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DTSTART:20210217T171500Z
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SUMMARY:On The Origin of the Milky Way
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DESCRIPTION:Professor Marcia Pointon\n\nOn The Origin of the Milky Way (1
 637) by Peter Paul Rubens: Astronomy\, Astrology and Mythology in early 
 modern Europe\n\nPlease pre-register on Eventbrite: https://www.eventbri
 te.co.uk/e/research-semilar-with-prof-marcia-pointon-on-the-origin-of-th
 e-milky-way-tickets-136600183827\n\nVideo pre-recorded and available on 
 The University of Manchester Portal:\n\nhttps://video.manchester.ac.uk/f
 aculties/84a42e9f3376057e09c91fdb89587a16/2c7a9b58-8737-4441-b45f-0fb25d
 8aed89/\n\nQ&A 17 February 2021\, 5.15pm on Zoom: https://zoom.us/j/9891
 6699051\n\nPainted for Philip II's hunting lodge at the Escorial in the 
 final decade of his life\, Rubens's autograph work The Origin of the Mil
 ky Way defies ready interpretation. The artist was a contemporary of Gal
 ileo\, the two men had friends in common even though attempts to evidenc
 e a meeting between the two have so far failed. Rubens was also one of t
 he first to introduce a telescope into a painting (in Allegory of Sight 
 with Jan Brueghel the Elder). He had already painted a series of night s
 kies and an eclipse. He had many recent books on astronomy/astrology\, a
 s well as ancient texts\, in his unparalleled library. This is a paintin
 g full of convincing\, but none quite fits into recognised constellation
 s. Nor does the image accurately accord with any known mythological narr
 ative. So\, is the Milky Way here simply an excuse to depict Juno as Que
 en of the heavens? I propose that Rubens was a learned eclectic for whom
  Aristotelian views of the cosmos could meld both with contemporary eart
 h-centred arguments about a providential universe and with new Copernica
 n theories. Uniting his lifelong interest in pictorial space with newfou
 nd possibilities for understanding the cosmos\, Rubens draws on the anci
 ent Roman concept of ‘Sparsio’\, or abundance\, with which he would have
  been familiar through his friendship with Hugo Grotius as well as throu
 gh his collecting of antiquities. Executed a few years after the fifty-t
 hree-year-old artist had married his second wife\, then aged sixteen\, w
 ith whom he had a series of children in rapid succession\, The Origin of
  the Milky Way constitutes a witty and profound meditation on female gen
 erosity within a framework of universal laws.\n\nAbout the speaker:\n\nM
 arcia Pointon is a graduate in English and History of Art from Mancheste
 r University and\, following seventeen years at the University of Sussex
 \, held the post of Pilkington Professor of History of Art at Manchester
  from 1992 to 2003. She has published many books and articles with inter
 ests ranging from landscape to Victorian subject painting\, from gender 
 in representation to problems in portraiture. Her work on eighteenth-cen
 tury English portraiture led her to question the significance of preciou
 s stones in images. It was an invitation in 2014 to give a short paper o
 n jewels in Rubens's art that precipitated a major change of direction a
 nd to her immersion in Northern European early modern art and science. H
 er recent publications include 'Peter Paul Rubens and the Mineral World'
 \, Artibus et Historiae\, 2019 and 'Rubens and Peiresc in Search of Agat
 e: Materiality and Aesthetics in Early Modern Europe'\, Art History\, No
 vember 2020.\n\nImage caption : Peter Paul Rubens\, The Origin of the Mi
 lky Way\, ca. 1837\, Madrid: Prado.\n
STATUS:TENTATIVE
TRANSP:TRANSPARENT
CLASS:PUBLIC
LOCATION:https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/research-semilar-with-prof-marcia
 -pointon-on-the-origin-of-the-milky-way-tickets-136600183827
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