Beyond Books: The Diagrammatic Mode in Byzantium, Byzantium at Ankara Spring 2021/22 Seminar Series, Zoom, March 31, 2022, 6:00 pm (Istanbul)

Byzantium at Ankara, a joint project of Bilkent Department of History and Hacettepe University, Department of Art History, is happy to announce the inaugural talk of the Spring 2021/22 Seminar Series. On Thursday 31 March 2022 (h. 18.00 Istanbul time), Prof. Linda Safran (Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, Toronto) will be delivering a talk entitled: "Beyond Books: the Diagrammatic Mode in Byzantium."

Diagrams in manuscripts are easy to recognize, if not necessarily easy to describe. This talk considers diagrams outside of manuscripts and unaccompanied by lengthy texts. Such diagrams, as well as abstract ways of thinking diagrammatically--that is, in linear and geometrical terms, in three dimensions and not just two--were more widespread in the Byzantine visual landscape than has previously been noticed. I propose that this "diagrammatic mode" played a role in public life, helping to structure the Byzantines' understanding of time and space, demonstrate harmonious relationships, and reify τάξις.

Linda Safran is a Research Fellow at the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Toronto. She holds a Ph.D in History of Art from Yale University. Her research interests are Byzantine and Mediterranean art and architecture, medieval studies, cultural history, material culture studies, archaeology of Southern Italy, Art History, and Jewish Art History.

For further information and registration, please send an email to byzantiumatankara@hotmail.com.