16th Annual Undergraduate Art History Symposium
The 16th Annual Undergraduate Art History Symposium & UBC Undergraduate Journal of Art History and Visual Culture launch took place on Friday, October 20th, 2020, from 3:00 - 4:30pm over Zoom. This event was delayed from it’s original date in April due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and three of the presented papers were also published in the 11th annual issue of UJAH. Presented by the UBC Art History Students' Association, Undergraduate Journal of Art History, and the Department of Art History, Visual Art and Theory.
About the Symposium: We aim to foster a supportive environment for research at the undergraduate level. Students present their research in order to receive feedback and showcase undergraduate research on art history and visual culture. Their abstracts are published in the physical print publication of the UBC Undergraduate Journal of Art History, and the entire essays are made available online.
“Judith Slaying Holofernes: Artemisia Gentileschi's Feminist Expression of Revenge Violence?”
Héloïse Auvray
After a long period of marginalization from the baroque canon, Judith Slaying Holofernes by Artemisia Gentileschi has been rediscovered by art historians. Part of the painting’s reappraisal comes from the Feminist reading of Catharsis from male violence through revenge that can be read into the painting’s portrayal of two women working together to behead a tyrant. Gentileschi’s biography makes this recently popularized view of the painting quite convincing because it makes the painting appear to realize her fantasies for revenge against her rapist. However, it is reductive to both the artist and the painting’s subject to define them solely on the artist’s rape. The goal of this essay is to question the legitimacy of the biographical reading of Judith Slaying Holofernes, particularly in the context of its feminist appropriation, by analyzing its subject matter, form, and history. I compare various essays and scholarly writings supporting different points of view about the importance of incorporating her rape and the following trial in the interpretation of her work, and I challenge readings that prioritize Artemisia Gentileschi’s victim status before her identity as a woman and artist.
THE TAKING OF CHRIST: CARAVAGGIO AS THE LANTERN-BEARER
Alyssa Cayetano
FROM PROPAGANDA TO PARALYMPICS: IMAGES OF DISABILITY AS A MATTER OF OTHERING
Yasmine Semeniuk
MOMENTUM
Katja Lichtenberger