ICMA at International Medieval Congress, Leeds 2026: "Periodisation and the Study of Medieval Art" roundtable 6 July + receptions

The British Archaeological Association (BAA) and the International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA)
present

Periodisation and the Study of Medieval Art:
A Roundtable Discussion
Monday 6 July 2026, 19.00-20.00

Session 431
Esther Simpson Building, Room 3.08

Al-Idrīsī, Nuzhat al-mushtāq fī ikhtirāq al-āfāq (The Book of Pleasant Journeys into Faraway Lands). 1553 CE manuscript of an 1154 original by al-Idrisi. Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford, MS. Pococke 375 (Uri Arab. Moh. 887).


with
Michael Höckelmann (Friedrich-Alexander Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg)
Amanda Luyster (College of the Holy Cross, Massachusetts)
Olenka Pevny (University of Cambridge)
Hanna Vorholt (University of York)

Moderated by Sophie Kelly, Department of History of Art, University of Bristol

Periodisation is often viewed as a 'necessary tool' for historical comparison and analysis. Recent developments in global art history and medieval studies, however, have unsettled traditional historical frameworks, exposing their Eurocentric underpinnings and limitations. The term 'medieval' itself emerges as a label that is both historically contingent and unevenly applied across different contexts. This round table discussion asks how we might reimagine temporalities in light of comparative, transcultural, and global approaches. Can periodisation remain a useful conceptual tool if we attend more closely to overlapping chronologies, regionally specific transitions, and cross cultural encounters? Or must it be fundamentally rethought in order to accommodate artistic practices that resist categorisation within fixed temporal frameworks? By drawing together scholars working across geographies and traditions, this interdisciplinary round table seeks to test the utility of periodisation as both a disciplinary tool and a critical problem.

Organized by Sophie Kelly, Department of History of Art, University of Bristol and Alice Isabella Sullivan, Department of the History of Art & Architecture, Tufts University

BAA Reception


Tuesday 7 July 2026, 19.00-20.00
University House, Beechgrove Room


The British Archaeological Association supports research on the art, architecture and archaeology of the Middle Ages, especially in Britain. The Association warmly invites all delegates to join us for drinks and to find out more about our activities.

 

Monk drinking from barrel (detail) from Li Livres dou Santé. France, late 13th century. Sloane 2435, f.44v, The British Library.

ICMA Reception


WEDNESDAY 8 July 2026, 19.00-21.30
The Dry Dock Leeds
All welcome, kindly RSVP HERE


Join fellow ICMA members for a special off-site reception at The Dry Dock Leeds on Wednesday 8 July 2026 from 19.00-21.30. Complimentary beer, wine, and alcohol-free drinks, plus small bites, will be provided. Food is available for purchase. Please invite a friend or colleague to introduce them to the ICMA!

The Dry Dock is about a 10 minute walk from the University of Leeds campus, en route to central Leeds. 

The Dry Dock
Woodhouse Lane
Leeds LS2 3AX

https://www.socialpubandkitchen.co.uk/dry-dock-leeds

WATCH NOW! ICMA at The Courtauld Lecture 2026: William J. Diebold, Judgments in Nuremberg: The 1950s Trade in Medieval Christian and Jewish Manuscripts in the “Most German of All German Cities”

ICMA at The Courtauld Lecture 2026

Judgments in Nuremberg: The 1950s Trade in Medieval Christian and Jewish Manuscripts in the “Most German of All German Cities”

William J. Diebold

Watch HERE
Past ICMA at The Courtauld Lectures can be found HERE

Cover of the Codex aureus Epternacensis (Nuremberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum)

Page from the Nuremberg Machzor (Zurich, private collection)

In the early 1950s, a number of public and ecclesiastical institutions in Nuremberg, West Germany bought, sold, and exchanged medieval illuminated manuscripts. A museum acquired a Christian gospel book but sold two haggadot from its collection; a church gave away a mass book made for it four hundred years earlier; the city library sold a Hebrew liturgical manuscript it had held for centuries. These transactions were fraught for a variety of reasons. Not only were monetarily and culturally valuable objects changing hands, but, just a few years after the Shoah, Jewish cultural artifacts were leaving German public collections. And all of this was taking place in the “most German of all German cities,” a Nazi-era sobriquet for Nuremberg that had been given a new twist when the city that had hosted the annual Nazi party rallies became the site of the trial of the leading Nazi war criminals.

This lecture, drawing on extensive archival research, attempts to answer such questions as: What did it mean in the early 1950s for a German museum to acquire a spectacular Ottonian gospel book? For a church to give an American donor a liturgical manuscript that had been made for it? For German public institutions to sell Hebrew illuminated manuscripts to an émigré German Jew living in Israel? These transactions are placed in their political and social context. Germany, accused of the worst crimes in the history of mankind, was struggling to reestablish itself. One of the ways it tried to do this was by reshaping the relationship of its medieval past to its modern present.



William J. Diebold is the Jane Neuberger Goodsell Professor of Art History and Humanities (emeritus) at Reed College. He was educated at Yale and Johns Hopkins and has published extensively on early medieval topics, including his book Word and Image: An Introduction to Early Medieval Art and articles on Carolingian and Ottonian manuscripts, ivories, and medieval texts about art. More recently, his research has been on the modern reception of the Middle Ages, especially in twentieth-century Germany, and has led to such publications as “The Nazi Middle Ages,” “Medievalism,” and, most recently, Medieval Art, Modern Politics (co-edited with Brigitte Buettner).



Organized by Jessica Barker, Senior Lecturer in Medieval Art History at The Courtauld.

This event took place on 20 May 2026, 17:30 - 19:00 at The Courtauld Institute in London, Vernon Square Campus, Lecture Theatre 2

About the ICMA at The Courtauld Lecture
Since 1999, the International Center of Medieval Art and The Courtauld Institute of Art have teamed up to present an annual lecture at The Courtauld in London. Delivered by a North American-based scholar, this lecture series aims to strengthen transatlantic contacts among medievalists from the university and museum worlds.

The ICMA at The Courtauld Lecture is made possible through the generosity of William M. Voelkle.

Click here for The Courtauld Institute of Art website.

ICMA Lecture: Saturday 20 June 2026 in Barcelona. The Lutheran Middle Ages: The Survival of Medieval Art in Protestant Churches in Germany by Justin E. A. Kroesen

The ICMA Lecture 2026 in Barcelona

The Lutheran Middle Ages: The Survival of Medieval Art in Protestant Churches in Germany

by Prof. Dr. Justin E. A. Kroesen, University Museum, Bergen (Norway)


Casa Amatller, Estudi Fotogràfic
Saturday 20th June 2026
18.00h (Barcelona time) | 12.00h (ET)

Register HERE (virtual only)
To attend in-person, email amatller@amatller.org

Wienhausen (Lower Saxony), former Cistercian monastery, the nuns’ choir looking east (photo Justin Kroesen)

Spaces that have remained largely unchanged over more than five centuries are rare; however, Protestant churches in Germany provide notable examples. Contrary to common assumptions, Lutherans often exhibited tolerance toward medieval church interiors, preserving, adapting, or simply accepting many artworks and furnishings as adiaphora – matters of minor importance. Consequently, Lutheran churches in Germany offer unique insight into church interiors prior to the Reformation, not only within Germany but across the Latin West. 

This lecture, based on Kroesen’s recent monograph The Lutheran Middle Ages, examines both the nature and the mechanisms of the preservation of medieval artworks in Lutheran churches. After outlining the principal factors that contributed to the survival of medieval art over five centuries of Protestantism, the scope of this phenomenon will be explored through selected case studies of notable survivals in churches throughout Germany, ranging from cathedrals and monasteries to rural parish churches. It will be shown that – perhaps paradoxically – many medieval artworks have endured not despite, but thanks to the Lutheran Reformation.

(photo Adnan Icagić)

Dr Justin Kroesen is Professor of Cultural History at the University of Bergen (Norway) and scientific curator of the University Museum’s art collection. His research focuses on the art and architecture of medieval churches across the Latin West, the material culture of worship, and the impact of the Reformations.

This lecture is organized by Francesca Dell’Acqua (DiSPaC–Università di Salerno and Chair of the ICMA International Engagement Committee) in collaboration with Marc Sureda i Jubany (Institut Amatller d’Art Hispànic, Barcelona).

Fundació Institut Amatller d’Art Hispànic

The FIAAH was created by Teresa Amatller in 1941 and was conceived by the art historian Josep M. Gudiol i Ricart (1904-1985), its first director, trained as an architect and with close links with eminent North American scholars such as Charles R. Post or Walter W. S. Cook. The Institut Amatller aims to promote research into Hispanic art history and to safeguard and disseminate the artistic heritage generated by the Amatller family. To achieve this purpose, the Institut maintains an exceptional photographic archive and a library specializing in Hispanic art history. From its inception, the Fundació has been headquartered in Casa Amatller, one of the most notable buildings on Barcelona’s Passeig de Gràcia and a jewel of Catalan Modernism created by the architect and art historian Josep Puig i Cadafalch. https://www.amatller.org/linstitut/

ICMA ANNUAL BOOK PRIZE, SUBMISSIONS DUE 19 June 2026

ICMA ANNUAL BOOK PRIZE 

AUTHORS: NOTIFY YOUR PUBLISHER TO SUBMIT YOUR BOOK 
DUE FRIDAY 19 JUNE 2026 (for email submission, see below)

The ICMA invites submissions for the annual prize for best single- or co-authored (two or more authors) book on any topic in medieval art. To be eligible for the 2026 competition, books must have been printed in 2025. No essay collections, exhibition catalogues, or special issues of journals can be considered. 

The competition is international and open to all ICMA members. To join or renew, click here. A statement of current membership is required with each submission.

Languages of publication: English, French, German, Italian, or Spanish

Prize: US $1,000 to a single author, or US $1,000 split equally between co-authors.
 

Submission of books: only printed books are eligible for the prize. A statement of current ICMA membership must accompany each submission. 

Presses and self-nominations: books must be sent directly to the jury members. Please email BookPrize@medievalart.org with the title(s), author(s), and press name. If self-nominating, please send along your press contact’s email.

ICMA Reception at ICMS Kalamazoo - Friday 15 May 2026 at 7pm (6:30pm Student Meet and Greet)

ICMA Reception at the International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo
Friday 15 May 2026

6:30pm - Student Meet and Greet
7:00pm - Reception (open to all)

RSVP HERE

 

Join ICMA members and the ICMA community for a special off-site reception near campus (approximately a 10-20 minute walk) on Friday 15 May 2026 from 7pm-9pm. Students are invited to join early at 6:30pm to meet other student colleagues. Light bites provided while supplies last. Complimentary beer, wine, cider, and alcohol-free drinks all night; mixed drinks available for purchase.

University Roadhouse (upstairs)
1332 W. Michigan Ave (MAP)
Kalamazoo, MI 49006

RSVP HERE
RSVP not required, but it is helpful!

ICMA at International Congress on Medieval Studies Kalamazoo 2026: Sponsored Sessions + Reception

ICMA at International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo
Sponsored Sessions and Reception
Friday 15 May 2026


Flesh and Form: The Marked Body in Material and Visual Culture
Session 144, Sangren Hall 1740 at 8:30am ET

Queer(ing) Medieval Art: Queer Spatiality
Session 224, Sangren Hall 3110 (hybrid) at 1:30pm ET

Reception
University Roadhouse at 7pm ET (6:30pm students)

Friday 15 May 2026, 8:30am ET
Session 144, Sangren Hall 1740

Flesh and Form: The Marked Body in Material and Visual Culture


Presider: Theresa Flanigan, Texas Tech University; Janis Elliott, Texas Tech University
Organizer: Katharine Denise Scherff, Northwestern State University of Louisiana

The Wound Man’s Marked Body: Violence in Late Medieval Medical and Devotional Discourse  Claudia Haines, Case Western Reserve University

The Saintly and the Sublime: The Queered Body of St. Christopher in Speculum naturale  Oliver Benjamin Gratzinger, Duquesne University

Jewish Liturgical Gestures in Early English Manuscripts: The Durham Ritual and Its Illustrations  Tiffany Beechy, Univ. of Colorado–Boulder

Respondent: Katharine Denise Scherff, Northwestern State University of Louisiana

Friday 15 May 2026, 1:30pm ET
Session 224, Sangren Hall 3110 (hybrid)

Queer(ing) Medieval Art: Queer Spatiality


Presider: Erika Loic, Florida State University
Organizer: Kris N. Racaniello, Graduate Center, CUNY; Erika Loic, Florida State University

Poetry and Miniature as Queer Domains: An Interdisciplinary Study of Gender in Premodern Iran Ali Bahranipour, Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz

Queering the Gaze: Reimagining Gender and Sexuality in Medieval Indian Miniature Paintings: Uncovering Hidden Desires and Gender Fluidity in Mughal and Rajput Miniatures Rohan Yadav, Independent Scholar

Erotic Spaces and Voyeurism in the Works of Obaid Zakani: Representation of Body, Place, and Desire in the Poetry of the Fourteenth-Century Shiraz School Seyedh Zahra Zarei, Independent Scholar

The Spatiality of Erotic Sovereignty: Mahmud, Ayaz, and the Mytho-Historical Orientation of Desire Gilad BenDavid, Graduate Center, CUNY / Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz– Max-Planck-Institut

ICMA Reception
Friday 15 May 2026

6:30pm - Student Meet and Greet
7:00pm - Reception (open to all)

RSVP HERE

Join ICMA members and the ICMA community for a special off-site reception near campus (approximately a 10-20 minute walk) on Friday 15 May 2026 from 7pm-9pm. Students are invited to join early at 6:30pm to meet other student colleagues. Light bites provided while supplies last. Complimentary beer, wine, cider, and alcohol-free drinks all night; mixed drinks available for purchase.

University Roadhouse (upstairs)
1332 W. Michigan Ave (MAP)
Kalamazoo, MI 49006

RSVP HERE
RSVP not required, but it is helpful!


*note: this is not listed in the official ICMS program since it is an off-campus event.

Call for Proposals: ICMA-Sponsored Session at 2027 International Congress on Medieval Studies Kalamazoo, due Sunday 17 May 2026

Call for Proposals
ICMA-Sponsored Session
International Congress on Medieval Studies 2027
Kalamazoo and online, 13-15 May 2027
due Sunday 17 May 2026
Submit proposals HERE

The International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA) seeks proposals for sessions to be held under the organization’s sponsorship at the International Congress on Medieval Studies (ICMS) at Kalamazoo. Session organizers and speakers must be ICMA members.  
 
Proposals to the ICMA must include a session abstract and a CV of the organizer(s). A list of speakers is not required at the time of application. Organizers will have the opportunity to send out a call for papers after the session is selected by the ICMA and has been approved by the Congress Committee in July.
 
Upload your proposals HERE by Sunday 17 May 2026. 
 
Please direct all inquiries to the Chair of the Programs & Lectures Committee: Alice I. Sullivan, Tufts University, USA, alice.sullivan@tufts.edu 
 
The ICMA Programs & Lectures committee will select a session to sponsor and will notify the successful organizer(s) by 27 May 2026. The organizer(s) will then submit the ICMA-sponsored proposal to the ICMS by 1 June 2026. 

ICMA in Minnesota: Laboratories of the Senses: Medieval Manuscript Facsimiles From Production to Pedagogy, Saturday 9 May 2026. Register today!

ICMA in Minnesota
Laboratories of the Senses: Medieval Manuscript Facsimiles From Production to Pedagogy


A workshop organized by William North with a presentation by Giovanni Scorcioni, founder of FacsimileFinder.com


Saturday 9 May 2026, 9:30am - 3pm
Carleton College
Register HERE

ICMA members are invited to a workshop in Minnesota presented at Carleton College on Saturday 9 May 2026. Facsimiles of medieval manuscripts offer scholars and students opportunities to experience and investigate in depth these complex products of medieval minds and hands. Medieval and Renaissance Studies at Carleton College is pleased to welcome Giovanni Scorcioni, founder of FacsimileFinder.com and expert in facsimile production, to lead a day of engagement with this important tool for our research and teaching. In addition to presentations by Giovanni Scorcioni, the day will include time to share successful facsimile-based assignments, to discuss challenges, and to workshop assignments with facsimiles to hand.


Organized by William North. Questions? Please contact wnorth@carleton.edu
Register HERE

International Center of Medieval Art's IDEA Lecture: 30 April 2026 in Toronto: Alka Patel - 'The World in Her Embrace’: Cambay and the Medieval Indian Ocean World

International Center of Medieval Art’s IDEA Lecture

Alka Patel
'The World in Her Embrace’: Cambay and the Medieval Indian Ocean World


Thursday 30 April 2026, 6pm ET
Art Gallery of Ontario
Toronto, Canada

in-person and online
reception to follow for in-person attendees

Register HERE

Martin Waldseemüller, Tabula Moderna Indiae, Strasbourg, 1513. Latin; hand-coloured on paper, 40 x 56 cm.  © The Barry Lawrence Ruderman Map Collection, David Rumsey Map Center, Stanford Libraries. 

Early modern and later maps clearly illustrate the port of Cambay’s (Khambhat) position as  the central axis of the Indian Ocean world, attracting the commercial attention of European  merchant guilds, and eventually the colonial desires of several monarchies. Cambay and other  South Asian port cities figure prominently in historical scholarship, serving as the specific  nodes within transregional networks enabling the circulation of people, things and ideas  across the world prior to the locomotive age.  

Less understood are the intraregional nexuses in which these port cities played constitutive  and determining roles – nexuses that ultimately made worldwide trade and travel possible.  Diverging from textual-archival approaches, this presentation relies on Cambay’s material 

cultural productions as primary sources for its fourteenth-century history, when the port and  the region were at the height of their worldwide economic and cultural prominence. The  Object (writ large) as a primary source is positioned to elucidate not only the raisons d’être for global trade’s convergence on Cambay and northwestern India, collectively it also  furnishes unique perspectives on the encounter between the “local” and the “global”  throughout the medieval Indian Ocean world.

Alka Patel is a leading expert on the architecture of South Asia and its connections with Iran and Central Asia, including overland and Indian Ocean maritime networks. Her works include Building Communities in Gujarat: Architecture and Society during the Twelfth-Fourteenth Centuries (Brill 2004) and Communities and Commodities: Western India and the Indian Ocean, for which she was guest editor of a special issue of Ars Orientalis XXXIV (2004). She received her B.A. from Mount Holyoke College and her PhD from Harvard University (2000), and currently teaches at Aix-Marseilles Université in the Laboratoire d'Archéologie Médiévale et Moderne en Mediterranée.

This event is co-sponsored by the Department of Visual Studies, University of Toronto Mississauga; the Department of Historical Studies, University of Toronto Mississauga; the Department of Art History, University of Toronto; Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto; the Art Gallery of Ontario; and the International Center of Medieval Art.

About the International Center of Medieval Art’s IDEA Lecture
Convened by the IDEA (Inclusivity, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility) Committee, the International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA)’s IDEA Lecture showcases research that engages, in content, method, or disciplinary practice, issues of inclusivity, diversity, equity, and accessibility.

Call for Participation: ICMA Book Prize Jury, due 27 April 2026

ICMA Book Prize Jury

Call for Participation

Due Monday 27 April 2026


The ICMA Book Prize is an international, annual prize open to single- or co-authored books on any topic in medieval art. The Jury is responsible for reading and considering each submission. The Book Prize accepts submissions in English, French, German, Italian, or Spanish. 


We are seeking three volunteer jury members to fulfill varied terms: one 1-year term (for 2026), one 2-year term (for 2026 and 2027), and one 3-year term (2026, 2027, and 2028). 

  • The time commitment will be 40+ hours per year, with most of the activity taking place during the June-October period and additional deliberations as needed through the end of the calendar year.

  • The number of submissions varies per year (as does workload), but typically 10-20 submissions are anticipated.

  • Candidates based in any part of the world are welcome to apply; jurors must remain active members of the ICMA throughout their term.

  • We seek an intellectually and institutionally diverse Jury capable of evaluating the field’s many flourishing areas of research. Candidates working in all subfields of medieval art history are welcome to apply.   

  • Candidates must hold a PhD or equivalent experience


Please apply HERE by uploading your CV and completing a brief application, including your area of expertise and a paragraph about why you’d be willing to serve on the Jury.

ICMA Student Travel Grants - due Monday 27 April 2026

STUDENT TRAVEL GRANTS
due MONDAY 27 APRIL 2026, 11:59pm ET

Applicants submit materials HERE.
Thesis advisor submit letter of recommendation HERE.

The ICMA offers grants for graduate students in the early stages of their dissertation research, enabling beginning scholars to carry out foundational investigations at archives and sites. Winners will be granted $3,000, and if needed, officers of the ICMA will contact institutions and individuals who can help the awardees gain access to relevant material. Three grants are awarded per year, and they are designed to cover one month of travel. 

The grants are primarily for students who have finished preliminary exams, and are in the process of refining dissertation topics. Students who have already submitted a proposal, but are still very early on in the process of their research, may also apply.  

NOTE: All funds must be expended by 31 December 2026.

All applicants must be ICMA members.

Applicants must submit:

  1. Outline of the thesis proposal in 800 words or less.

  2. Detailed outline of exactly which sites and/or archives are to be visited, which works will be consulted, and how this research relates to the proposed thesis topic. If you hope to see extremely rare materials or sites with restricted access, please be as clear as possible about contacts with custodians already made.

  3. Proposed budget (airfare, lodging, other travel, per diem). Please be precise and realistic. The total need not add up to $3,000 precisely. The goal is for reviewers to see how you will handle the expenses.

  4. Letter from the thesis advisor, clarifying the student’s preparedness for the research, the significance of the topic, and the relevance of the trip to the thesis.

  5. A curriculum vitae.                  

Upon return, the student will be required to submit a letter and financial report to the ICMA and a narrative to the student section of the Newsletter.

Applications are due by MONDAY 27 APRIL 2026, 11:59pm ET. The winners will be notified in June 2026.

NOTES ON FILE SUBMISSION: Please upload PDFs (.jpg, .png also accepted) with the file named as LAST NAME first, then the item. Example: SMITHcv.pdf, SMITHbudget.pdf, SMITHthesis.pdf, etc.

Similarly, please notify the thesis advisor to name the file as STUDENT LAST NAME first, then the item. Example: SMITHletter.pdf

Applicants submit materials HERE.
Thesis advisor submit letter of recommendation HERE.

Email questions to Ryan Frisinger at awards@medievalart.org. The winning applications will be chosen by members of the ICMA Grants and Awards Committee, which is chaired by our Vice-President.


STUDENT RESEARCH GRANT: DUE MONDAY 27 APRIL 2026

Student Research Grant
due MONDAY 27 APRIL 2026, 11:59pm ET

 

Upload materials HERE

This grant of $500 is intended to encourage an early-stage graduate student (someone enrolled in a post-baccalaureate graduate program, who may have received a MA or MPhil, or who is otherwise pre-ABD) to pursue research on cross-cultural visual connections involving art produced in parts of the medieval world that until recently have been studied separately. To be eligible, applicants must be involved in research on the connections between art of at least two of the following broadly-defined regions:  

  • Africa

  • Asia

  • Europe and Byzantium

  • North Africa, the Middle East, and the Near East

Funds awarded could be used to defray expenses of attending or presenting at a conference or visiting a museum, archive, or site. Applicants must be members of the ICMA (information on memberships can be found here).
 
We are grateful to Robert E. Jamison, Professor Emeritus of Mathematics, Clemson University, for underwriting this grant. The grant recipient is to send their winning application directly to Robert E. Jamison as soon as the award is announced.

The deadline for submission is MONDAY 27 APRIL 2026, 11:59pm ET.  The winners will be notified in June 2026. Recipients will be asked to forward their winning application to Robert E. Jamison.

 
Applicants must submit: 

  1. Description of the project to be undertaken, in 400 words or less.

  2. Proposed budget.  Please be precise and realistic: if the budget exceeds $500, state how you will cover the remaining portion of the cost.

  3. A curriculum vitae.            

NOTE ON FILE SUBMISSION: Please submit PDF files when appropriate with the file named as LAST NAME first, then the item. Example: SMITHdescription.pdf, SMITHbudget.pdf, SMITHcv.pdf


All applicants must be ICMA members.
All submissions are to be uploaded HERE.


A parallel grant is available via The Association Villard de Honnecourt for the Interdisciplinary Study of Technology, Science, and Art (AVISTA).  Students may apply for both the ICMA and the AVISTA grants but would be eligible to receive only one of the awards. 

Email questions to Ryan Frisinger at awards@medievalart.org. The winning application will be chosen by members of the ICMA Grants and Awards Committee, which is chaired by our Vice-President.

Map of the world; with windfaces along upper and lower edge; stencil-coloured illustration to Ptolemy, 'Cosmographia', Ulm: Leonhard Holl, 1482. Coloured woodcut. © The Trustees of the British Museum Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) license.

ICMA-Kress Exhibition Development Grant - due Sunday 3 May 2026

ICMA-KRESS EXHIBITION DEVELOPMENT GRANT
Deadline for applications: SUNDAY 3 MAY 2026, 11:59pm ET

Upload materials HERE

Thanks to the generosity of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, ICMA members are eligible to apply for an ICMA-Kress Exhibition Development Grant of $10,000 to support research and/or interpretive programming for a major exhibition at an institution that otherwise could not provide such financial support. Members from all geographic areas are welcome to apply.

As an organization, the ICMA encourages scholars to think expansively, exploring art and society in “every corner of the medieval world,” as characterized in our mission statement. With this grant, we hope to encourage colleagues to develop innovative exhibition themes or bring little-known objects before new audiences. We also aim to enhance the impact of exhibitions by supporting related lectures or symposia.

ICMA-Kress Exhibition Development Grant can be used to fund travel in the research and preparation stages of an exhibition and/or to underwrite public programming once a show is installed. This grant is designed to assist with an exhibition already in the pipeline and scheduled by the host museum.

We ask applicants to upload to the ICMA submission site:

  • Applicant’s cv

  • Description of the exhibition and its goals, including an overview of the structure of the exhibition – themes and estimated number of objects in each section of the show – and dates of the exhibition

  • Statement of other sources of funding both secured and provisional, with specifics on the amounts already awarded and expenses to be covered by secured and provisional funding

  • Sample wall panel for a subsection of the exhibition and sample labels for 3-4 examples of works in the show

  • If the applicant seeks funds to travel to see objects for inclusion in the exhibition, a list of institutions to be visited, names of contacts at each, and key objects (with accession numbers) to be inspected

  • If the applicant seeks funds for exhibition programming, specific information on gallery talks, public lectures, or symposium, with anticipated names of speakers and estimated dates

  • Letter of support from the Museum Director or Curator with whom the applicant is working, confirming that the exhibition will be mounted

  • If funds will be used toward a lecture or symposium connected to an exhibition, letter of support from institutional administrator/s (Dean, Provost, or Museum/Gallery Director) confirming that space at the organizer’s institution will be made available for the event/s

Applications will be reviewed by the ICMA Grants & Awards Committee and approved by the ICMA Executive Committee. The recipient will be notified in June 2026. An update report from the recipient will be due in December 2026.

Questions can be addressed to Ryan Frisinger, Executive Director, at awards@medievalart.org

Upload materials HERE


ICMA News, Spring 2026 now available online

ICMA News               

Spring 2026
Alice Isabella Sullivan, Editor

Click here to read.
Also available on www.medievalart.org

This issue marks the first ICMA News under the new editorship of Alice Isabella Sullivan.

INSIDE

COMMEMORATIONS
Stephen N. Fliegel (1950–2025)
John Lowden (1953-2026)

SPECIAL FEATURES

Reflections on the exhibition – Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry by Larisa Grollemond, Alixe Bovey, and Anna Russakoff

Exhibition Reports

Spectrum of Desire: Love, Sex, and Gender in the Middle Ages by Kris N. Racaniello

Le Moyen Âge du 19ème siècle: Créations et faux dans les arts précieux by Brigitte Buettner

Realms of the Dharma: Buddhist Art Across Asia by Bryan C. Keene


EVENTS AND OPPORTUNITIES

The deadline for the next issue of ICMA News is 15 June 2026. Please send information to newsletter@medievalart.org 

If you would like your upcoming conference, CFP, or exhibition included in the newsletter please email the information to EventsExhibitions@medievalart.org.

JOB ALERT: Coordinator for Digital Engagement, applications due Sunday 12 April 2026

CALL FOR APPLICATIONS

COORDINATOR FOR DIGITAL ENGAGEMENT
DUE SUNDAY 12 APRil 2026, 11:59PM ET


The International Center of Medieval Art (the “ICMA”) invites applications for a Coordinator for Digital Engagement. Established in 1956, the ICMA continues to go strong, thanks, in part, to our aim to serve the needs and interests of our members. Through our digital presence, we strive to reach an ever-developing community of scholars, curators, and enthusiasts committed to exploring the art and architecture of the medieval realm, broadly defined.

The Coordinator for Digital Engagement will work remotely, approximately 10 hours per month on a flexible schedule, and may reside anywhere. Reliable internet and computer access are required. All are welcome to apply; preference given to those pursuing a career in medieval art history.

The Coordinator will collaborate with the ICMA President, Vice President, Committee Chairs, and Executive Director on projects relating to online programming that serve the needs of scholars, instructors, museum professionals, and other enthusiasts and specialists in medieval art history. These projects and tasks include: handling technical aspects of online workshops and lectures, such as multi-speaker panels; managing large group meetings, such as a Town Hall; editing video and audio recordings for posting to the ICMA website; and collaborating with the Digital Resources Committee to maintain and innovate upon our existing website resources, including social media.

Essential skills: facility with Zoom (meetings and webinars); experience with voice and video editing and with podcast software; familiarity with website platforms such as Squarespace; competency with basic HTML and basic photo/video editing software; comfort interacting with a broad membership during live events and fielding questions; eagerness to work with the leadership and members of the ICMA; and overall aptitude for public-facing work.

The International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA) is dedicated to the support of the study, understanding, and preservation of visual and material cultures produced primarily between ca. 300 CE and ca. 1500 CE in every corner of the medieval world. The organization embraces diversity in all forms, serving a membership of scholars with a variety of racial, ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic backgrounds, religious beliefs, and gender identities, among other factors. We encourage applications from candidates committed to forging and sustaining the ICMA’s multifaceted diversity and to being part of a community in which all are warmly welcomed and encouraged to succeed.

Please upload a CV, list of three references, and letter of interest (no more than two pages, single spaced) describing: (1) your research expertise; (2) the history of your engagement, if any, with the ICMA; (3) your knowledge of relevant digital platforms. Finalist candidates will be invited for interview in late April/early May 2026.

Upload application HERE

Deadline for Applications: Sunday 12 April 2026, 11:59pm ET
Term: Beginning May 2026
Compensation: $20/hr for approximately 10 hours per month; no fringe benefits

Email icma@medievalart.org with any questions.

ICMA Reception at the Medieval Academy of America's Annual Meeting: Friday 20 March 2026 at 6:30pm (Smith College Museum of Art)

The International Center of Medieval Art is co-sponsoring a special viewing and reception for Medieval Academy of America’s Annual Meeting attendees at the Smith College Museum of Art on Friday 20 March 2026, beginning at 6:30pm.

Check the Annual Meeting program for further information; a bus from the UMass Hotel at 6:30 is available, but pre-registration is required.

https://maa2026.wordpress.amherst.edu/

ICMA-Sponsored Keynote at the Canadian Conference of Medieval Art Historians (CCMAH): Friday 27 March 2026 in Toronto

The ICMA is sponsoring the 2026 Keynote at the Canadian Conference of Medieval Art Historians (CCMAH)

Sarah Guérin
‘Gold of the Blacks’: Aureate Ambitions and the Eighth Crusade

Friday 27 March 2026 at 5:15pm
Art Gallery of Ontario
Toronto, Canada

The Eighth Crusade of 1270 still puzzles historians. Instead of Jerusalem, vulnerable Acre, or even Mamluk Egypt, the troops of Louis IX quixotically headed for Hafsid Tunisia, where the saintly king died of dysentery on African soil. I argue that Louis’s ambitions were fueled by the desire to control Tunis as an outlet of gold coming across the Sahara from West Africa, gold that was transforming the economy, arts, and material culture of Europe at this time. This talk will present evidence of the French kings’ and princes' knowledge that the gold obtained in Tunis indeed came from south of the Sahara, from a region called “The Land of the Blacks,” Bilad al-Sudan in the Arabic sources. Furthermore, the political jostling that led up to the 1270 crusade included not only Louis IX, Charles of Anjou, and Hafsid emir al-Mustanstir but also the head of an Ayyubid force roaming the Sahara in search of gold, Qarâqush, and the second-generation Black king of Kanem, whose territories were situated on the shores of Lake Chad, named in the emic sources as Mai Dunama Dabbalemi. I argue that the struggle to control West African gold bullion thus occupied rulers from across Afro-Eurasia in the mid-thirteenth century.

Registration for the conference can be found by clicking HERE.

Special viewing + reception for "Praymobil - Medieval Art in Motion", Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum, Aachen, 11 March 2026

Special invitation from our friends at the Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum

Praymobil: Medieval Art in Motion

Exhibition viewing + reception

Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum
Aachen, Germany

Wednesday 11 March 2026, 18:00-21:45

 

RSVP  info@suermondT-ludwig-museum.de

As the preview day of The European Fine Art Fair in Maastricht approaches on Thursday 12 March 2026, the Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum and Friends of the Museum welcome ICMA members to their museum in neighboring Aachen.

As in previous years, the team of the Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum in Aachen (Wilhelmstraße 18, 52070 Aachen) and the Friends of the Museum are delighted to invite you and your friends on Wednesday 11 March 2026 at 18.00 h (6 pm) to join us for a reception until approximately 21.45h.

This year we have the pleasure to offer you not only snacks and drinks but also an exclusive visit to our current exhibition Praymobil: Medieval Art in Motion. Michael Rief, Deputy Director of the museum and Curator of this critically acclaimed exhibition, will offer guided tours before the show closes on 15 March.

We’re looking forward to welcoming you and ask that you send a short RSVP to: info@suermondt-ludwig-museum.de

New Video! ICMA ViewPoints Book Launch, 'Queer Making: On Artists and Desire in Medieval Europe' by Karl Whittington

ICMA Viewpoints Book Launch

Queer Making: On Artists and Desire in Medieval Europe by Karl Whittington

Online, 17 February 2026 at 12-1:00 pm ET

with Karl Whittington (Professor of History of Art, The Ohio State University)

Melanie Holcomb (Curator of Medieval Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art), and

Roland Betancourt (Andrew W. Mellon Professor, National Gallery of Art; Chancellor’s Professor, Department of Art History, University of California Irvine)

To watch: https://www.medievalart.org/special-online-lectures

What role does desire play in the making of art objects? Art historians typically answer this question by referring to historical evidence about an artist’s sexual identity or to particular kinds of imagery. But what about anonymous artists? Or works whose subject matter is mainstream?

We know little about the identities and personalities of most premodern artists, but this should not hold us back from thinking about their embodied experience. In this book, Karl Whittington contends that we can “queer” the works of anonymous makers by thinking about their embodied experiences creating art. Considering issues of touch, pressure, and gesture across substances such as wood, stone, ivory, wax, cloth, paint, and metal, Whittington argues for an erotics of artisanal labor, in which the actions of hand, body, and breath interact in intimate ways with materials. Whittington takes seriously the agency of materials and technical processes, arguing that they necessarily placed the bodies of artists and artisans into physical situations and psychological states that can be read through the lens of desire.

Combining historical evidence with speculative description, this evocative set of essays broadens our understanding of the motivations and experiences of premodern artists. It will appeal to scholars and students of art history, medieval studies, gender studies, queer studies, and anthropology.

To purchase, visit https://www.psupress.org/books/titles/978-0-271-10042-5.html

ICMA in North Carolina: Study visits to the North Carolina Museum of Art, Duke University Libraries, Nasher Museum of Art, and Ackland Art Museum: 26-28 February 2026 - REGISTER TODAY!

ICMA in North Carolina
Study visits to the North Carolina Museum of Art, Duke University Libraries, Nasher Museum of Art, and Ackland Art Museum
Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill, North Carolina
Thursday 26 February-Saturday 28 February 2026

Register HERE

ICMA members and local medievalists are invited to a special tour of medieval collections in North Carolina on 26-28 February 2026. This is a multi-day event with multiple site visits. Attendees are responsible for transportation and travel costs between venues. Lunch and refreshments will be provided on Friday, 27 February.


SCHEDULE

Thursday 26 February 2026 at the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, North Carolina

  • Afternoon session (1pm-4pm) featuring a conversation in the medieval gallery and with objects in storage with curator Lyle Humphrey 

  • Tour of the exhibition The Book of Esther in the Age of Rembrandt with curator Michele Frederick (more information HERE)

Friday 27 February 2026 at Duke University Libraries and the Nasher Museum of Art in Durham, North Carolina

  • Morning session (10am-11:30am) on medieval manuscripts with Kate Collins and Mina Moon-Black at Duke University Libraries

  • Lunch will be provided

  • Afternoon session (2pm-4pm) at the Nasher Museum of Art with curator Katherine Werwie. This will include a tour of the medieval gallery and a study storage visit, with a focus on recent testing on a head from Notre-Dame Cathedral.

Saturday 28 February 2026 at the Ackland Art Museum in Chapel Hill, North Carolina

  • Morning session (10am-12pm) with curator Dana Cowen on their Islamic, medieval, and early modern collections 


Space is limited. Please indicate which part of the program you will attend. Priority will be given to those who attend all sessions.

Register HERE