematic, raising a host of questions: To what extent does Spanish art exist before the establishment of Spain as a nation state? To what extent is the art of the Habsburg and Bourbon empires a Spanish art outside Spain? What is the role of Spain in the wider canon of European art? Who has exploited the visual arts of the Hispanic world, geographically, politically and intellectually? These questions ultimately point to a tension between canons and repertoires; between centres and peripheries; and between consolidating the ‘core’ and expanding the ‘remit’ of the so-called Spanish school.
This conference will explode the disciplinary, material and geographical limits of Spanish art, inaugurating the Zurbarán Centre as a critical and innovative research institution for the study of Spanish and Latin American art in the twenty-first century. Papers may challenge the canonical construction of Spanish art, which can be traced back to writings from Palomino’s Lives of the Eminent Spanish Painters and Sculptors (1724) to Stirling Maxwell’s Annals of the Artists of Spain (1848), to more recent publications by scholars in the field. Papers may also probe the chronological, geographical and material boundaries of the ‘El Greco to Goya’ survey, interrogating the ways in which academics, curators, scholars and teachers narrate this material through various platforms, including publications, museum displays, exhibitions, lectures, gallery talks and academic courses. Speakers are encouraged to address the various ‘terrains’ of Spanish art, from geographical constructions of Iberia as Europe’s frontier or edge, to exchange with all that lies beyond the Pillars of Hercules. Topics for discussion may include, but are not limited to:
What is ‘Spanish art’?
Who are the cultural stakeholders of Spanish art?
What are the discords between regional, national, anti-national and transnational narratives of Spanish art, for example in museum collections and displays?
How does Spanish art feature in diplomatic exchanges?
Collections of Spanish art as an ‘imprint’ of Spain, and the role of foreign collections in disseminating Spanish art as a distinct school
Spain at the intersection of Christian, Jewish and Islamic cultures
Copies, quotations and appropriations of Spanish art
Languages and literatures: strategies of describing, narrating and translating Spain in word and image
Performing ‘Spanishness’ in the arts, including music, theatre and film
Spanish discourses in aesthetics
Spanish art beyond Iberia
Mobility and portability of Spanish art
Travel and discovery: geographies, centres, peripheries and liminal spaces
Legacies: textual and visual responses to Spain abroad
Eschewing binaries: high and low, sacred and secular, medieval and renaissance
Specialists of Spanish arts, artistic communication and exchange, as well as experts of other regions are invited to discuss the role and definition of Spain in their own disciplines. Presentations may be delivered in English or Spanish. Please send paper titles and abstracts of no more than 250 words, together with a CV and 150-word biography, to Dr Edward Payne by 31 March 2019: edward.a.payne@durham.ac.uk.
Reference Number:
Location: Durham City / Bishop Auckland
Faculty/Division: Arts & Humanities
Department: Any in the Faculty of Arts & Humanities
Grade: Grade 10
Position Type: Full Time
Contract Type: Permanent Closing Date: 31 January 2017
Job Description
We are seeking an outstanding academic leader and scholar in Spanish and/or Latin American Visual Art to be the driving creator of the Zurbarán Centre for Spanish and Latin American Art, a new collaborative initiative between Durham University and Auckland Castle Trust (https://www.dur.ac.uk/zurbaran). The Director will be an internationally recognised authority in her/his field who will act as an intellectual entrepreneur, developing academic contacts both inside Durham University, and nationally and internationally.
Background
Durham University formally established the Centre in October 2016. It owes its inception to County Durham’s remarkable collections in Spanish art dating from the fifteenth to the twentieth centuries, on the one hand, and Durham University’s established strengths in Spanish and Latin American Studies, on the other. The Centre will build on existing work to foster excellent research in Spanish and Latin American art, from the European Middle Ages and Pre-Colonial Americas to contemporary film and photography. Members of the Centre will collaborate with museums and galleries, providing its researchers with a unique opportunity to work with curatorial staff on joint research and engagement projects. It is expected that Durham University’s undergraduate and postgraduate student communities will have the chance to work with the Centre.
The Centre will be an embedded part of Durham University located in Bishop Auckland, where the Director will be primarily based. This represents an exciting opportunity to further the ambitions of both partner organisations to become the leading home for the study, enjoyment and appreciation of Spanish and Latin American art.
The twin catalysts for this initiative are Auckland Castle Trust’s major arts and heritage-led regeneration project in Bishop Auckland and Durham University’s strategic investment in founding the Centre for Visual Arts and Culture (CVAC) in 2014. A key pillar of the Auckland Castle project is the creation of a suite of galleries to house permanent and temporary displays of Spanish art.
Durham University’s commitment to visual culture was cemented in 2013–14 by the establishment of two chairs in visual culture, situated in the School of Modern Languages and Cultures (MLaC) and the Department of History. These appointments have provided dynamic leadership for CVAC, which co-ordinates visual culture research across the University’s three Faculties. CVAC unites some fifty members of academic and curatorial staff who are engaged in research on a variety of visual forms, objects and practices. It is home to a new taught MA in Visual Arts and Culture and to the Leverhulme Doctoral Training Centre in Visual Culture, established in 2015 with a £1million grant from the Trust. In its postgraduate provision and its current research initiatives, the Centre encourages collaboration between academic staff and those who care for and display the University’s museum and archival collections. This intimate relationship between scholarship and collection is mutually enriching for both parties. It allows curatorial staff to deliver teaching on a variety of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes (over 1,000 hours in 2014–15), while also enabling teaching staff to become involved in the practice of curating exhibitions. This is one of Durham University’s unique features, and it enables not only visual culture but also other related areas, such as archaeology and anthropology, to thrive. Researchers from a number of different departments (including Anthropology, Archaeology, English, Geography, History, MLaC, Music and Theology) are currently exploring topics in visual cultures across a broad chronological span, and in a range of different forms, from the fine arts through to theatre, cinema, music and photography.
Auckland Castle is one of the most important working episcopal palaces in Europe, the seat of the Prince Bishops of Durham since the twelfth century. For more than 250 years, Auckland Castle has been home to the internationally significant cycle of masterpieces from the Spanish Golden Age, ‘Jacob and his Twelve Sons’ by Francisco de Zurbarán. These paintings hang in the specially-constructed Long Dining Room and, as such, form part of the extraordinary and high-quality collections of Spanish art in County Durham, which holds the largest concentration of Spanish art in the UK outside London. In addition to Auckland Castle, significant holdings form part of the collections of the Bowes Museum (which has more than 100 artworks), Durham University, Durham Cathedral, Raby Castle and Ushaw College.
Jonathan Ruffer, an investor and philanthropist, set up Auckland Castle Trust in 2012 to secure the future of the Zurbaráns in Bishop Auckland. This was a symbolic act, which prevented the sale of the paintings abroad. Auckland Castle Trust is using these paintings and the Castle as the centre-piece of an innovative art, culture and heritage-led regeneration initiative in one of the North-East’s poorest and most disadvantaged communities.
This project has seen the Trust develop ambitious plans for a Spanish Art Gallery. Located in the centre of Bishop Auckland, the Gallery’s permanent and temporary exhibition spaces will showcase Spanish and Latin American art from local collections and from leading national and international partners. To date, the Trust is negotiating partnerships with an impressive array of institutions, including in the UK, the British Museum, the Victoria & Albert Museum, the Bowes Museum, and Glasgow Life; in Spain, the Museo Nacional del Prado, the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, and the Centro de Estudios Europa Hispánica; and in the US, the Meadows Museum, Dallas, the Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, and the Frick Collection, New York.
Relationships and Contacts
The Director will work closely with the Centre Administrator, as well as Centre staff, affiliates and postgraduates. S/he will also work with the Director of the Centre for Visual Arts and Culture and with the University’s Director of Cultural Engagement. The role will also involve close collaboration with key staff at Auckland Castle Trust, including the Senior Curator for Spanish Art and his team and the Curatorial Director. The working relationship will be formalised in a management memorandum that will include the establishment of a Joint Management Board. The Director will lead on the drafting and agreement of the memorandum. The Director of the Zurbarán Centre will be located in an appropriate academic department of Durham University and will be line-managed by the Head of Department.
Requirements
The successful applicant will be a researcher of international distinction with a record of successful academic leadership. S/he will have an international reputation based on a profile of world-leading publications in one or more sub-disciplines of Spanish and/or Latin American visual art. S/he will have a broad view of current scholarship in the field, and an interest in the relationships between different scholarly approaches to the subject. S/he will be expected to provide dynamic and proactive leadership, developing and enriching the research culture of her/his department, the Zurbarán Centre for Spanish and Latin American Art, and the Faculty of Arts and Humanities. S/he will also strengthen existing relationships between Durham University and Auckland Castle Trust, and develop connections between the Centre and a range of international partners from the university and cultural sectors. The postholder will have a track record of postgraduate supervision and a commitment to excellence in teaching, contributing constructively to the ongoing development of undergraduate and postgraduate curricula.
The post is available from 1 September 2017.
Responsibilities
Person Specification
Qualifications: Essential:
PhD in a relevant subject area
Experience: Essential:
An outstanding or developing record of academic leadership.
An outstanding, sustained record of research in the field of Spanish and/or Latin American visual art/visual culture, including publication at international/world-leading levels of recognition.
Engagement with cultural institutions and other non-HE partners in the generation and application of research.
An excellent record of research grant application and income generation.
A strong external profile (e.g. editorial roles, membership of editorial boards, provision of expert advice, membership of policy-making bodies or review panels, advisory boards or funding councils).
Clear plans for future grant applications and research collaboration both within a field and across the University.
A demonstrable record of high achievement in teaching.
Evidenced commitment to the mentoring and guiding of early career academic staff.
Ability to attract postgraduate students and secure their funding.
A strong track record of successful postgraduate supervision.
Desirable:
A record of leadership in teaching and course management.
A record of securing philanthropic income to support academic initiatives.
Skills / Competencies:
Essential:
The vision and ability to shape the future of the Zurbarán Centre for Spanish and Latin American Art within Durham and beyond, as well as the future of a home department.
Excellent leadership skills, coupled with the drive and ability to make a significant contribution to the department, the Centre, and the University.
The ability to develop and sustain collaborative networks within and beyond the University.
Evidenced ability to plan, lead and deliver collaborative projects across disciplinary boundaries.
Outstanding interpersonal and communication skills.
A demonstrable commitment to collegial working practices and to working with non-HEI partners.
Additional Information
Durham University is one of the UK’s leading Universities with a strong commitment to the highest international levels of excellence in research and education. There is an expectation that the person appointed will take personal responsibility for developing their role, and show excellence in leadership in working with students, academic colleagues and professional support staff.
As a senior member of staff, the successful candidate will be expected to demonstrate leadership externally in promoting the interests of the University.
As part of the application process please provide the names and contact details (preferably email) of at least 3 referees who could be contacted prior to interview.
