Chestertown, MD, February 27, 2007 — It will be a journey back to the Middle Ages via art and architecture when Robert A. Maxwell, Assistant Professor of Art History at the University of Pennsylvania, presents "Castles, Towns and the Problem of Romanesque Art" at Washington College's Casey Academic Center Forum on Thursday, March 1, at 4:30 p.m.
The Romanesque period is perhaps best known for its pilgrimage churches and great abbeys like Cluny, Moissac and Santiago de Compostela. The 11th and 12th centuries, however, saw the greatest flurry of building not along pilgrimage routes or in reclusive mountain passes, but in towns and around castles. Dr. Maxwell's lecture will explore this lesser known side of Romanesque production, focusing on the steep rise in urbanism in France's Aquitaine region. He will argue, furthermore, that attention to the urban quality of Romanesque production compels reconsideration of the great abbeys and reclusive pilgrimage sites and their place in the broader scope of medieval art.
Dr. Maxwell has written on sculpture, manuscripts and medieval art's historiography. Thursday's lecture draws from The Art of Urbanism in Medieval France, his forthcoming book on architecture and urbanism in the Romanesque period.
"Castles, Towns and the Problem of Romanesque Art" is presented by the Washington College Department of Art and the Department of History. Admission is free and open to the public.
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