Sometimes there’s no substitute for seeing the object you are studying first hand. For more than three semesters, from a graduate seminar in medieval cathedrals, to intensive thesis research, art history graduate student Rebecca Teague has focused on the sculpture programs of three 12th-century cathedrals in three small towns in northern Italy. She is now writing her master’s thesis on the cathedral facades designed by the sculptor Niccolò in Verona, Piacenza and Ferrara. Teague’s research focuses on what may have shaped the iconography of the programs, especially local influences. “My thesis looks at some of the large-scale political issues going on at the time of the cathedral was built, filtered through a local lens," she said. "Why, for example, was a less common historical figure or saint chosen over one more commonly used? You have to delve into what the local people valued, what the local culture was like at the time. So, not only do sources for some of this imagery come from farther afield, such as the Lateran in Rome, but there are similar examples of the imagery at sites nearby.” Then, during a study-abroad trip with the Department of Art and Art History last May, Teague got to see the cathedrals in context. She was able to visit Rome, Florence and Venice with the student group and served as a teaching assistant to Dr. Tanja Jones, who is also her thesis advisor. After the main part of the trip was over, Teague and Dr. Jones made a side trip to Verona, to view first hand the cathedral doorways at Verona, and nearby Piacenza and Ferrara. Teague made her home base in Verona for four days. Each day she would work on one of the cathedral sculpture programs. She traveled to each town to experience the space, take photos and make notes about details that particularly struck her as she viewed the work up close. To get to Ferrara, for example, she traveled by train, which took a little over an hour. Once there, she explained, “I would spend the rest of the morning taking photos of the cathedral all the way around.” After lunch, she returned to the cathedral square to take more photographs. “I would look at the interior and take photos of the architectural plans that nearly every church displays in the crypt. I would also often take a walk in the area surrounding the church and make notes about nearby buildings. Then I would check to see if the same buildings were around during the time period that the cathedral was being built.” Getting to see the buildings and their sculptures up close, and to explore the town around the cathedrals, some of which existed in the 12th century, helped her understand their reality. She said, “I devoted all my time to the actual experience of the space,” and saved researching sources for when she was back in the US. This fall, with her thesis almost completed, Teague hadn't forgotten about the real-life experience of her research subjects. She still sounded in awe of the scale of the architecture she was able to see: “I got a sense of how weathered they are, how large they are, their sense of power.” Rebecca Teague received the BA in psychology at Auburn University at Montgomery before being accepted in the MA program in art history at The University of Alabama, where she was awarded a teaching assistantship for three years. In 2017, she was awarded a mid-year Academic Merit Scholarship from the Joseph and Carolyn Bolt Endowed Support Fund in Art History. At the 22nd Annual Graduate Student Symposium in Art History, she won second place for the Harrison Award for Excellence in Research – Graduate Paper Presentation for her paper, “Nanni di Banco’s St Luke as a Statement Against Albizzi Control.” After defending her thesis, “Carving Politics: Niccolò’s Façades at Piacenza, Ferrara, and Verona Cathedrals,” Teague hopes to graduate in December and take some time off before she continues her studies in Romanesque art in a doctoral program. For information about UA Art and Art History's programs, go to: https://art.ua.edu/academics/. For information about our trip to Spain in 2019, go to: https://art.ua.edu/study-abroad/
Art Students Find Synergy in European Study Abroad
In May, UA instructor of photography and digital media Lee Black and students delved deep into art and the psyche. Black and co-director Dr. Joy Burnham, Professor of Counselor Education, led eleven UA students on a May interim course to Switzerland and Austria titled, “UA in Europe: Finding Meaning - Synergy of Psychology & Art through Mind & Soul.” Describing the course, Burnham said, “This journey into Europe explores the rich history of psychology’s roots while also focusing on art from the same time period.” UA undergraduate and graduate students in art, psychology, counseling, speech and hearing, New College and business did assigned readings, research, art projects and writing, focusing on the theories of Freud, Adler, Jung and Frankl, leaders in the new field of psychology, and their contemporaries in art, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Black and Burnham led their students through museums and historic sites in the two countries and taught courses in digital media and counselor education. In art museums in Vienna, Zurich and Basel, the group viewed works by major artists such as Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele who were influenced by the new psychological ideas. They also visited sites such as the burial places of Beethoven and Mozart and toured the Mauthausen concentration camp. One of the highlights of the trip was their visit to the Jung Institute, once the home of Carl Jung, founder of analytical psychology, just outside of Zurich. There they attended a private lecture and were invited into Jung’s study where they met his grandson, who lives there now. Lee Black said she was inspired to be in the place where Jung studied and came up with his influential ideas about the human mind. “I was standing next to his desk where he wrote the Red Book [in which he developed his principal theories of the psyche]," she added, "He had books that were 400 to 500 years old in his library…it was profound.” New College senior SARAH JOHNS is working on her depth study in art therapy, which, she explains, "combines art and psychology - so this study abroad program was perfect for me!" Although apprehensive about traveling overseas, Johns' favorite experience turned out to be an unexpected ride up Mount Pilatus in Lucerne, Switzerland (6,982 feet above sea level). She added, "At the very least, I think I grew in terms of my confidence in my ability to operate independently." Senior BFA major in digital media and photography ALEX GREEN (who minors in art history) said that one of the best things about the trip was being able to see art works in person. “I’d never seen any major artists before this,” he said. His most memorable pieces were by Andy Warhol, Salvador Dali and Claude Monet in the Kunsthaus in Zurich and sculpture by Donald Judd in the Kunstmuseum in Basel. After the group trip, Green was able to stay on a few days and travel to Berlin, where he got to see the famous bust of Nefertiti at the Neues Museum. When he returned to Alabama, he took Art After World War II (ARH 381) with Tom Wegrzynowski during the summer semester (“I loved that class!”) and said that he reabsorbed much of what he had learned in Europe in a different way. When asked how this trip has affected him, Green expressed well the “synergy” of the experience of travel: “Honestly, my perspective on life has changed by being immersed in another culture.” Burnham and Black are working with UA Study Abroad to take another group of students in May of 2017. To find out more about this and other UA study abroad programs, check the Study Abroad “Start” page on the UA Study Abroad website or email studyabroad@ua.edu. Photo captions, top to bottom: 1. Sarah Johns and Megan Goldman in the Secession Building, Vienna. Photo by Lee Black. 2. Lee Black teaches Courtney Potts' a tutorial in Photoshop during their trip. Photo by Joy Burnham. 3. UA students in Vienna, May, 2016, with Dr. Peter Hlebowitsh, Dean of the College of Education at UA. Photo courtesy of Lee Black. 4. Instructor Lee Black in the Leopold Museum in Vienna. Photo courtesy of Lee Black.