Thu 8 Sep, 6pm
English or European? Portraiture and the Politics of National Identity in Early Georgian Britain
Explore the shifting politics of portraiture in early Georgian Britain with one of the world’s leading authorities on the history of British art, David Solkin.
The influence of European art created a fundamental shift in British portraiture in the mid eighteenth-century. With some artists championing native tradition and others embracing Continental trends, a struggling national identity was played out in British portraiture.
Speaker: David H. Solkin FBA, Walter H Annenberg Professor of the History of Art, The Courtauld Institute of Art
Fri 9 Sep, 6.30pm
Conversing in and with the Landscape: Edward Haytley’s portraits of The Brockman Family at Beachborough
-Dr Kate Retford, Senior Lecturer, Department of History of Art, Birkbeck, University of London
In the mid 1740s Edward Haytley spent time at the residence of Squire James Brockman in Kent, England, working on pendant canvases which have been in the NGV Collection since the early 1960s.
Explore how these paintings developed the conventions of ‘the conversation piece’: an innovative mode of small group portraiture, in which the polite classes of eighteenth-century England were pictured engaged in genteel diversions, undertaken in elegant settings. As Dr Kate Retford will explain, Haytley’s key contribution was to meld this tradition with the art form of the ‘multiple gardenscape’ and so blur the boundaries of portraiture, landscape and genre.
Dr. Kate Retford is Senior Lecturer and Head of the History of Art department at Birkbeck College, University of London. She has published widely on eighteenth-century British art, particularly the portraiture of the period and the country house art collection.
Sat 10 Sep, 6pm
Portrait and Autograph: Art and Identity in the Age of Reform, c.1820-40
-Martin Myrone, Lead Curator, Pre-1800 British Art, Tate Britain, London
In an 1830s portrait series by English painter Henry Perronet Briggs, the artist incorporated physical text, inscribed and pasted on the canvas. These paintings prompt an examination of British portraiture in the age of political reform and industrialisation.
Delivered by Martin Myrone, of Tate Britain, explore questions of authenticity, identity, illusion and the portrait-as-object in this fascinating lecture.
Human Kind conference registration includes
•Three days made up of twenty sessions of papers showcasing research in the field of eighteenth and nineteenth-century British and Australian portraits
•Five keynote lectures by leading international experts in the field, held in the Clemenger Theatre, National Gallery of Victoria and the Forum Theatre, Arts West, University of Melbourne. These keynote lectures are free public events but seating priority is given to conference delegates
•Expert session chairs representing international art institutions including the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, Tate Britain, Birkbeck London University, The Power Institute of Art History, University of Sydney, National Gallery of Victoria, Australian National University, Canberra
•Book launch with refreshments on Thursday 8 September at the Ian Potter Museum of Art, University of Melbourne
•Conference Opening Reception (drinks and canapés) on Thursday 8 September at Garden Restaurant, NGV (paid event)
•Complimentary ticket to Late Night Friday at the NGV including exhibition viewing of Degas: A New Vision, and Late Night music
•Conference Dinner (drinks starter, three courses and wine) on Saturday 10 September at Garden Restaurant, NGV (paid event)
•Tea and coffee in the morning and afternoon during Conference sessions
•Closing Forum with open panel discussion and debate including keynotes speakers