Traditionally sight has been the only sense with a ticket to enter the museum. The same is true of histories of art, in which artworks are often presented as purely visual objects. In The Museum of the Senses Constance Classen offers a new way of approaching the history of art through the senses, revealing how people used to handle, smell and even taste collection pieces. Topics range from the tactile power of relics to the sensuous allure of cabinets of curiosities, and from the feel of a Rembrandt to the scent of Monet's garden. The book concludes with a discussion of how contemporary museums are stimulating the senses through interactive and multimedia displays.
Classen, a leading authority on the cultural history of the senses, has produced a fascinating study of sensual and emotional responses to artefacts from the middle ages to the present. The Museum of the Senses is an important read for anyone interested in the history of art as well as for students and researchers in cultural studies and museum studies.
- 185 pages
- English
- PDF
- Available on iOS & Android
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Information
THE
MUSEUM
OF
THE
SENSES
10
Sealed
with
a
Kiss
The
cult
of
saintly
relics
reached
its
fullest
expression
in
the
Middle
Ages
when
churches
competed
over
the
importance
of
their
collections
and
pilgrims
made
long,
hard
journeys
to
visit
sacred
shrines.
The
most
popular
relics,
durable
and
pulsating
with
holy
vitality,
were
the
bones
of
saints.
These
were
often
enclosed
in
splendid
reliquaries
(Bagnoli
2011;
Figure
1.1).
Another
popular
kind
of
relic,
known
as
a
second-class
relic,
was
an
object
that
had
reputedly
come
into
close
contact
with
a
saint.
In
the
case
of
St.
Francis
of
Assisi,
for
example,
sandals
and
fragments
of
tunics
belonging
to
the
saint
served
as
relics.
The
most
valued
of
such
relics
were
treasures
indeed,
both
in
a
spiritual
and
monetary
sense.
When,
in
the
thirteenth
century,
the
Emperor
of
Constantinople
received
a
substantial
loan
of
gold
from
Venice,
he
provided
as
security
nothing
more
than
a
thorny
wreath
–
but
that
wreath
was
the
crown
said
to
have
been
worn
by
Jesus
when
he
was
crucified
(Figure
1.2).
Figure
1.1
Painted
medieval
reliquary
(courtesy
of
The
Walters
Art
Museum).
Table of contents
- Cover
- Contents
- List of Figures
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- 1 A Taste of Heaven: Relics and Rarities
- 2 The Feel of a Rembrandt: Paintings and Sculptures
- 3 The Lure of the Unseen: Egyptian Mummies
- 4 Conversation Pieces: The Arundel Collection
- 5 A Trail of Scent: The Afterlife of Collections
- 6 The Museum Retouched: From Empire of Sight to Sensory Playground
- References
- Index
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Yes, you can access The Museum of the Senses by Constance Classen in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Art & Museum Studies. We have over 1.5 million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.