This expert meeting will be based on conversations around drawings. We will bring together historians of art and science who work with early modern drawings. With short presentations of current research objects (drawings of all kinds), we will discuss how drawings on paper were part of a process of observation, thinking, and communicating. We will specifically look at materials involved, the processes used, the subjects depicted and the draughts(wo)men who produced the drawings.

The workshop brings together scholars from various disciplines to discuss the current state of research on architectural exchanges between the Low Countries and Florence at the time of the Renaissance. Focusing on exchanges from North to South, the aim is to improve our understanding of how the intense commercial, artistic, political and military ties with ‘le Fiandre’ have enriched Florence’s architectural culture.

How do representations of marginalized bodies challenge dominant narratives in history? What new realities are revealed about the absence and agency of Black Africans by a more global approach to the 14–17th centuries? The international conference Hidden in Plain Sight, co-hosted by the NIKI and NYU-Florence, will explore a range of interrelated themes, drawing from art history, anthropology, African studies, history, musicology, and other fields. By critically re-examining histories of colonialism and slavery, the event seeks to reshape our understanding of disciplinary boundaries and spark new scholarly debates.

The theme of the Last Days of the Virgin was a frequent subject of pictorial representation in the Mediterranean area from the ninth century to the end of the fifteenth century, despite the absence of any canonical evidence for Mary’s death and Assumption.

On the occasion of the exhibition ”Giovanni Stradano. Le più strane e belle invenzioni del mondo”, curated by Alessandra Baroni and held at Palazzo Vecchio in Florence (17 November 2023-18 February 2024), the Netherlands Interuniversity Institute for Art History (NIKI) organises an international conference on Johannes Stradanus and on the many ways in which the artist from Bruges,“with the flowers of his art, made Florence appear even more beautiful” (Van Mander).