Ideas about the origins and context for the flâneur have been tied to Paris, and viewed through the lens of Walter Benjamin’s Arcades Project. While Benjaminian orthodoxy has increasingly been challenged, the association of the flâneur with modernity and European cities has continued to dominate studies of its variant forms. This conference aims to de-centre the concept and expand such critique by identifying and analysing forms of pedestrian observation in the early modern period taking note of the fact that strolling, seeing and being seen—and ‘walking the city’—emerged well before Europe and the 19th century in urban experiences in cities like Istanbul, Isfahan, Delhi and Beijing.
Organised by Dr Sussan Babaie (The Courtauld Institute of Art) and Professor Richard Wrigley (History of Art, University of Nottingham)
PROGRAMME
Please note that the conference takes place at The Courtauld’s Vernon Square campus
FRIDAY, November 15, 2019
16:30 – 17:00
Registration
17:00-17:30
Opening remarks: Sussan Babaie and Richard Wrigley
17:30 – 18:30
Keynote Address: Modalities of urban experience and a lexicon of vision: Walking-viewing early modern Istanbul
Professor Çiğdem Kafescioğlu (Boğaziçi University, Istanbul)
18:30 – 19:30
Drinks reception
SATURDAY, November 16, 2019, 9:30 – 17:00
9:00-9:30am: Registration
Morning Session:
9:30-10:00
Aslıhan Aksoy-Sheridan (TED University, Ankara)
An Ottoman Armenian flâneur in early modern Istanbul: Eremia Chelebi Komurjian capturing the seventeenth-century Ottoman capital
10:00-10:30
David Karmon (Holy Cross, Worcester, Massachusetts)
Pavements and pedestrian movement in the Renaissance: Venice and Rome
10:30-11:00
Saundra Weddle (Drury University, Springfield, Missouri)
Visualizing and mobilizing sex work on Venice’s canals
11:00-11:30
Discussion #1
11:30-12:00
Coffee break
12:00-12:30
Peyvand Firouzeh (University of Sydney)
Walking Yazd: Historicism, urban planning, and imperial connectivity
12:30-13:00
Nuno Grancho (Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, ISCTE-IUL)
Spatial mobility in the early modern colonial city of Diu
13:00-13:20
Discussion #2
13:20-14:30
Lunch
14:30-15:00
Marika Takanishi Knowles (University of St Andrews)
A guide to walking in Yoshiwara (1678): Hishikawa Moronobu’s flâneur
15:00-15:30
Marie Yasunaga (University of Amsterdam)
Exploring urban space of Edo through Hasegawa Settan’s illustrations of Edo Meisho Zue
15:30-15:50
Discussion #3
15:50-16:00
Comfort Break
16:00-16:30
Concluding remarks: Stephen Whiteman (The Courtauld)