ART HISTORY AT WORK LECTURE SERIES

Restitution of Cultural Property: International Conventions and Their Practices

Jihon Kim, Ph.D.
Fulbright Visiting Scholar, Harvard University Asia Center
Chief of International Cooperation,
Korean National Commission for UNESCO

Since the end of the Second World War, international organizations have introduced several conventions to combat the illicit trafficking of cultural property and facilitate its restitution. These conventions have gradually increased awareness within the international community and helped to moralize the art market. They have also enabled peaceful settlements related to the
restitution of stolen or illegally exported cultural properties.

This talk introduces key ideas of those international conventions for the restitution of cultural property. In particular, the UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property adopted in 1970, and the UNIDROIT Convention on Stolen or Illegally Exported Cultural Objects adopted in 1995 will be the main focus. Additionally, several cases from the US and Korea will be analyzed to demonstrate both the achievements and challenges faced by the international community.

This talk also aims to help students understand the work of international organizations in the field of art and culture.

Thursday, May 30, 2024 at 4:00pm via Zoom.

Eighth Distinguished WAI Lecture on Renaissance Art and Culture

Praised to the Skies: Elevation, Framing and Sacred Space in the Renaissance Pala

Alison Wright, Professor in Italian Art c. 1300-1500, Department of History of Art, University College London

Friday, 17 May 2024, 7.30-9.30 pm, UTC+8 Beijing, Shanghai, Taipei, and Hong Kong, onsite & Zoom 
[11.30 am–1.30 pm, London; 12.30–2.30 pm, Berlin; 6.30–8.30 am, New York/Washington D.C.]   

Ercole de’ Roberti, Pala Portuense, 1479-1481, detail, oil on canvas, 323×240 cm. Made for S. Maria in Porto Fuori, Ravenna. Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan

Around 1500, a “revolutionary novelty of pictorial language” (Salvatore Settis) can be observed in Venetian painting, which clearly deviates from the concept of “historia” as formulated by Leon Battista Alberti and implemented by early Renaissance painting, especially in Florence. Particularly in paintings by the old Giovanni Bellini, the early deceased Giorgione and the young Titian, there are hints of an alternative conception of what paintings can achieve. At the centre of this understanding is less an intellectual-scholarly ambition or the precise and reliable communication of certain thoughts than a form of perception in which viewing and contemplation are combined in a distinctive way. In addition to what a depiction gives us to see and reflect upon, i.e. the figures, actions and the meanings conveyed with them, what counts at least as much in Venetian pictorial culture is that a painting stimulates its audience to a specific doing and an unusual experience: to a thoughtful looking. The lecture will present this pictorial concept and ask to what extent it can be traced back to late medieval inspirations. The thesis will be put up for discussion that it is precisely the rather traditional cultural practice of Christian allegoresis from which essential impulses could be taken to arrive at a new conception of the possibilities of painting. This conception, in turn, was to become of great importance for the art of the early modern period. Pictures – as Venetian paintings show – cannot be reduced to being manifestations of a clearly predetermined meaning, but prove to be objects of open, temporally extending contemplation and reflection. Based on these observations, the concluding part of the lecture will outline more general considerations on the temporality of viewing pictures. 

Registration

If you are residing outside mainland China and interested in attending this or other WAI lectures, please register for virtual participation: https://forms.gle/LAj5SkGCuy7Pgu1x9

Kindly note that Professor Wright’s lecture was initially planned for May 24, 2024, but it has been rescheduled to May 17, 2024. If you are interested in joining this event via Zoom, please mark box number 7. Those who have registered will receive timely email notifications with the Zoom links prior to each scheduled event.