Sculptures, statuettes, paraphernalia, books, music, performances are “stuff” deeply entangled in religious practices and belief-systems, and they concur to shaping our visualization of religious cultures. This religious stuff undoubtedly has a major role not only in the religious experience, but also in the communication thereof outside of the local context. However, this is not always the case, and we need to investigate what actually happens when religious imagery travels outside of its geo-historical context of origin. This type of enquiry, deeply rooted in a material approach, reveals how religious semantics can mutate and transform, concurring to the creation of a new semantic or to the blending and neo-creation of a shared visual culture across histories and geographies.
During this seminar we will investigate issues of globalization and transculturality, materiality and material agency; participants will be invited to explore and challenge ideas of religious culture, identity and syncretism.
The geographical focus is very wide, covering mostly Afroeurasia, while the chronological focus will be defined according to the participants’ interests. We will analyse case studies spanning across religious traditions (e.g. South Asian religions, Christianity, Islam) which
will mostly move from what is generally recognized as religious imagery, leading to a deconstruction of the concepts and to a wider take on shared figurative culture and its impact in a wide geo-historical perspective.
- Kursleiter/in: Serena Autiero