Official opening of the Centre for the Study of Antiquity and Christianity and the Velux project The transformation of religious identity in the Hellenistic-Roman world, 100-600 AD. The significance of conversion and initiation to the formation of religious identity:

15.15: The Dean
15.30: Lecture by Prof. Inge Nielsen, Universität Hamburg: Religious associations in antiquity.
16.30: Reception

Friday 5 March, 15.15-17.30 – Auditorium 2, Building 1441 (Reception in room 110)
Downloadable pdf poster.

“Abu Mina og Skt Menas-souvenirs – Små genstande med store perspektiver”
Wednesday 17 March 3 pm
Aarhus University, building 1414, auditorium 407

The official opponents are:
Dr. Peter Stewart, Reader in Classical Art and its Heritage, Courtauld Institute of Art, London, UK.

Dr. Eric Varner, Associate Professor, Departments of Classics and Art History, Emory University, Atlanta, USA.

Mag. art. Birte Poulsen, Associate Professor, Institute of Anthropology, Archaeology and Linguistics, Aarhus University (chair)

Aarhus University Conference Centre, Byg. 1421, Mødelokale 2

The conference is open to the public, no registration necessary.

Using Images in Late Antiquity
Identity, Commemoration, and Response

Organised by the research programme
Art and Social Identities in Late Antiquity, Aarhus University, Denmark

Accademia di Danimarca, Via Omero 18, Roma
13-15 January 2010

The conference will focus on the active role of art and architecture in Late Antiquity and situate the use of images in the period’s dynamic political, religious and social life. The seminar aims to cross interdisciplinary boundaries and arrive at an original and comprehensive view of late antique society. Through images and the responses to them, we ask the invited contributors to focus on questions such as: Why were works of art made? Who commissioned them, and how were they looked at? The papers should try to illuminate the contexts in which works of art were created, and how they were valued and viewed. These questions could be applied to the various places of exchange (sacred and secular) where identities were taken on and transformed, often through the mediation of images.

Programme

Wednesday 13 January

18.00 Keynote lecture
Franz Alto Bauer (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich, Germany)
Communicating Sanctity in Late Antiquity: The Case of Hagios Demetrios in Thessaloniki
Rinfresco

Thursday 14 January

9.30 Welcome and introduction to the seminar
Director Erik Bach (Accademia di Danimarca) and organisers

Session 1 – Chair: Franz Alto Bauer

9.45 Sarah E. Bassett (Indiana University, USA)
Late Antique Honorific Sculpture in Constantinople

10.25 Ine Jacobs (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium)
The Last Roman Heyday: Civic Representation around AD 400

11.05 Coffee

Session 2 – Chair: Arnaldo Marcone

11.30 Paolo Liverani (Università degli Studi di Firenze, Italy)
Chi parla a chi? Epigrafia monumentale e immagine pubblica in epoca tardoantica

12.10 Stine Birk (Aarhus University, Denmark)
Using Images for Self-Representation on Roman Sarcophagi

12.50 Lunch (speakers only)

Session 3 – Chair: Birte Poulsen

14.30 Eric Varner (Emory University, Atlanta, USA)
Maxentius and Constantine: Images and the Expropriation of Imperial Identity

15.10 John Weisweiler (St John’s College, Cambridge, England, and Istituto Svizzero di Roma)
Aristocrats as Imperial Officials: Imperial Symbols of Authority in the Self-Representation of the Late Roman Aristocracy

15.50 Arnaldo Marcone (Università degli Studi Roma Tre, Italy)
Alla ricerca di un’identità. Tradizioni classiche nella prima iconografia cristiana

Friday 15 January

Session 4 – Chair: Sarah Bassett

9.00 Trinidad Nogales Basarrate (Museo Nacional de Arte Romano, Mérida, Spain)
Scultura della Tarda Antichità ad Augusta Emerita e nel suo territorio (Hispania):
officine, modelli e circuiti

9.40 Niels Hannestad (Aarhus University, Denmark)
Supply of Sculpture in ‘Stately Homes’ in Late Antiquity

10.20 Donato Attanasio (Istituto di Struttura della Materia del CNR, Rome, Italy)
The newly discovered Göktepe quarries in ancient Caria near Aphrodisias: Use and distribution from the 1st century to Late Antiquity

11.00 Coffee

Session 5 – Chair: Carola Jäggi

11.30 Simon Malmberg (Istituto Svedese di Studi Classici, Rome, Italy)
Above the Gate: Symbols on the gate, and the gate as symbol at Rome, Ravenna and Constantinople

12.10 Hendrik W. Dey (Hunter College of the City University of New York, and Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, Washington DC, USA)
At the Intersection of ‘Image’ and ‘Reality’: The Use of Colonnaded Streets in Late Antiquity

12.50 Lunch (speakers only)

Session 6 – Chair: Eric Varner

14.30 Katherine M.A. Dunbabin (McMaster University, Canada)
Myth, Theatre, and Performance: Cultural Identity in Mosaics of the Roman East

15.10 Birte Poulsen (Aarhus University, Denmark)
City Personifications in Mosaics in Late Antiquity

15.50 Troels Myrup Kristensen (Aarhus University, Denmark)
Christian Responses to ’Pagan’ Statuary in Late Antique Scythopolis (Beit She’an)

Late Antiquity Session
Friday 18 September 13:00-16:15
Organisers: Troels Myrup Kristensen and Birte Poulsen (Aarhus)
13:00 Louise Blanke, Copenhagen: The White Monastery at Sohag (20 min)
13:25 Ole Herslund, Copenhagen: Desert Monks in a Pharaonic Landscape – Use, Reuse and Transformation of Bronze Age Tombs in Late Antique Middle Egypt (20 min)
13:50 Eivind Heldaas Seland, Bergen: Palmyra – Change and Continuity in Late Antiquity (20 min)
14:15 Birte Poulsen, Aarhus: Halikarnassos in Late Antiquity (15 min)
14:35 Coffee break
14:40 Gitte Lønstrup, Aarhus: Christian Constructions of Memory in “New” and “Old” Rome (10 min)
14:55 Simon Malmberg, Rome: Ravenna Capitale: The Development of a Capital, 402-526 (15 min)
15:15 Troels Myrup Kristensen, Aarhus: Sculpture and urban stories (10 min)
15:30 Stine Birk Toft, Aarhus: Self-Representation and the Construction of Identity on Roman Sarcophagi (10 min)
15:45 Arja Karivieri, Stockholm: Anomalies in the Early Christian Architecture of Northern Greece (15 min)
16:05 Final discussion

Stine Birk will defend her PhD dissertation “Reading Roman Sarcophagi. Aspects of Identity, Commemoration and Production” on Thursday 10 September 1-4 pm.

The official opponents are:
Reader Emerita Janet A.R. Huskinson, Department of Classical Studies, Open University, Milton Keynes, UK.
Professor, Dr. Michael Koortbojian, Department of Art & Archaeology, Princeton University, USA.
Associate Professor, mag. art. Birte Poulsen, Institute of Anthropology, Archaeology and Linguistics, Aarhus University (chair)

Aarhus University Conference Centre, Byg. 1421, Mødelokale 2

“Mosaics of Constantinople in late antiquity: pavement art and its social context”
Monday 7 September 2pm
Building 1414, Auditorium 407

A conference organized under the auspices of the research programme “Art and Social Identities in Late Antiquity” funded by the Danish Research Council.

The conference will focus on the active role of art and architecture in Late Antiquity and situate the use of images in the period’s dynamic political, religious and social life. The seminar aims to cross interdisciplinary boundaries and arrive at an original and comprehensive view of late antique society. Through images and the responses to them, we ask the invited contributors to focus on questions such as: Why were works of art made? Who commissioned them, and how were they looked at? The papers should try to illuminate the contexts in which works of art were created, and how they were valued and viewed. These questions could be applied to the various places of exchange (sacred and secular) where identities were taken on and transformed, often through the mediation of images.

Preliminary list of speakers:
Johanna Auinger (Vienna, Austria)
Sarah Bassett (Wayne State, USA)
Franz Alto Bauer (Munich, Germany)
Hendrik Dey (Aarhus, Denmark)
Katherine Dunbabin (McMaster, Canada)
Niels Hannestad (Aarhus, Denmark)
Ine Jacobs (Leuven, Belgium)
Troels Myrup Kristensen (Aarhus, Denmark)
Paolo Liverani (Florence, Italy)
Simon Malmberg (Swedish Institute, Italy)
Arnaldo Marcone (Roma Tre, Italy)
Trinidad Nogales (Merida, Spain)
Birte Poulsen (Aarhus, Denmark)
Stine Birk Toft (Aarhus, Denmark)
Eric Varner (Emory, USA)
John Weisweiler (Cambridge, UK)

Grand strategy? Defense in Depth? Desperation?
City Walls and the Fortification of ‘Interior’ Provinces in the Later Roman West

Tuesday 19 May 2009
13.15-16.30
University of Aarhus, Bldg 1414, Room 407

Speakers:
Neil Christie, University of Leicester
‘Walled out or walled in? Changing urban roles and identities in late Roman Italy’

Hendrik Dey, University of Aarhus
‘Grand strategy,’ propaganda and the ideology of city walls in late antiquity

Simon Esmonde Cleary, University of Birmingham
‘Walls and their significance for the nature of towns in late Roman Gaul’

Gareth Sears, University of Birmingham
Strategic defence or urban ideology? City walls and their importance in late Roman Africa