Wilson, Bronwen

views updated

Wilson, Bronwen

PERSONAL:

Education: University of British Columbia, B.A., 1987, M.A., 1994; Northwestern University, Ph.D., 1999.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department. of Art History, Visual Art, and Theory, University of British Columbia, 403-6333 Memorial Rd., Vancouver, British Columbia V6T 1Z2, Canada. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Writer and educator. McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, assistant professor, 2000-05, associate professor, 2005-07; University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, associate professor, 2006—.

MEMBER:

Renaissance Society of America (chair of Dress and Identity conference, 2008), College Art Association (co-organizer and chair of Skepticism and the Arts conference, 2007).

AWARDS, HONORS:

Roland H. Bainton Prize, 2006, for The World in Venice: Print, the City, and Early Modern Identity.

WRITINGS:

The World in Venice: Print, the City, and Early Modern Identity, University of Toronto Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 2005.

Contributor to books, including In Firenze alla Vigilia del Rinascimento, edited by Maria Predelli, Cadmo (Turin, Italy), 2006; Mediterra-noesis: Voci dal Medioevo e Rinascimento Mediterraneo, edited by Roberta Morosini and Cristina Perissinotto, Salerno Editrice (Turin, Italy), 2007; and The Renaissance World, edited by John Martin, Routledge (New York, NY), 2007. Contributor of essays and articles to periodicals, including Renaissance Quarterly, Word & Image, Studies in Iconography, and Urban History.

SIDELIGHTS:

Writer and art historian Bronwen Wilson attended the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, where she received her B.A. in 1987 and her M.A. in 1994. She then graduated from Northwestern University with her Ph.D. in art history in 1999 before accepting a teaching position at McGill University's department of art history and communication studies, in Montreal, Quebec, in 2000. Wilson returned to the University of British Columbia in 2006 to fill an associate professor position in the department of art history, visual art, and theory. She has taught such courses as "The Politics of Style: Art, Patronage, and Publics in Sixteenth-Century Italy" and the "History of Art, Architecture, and Visual Culture in Italy, 1300-1700." Wilson has also contributed essays and articles to many publications in her field, including the Renaissance Quarterly, Word & Image, Studies in Iconography, and Urban History.

In 2006, Wilson was awarded the Roland H. Bainton Prize for The World in Venice: Print, the City, and Early Modern Identity, published by the University of Toronto Press in 2005. Sheila Das, a Letters in Canada contributor, stated: "In a fascinating and well-written study, Bronwen Wilson investigates the mutually constitutive relationship of print and identity in Venice by examining the visual strategies of constructing a consciousness of place, society and individuals through the media of maps, costume books, event depiction, and printed portraits," and she concluded that the text provides "a rigorous, engaging exploration of print media and self-awareness." Wilson includes mention of Lacanian psychological theory regarding identity and expression as well as Saussure's modern theory of signification to illustrate the important place print media occupied in Venetian culture and society and its lasting message. This "expanding image of the world," as a Reference & Research Book News article explained, became "projected in prints" and augmented an evolving relationship between not only the art and artist but also between the art and culture. Alexander Wilkinson, in his review for the Canadian Journal of History, claimed that Wilson's thesis addresses "the complex question of identity and identity formation," and "that, in the first great age of print, Venetian identity was informed not only by an expanding knowledge of the world and an increase in social exchanges, but also by new representational technologies such as cartography, engraving, and perspective. New visual experiences, according to Wilson, transformed the ways in which identities were fashioned." Wilkinson further stated that the text "is an impressively well-researched and well-conceived monograph." The World in Venice is organized into four main sections, or chapters, detailing printed maps and techniques, costumery and social stature, culture, and portraiture. Monika Schmitter, in a review for the Renaissance Quarterly, described the text as "an art history concerned primarily with visuality, the effects of images, rather than with objects," but added, "the book's main strength is its perceptive visual analysis." In other words, the text places the Venetian artistry in a cultural context rather than examining it as a solitary entity. Schmitter also stated, "The new diversity and accessibility of printed images shaped the way people saw themselves through imagining how they were seen by others. In this ‘mirroring’ activity, Wilson identifies the birth of the modern subject," and she acknowledged Wilson's "attempt to apply modern theories to an early modern context."

Wilson's research interests include Italian art, architecture, and visual history and culture between the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries, as well as artistic theories and interpretations, methodology and historiography, print culture, portraiture, and landscape. She has also chaired and organized conferences such as "Dress and Identity" and "Skepticism and the Arts" for the Renaissance Society of America and the College Art Association respectively.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Canadian Journal of History, September 22, 2006, Alexander Wilkinson, review of The World in Venice: Print, the City, and Early Modern Identity, p. 355.

Letters in Canada, winter, 2007, Sheila Das, review of The World in Venice, pp. 389-390.

Reference & Research Book News, August 1, 2005, review of The World in Venice, p. 43.

Renaissance Quarterly, June 22, 2006, Monika Schmitter, review of The World in Venice, p. 517.

Technology and Culture, October 1, 2006, Evelyn Lincoln, review of The World in Venice, p. 842.