PICTURE is an international research seminar dedicated to rural photography in Europe during the long nineteenth century.
The project was initiated through the Circle U. Seed Funding Programme
Join us online from the 14th to the 15th of November! Together, we'll explore how photography was used not only to document transformations in rural landscapes, but also as a social and cultural tool to imagine and shape these environments.
At a time when the rural environment was being radically transformed by the Second Industrial Revolution, photography captured a crucial tension between a romanticized, pastoral past and a mechanized, rationalized future. This project's approach allows us to examine the topic across different scales, from the micro-level of individual photographs to the macro-level of national identity and global circulations of agricultural, artistic, or scientific information, ideas, and power. By studying how rural environments were visually represented in photographs, as well as the ideologies, networks, and material culture structuring these photographic processes, we can better understand the historical construction of rural space and place. Furthermore, by drawing from case studies from all over Europe, including Great Britain, Romania, Poland, and Germany, we hope to investigate the role of rural representations in the construction of regional, national, or European identity and explore the diverse meanings of rurality across the continent.
Programme
14 November
- 09:30: Rural Photography, Tourism, and the Making the Picturesque Lake District
- 10:15: Above and Beyond: The cloud as drifting conceptual and visual motif in photographic theory
- 11:10: Framing Nature: Serbian Landscape Photography at International Exhibitions
- 12:30: TEXTURE (Flax and River Lys Museum): Rural Photography in Europe During the Long Nineteenth Century
- 14:15: Digging through the Hinterland(s) of the Front(s) during the Great War
- 15:10: Rediscovering Vitold Rola Piekarski's Photographic Fieldtrips in Rural Romania
15 November
- 09:30: Nature in German Photographic Publications (1871-1933)
- 10:15: Intoxicating Landscapes: Visual and Narrative Representation of Polish Peasant Drinking Culture in the Second Half of the 19th Century
- 11:10: Conclusion
