Paintings, Peepshows, and Porcupines: Exhibitions in London, 1775–1851

In late 18th- and early 19th-century London, works of art were embedded in an exhibitionary landscape consisting of the richest imaginable array of artifacts, environments, and living creatures. Even as art historians have valorized the expressive possibilities of alternative display venues as central to avant-garde identity, the appearance of paintings in the precincts of commercial entertainment has, for many years, been consigned to a position of marginal curiosity in the history of art. This conference explores the integration of artworks into an exhibitionary ecosystem in which the heterogeneity of display blurred hierarchical divisions between high and mass culture, art and commerce, and natural and art history. An international group of distinguished scholars will rethink some of our fundamental assumptions about exhibitions and the corpus of objects they have furnished.

Funding provided by the William French Smith Endowment and the USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute.

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Verso blog: Paintings, Peepshows, and Porcupines: Exhibitions in London
by Jordan Bear and Catherine Roach

CONFERENCE SCHEDULE

Friday, Sept. 22, 2023

8:30 a.m. | Check-In

9 a.m. | Registration & Coffee

9:45 a.m. | Welcome

• Susan Juster (The Huntington)
• Catherine Roach (Virginia Commonwealth University)
• Jordan Bear (University of Toronto)

10:15 a.m. | Session 1: Discriminating Viewers 
Moderator: Jordan Bear (University of Toronto)

• Robbie Richardson (Princeton University)
  “Displaying Indigenous Art in Eighteenth-Century Britain: Spectacle, Commodity, and Imperial Nostalgia”
• Catherine Roach (Virginia Commonwealth University)
  “‘I Often Saw My Own Face There’: Recognition and Discrimination”

Noon | Lunch

1 p.m. | Session 2: Sensations and Sensibilities 
Moderator: Morna O’Neil (Wake Forest University) 

• Zirwat Chowdhury (University of California, Los Angeles)
  “Francis Hayman’s Histrionic Paintings at Vauxhall Gardens” 
• Holly Shaffer (Brown University)
  “A Fragrant Exhibition at the Oriental Club, London” 

2:45 p.m. | Break

3 p.m. | Session 3: Breaking Bodies
Moderator: Melinda McCurdy (The Huntington)

• Meredith Gamer (Columbia University)
  “Manners of Viewing: Paint, Print, and the Spectacle of Death” 
• Adam Eaker (Metropolitan Museum of Art) 
  “The Art of Marring a Face: Exhibiting Boxers in Georgian London”

Saturday, Sept. 23, 2023

9:30 a.m. | Registration and Coffee

10:15 a.m. | Session 4: Other Centers 
Moderator: Catherine Roach (Virginia Commonwealth University)

• Alison FitzGerald (Maynooth University)
  “Centers and Peripheries: Exhibiting London’s ‘Marvels’ in Britain’s ‘Second City’” 
• John Plunkett (University of Exeter)
  “Moving Pictures: Panoramas, Peepshows, and Exhibition Networks” 

Noon | Lunch 

1 p.m. | Session 5: Negotiating Difference
Moderator: Adam Eaker (Metropolitan Museum of Art)

• Ann Bermingham (University of California, Santa Barbara)
  “Ethnographic Entertainment: George Catlin’s Indian Gallery”
• Nicholas Robbins (University College London) 
  “Modeling Race at the Egyptian Hall”  

2:45 p.m. | Break 

3 p.m. | Session 6: Art and Science 
Moderator: Emily Talbot (Norton Simon Museum) 

• Morna O’Neill (Wake Forest University)
  “Still Lives: Art and Industry on Display circa 1851” 
• Jordan Bear (University of Toronto)
  “The Altarpiece and the Sea Serpent: Two Evidentiary Strategies in Nineteenth-Century London Exhibitions” 

4:45 p.m. | Wrap-Up: General Reflections and Q&A