Though they survive mostly as fragments scattered in museum collections, textiles touched all aspects of late antique and Byzantine life, not only as fabric meant to protect and adorn the body, but also as soft furnishings applied throughout the interior and exterior of private, public or sacred architecture. While there have been numerous efforts to offer ‘readings’ of the textile’s iconography, only recent scholarship has turned to an increased interest in technical and scientific analyses as well as contextual interpretations of pre-modern fabric around bodies and dwellings. The lecture aims to discuss how the Byzantines related, conceptually and with their bodies, to textiles and focuses on the latter category of soft furnishings with a particular attention to ideas that draw on the material properties of fabric.

Presented by the Case Western Reserve University Department of Art History and Art

Free, no reservations required.