Transnational Circulation of Devotional Objects through Religious Orders: between the Iberian World and Rome

As the epicenter of the Catholic world, Rome occupied a powerful place in the imaginary of the Early Modern Age on a global scale. In turn, Rome was also recipient of ideas, people, and objects. Although these are commonplaces in the historiography, this workshop aims to analyze a specific kind of circulation within this context that has been less explored. It will focus on the religious agents who connected Rome materially with the Iberian world through the acquisition and distribution of a wide range of “travelling objects”, most by nature physically “small” which have failed to draw the attention of traditional art history.

Please follow the workshop also online on our Vimeo Channel: https://vimeo.com/event/4779475

Scientific Organization:
Luisa Elena Alcalá, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid
Margarita Vázquez Manassero, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid
Tristan Weddigen, Bibliotheca Hertziana-Max Planck Institute for Art History
Elena Amerio, Bibliotheca Hertziana-Max Planck Institute for Art History / UAM

PROGRAM

Tuesday, 2025, February 4

9:00 WELCOME AND OPENING REMARKS

Tristan Weddigen (Bibliotheca Hertziana) and Luisa Elena Alcalá (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid)

SESSION 1: MAKING ROME GLOBAL THROUGH OBJECTS, WORDS AND TEXTS

Chair: Luisa Elena Alcalá (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid)

9:30 Carmen Fernández-Salvador (Universidad San Francisco de Quito)

Traveling Objects and Portable Geographies: Transferring the Aura of Sacred Places (17th Century)

10:10 Anne Lepoittevin (Sorbonne Université)

Rome and the Market for Portable Works of Canonization (XVI-XVIII): from Agnus Dei to Devotional Medals

10:50 PAUSE

SESSION 2: DOCUMENTING JOURNEYS AND TRANSNATIONAL CIRCULATIONS OF DEVOTIONAL OBJECTS

Chair: Carmen Fernández-Salvador (Universidad San Francisco de Quito)

11:15 Elisa Frei (Goethe-Universität Frankfurt)

Transoceanic Odyssey: The Journey of an Italian Abbot and his Luggage from Rome to China via Brazil (circa 1700)

11:55 Steven W. Hackel (University of California, Riverside)

Franciscan and Jesuit Procurators and the Circulation of Sacred Catholic Art on the Northern Fringe of Viceregal New Spain

12:35 Vanina Scocchera (CONICET – Centro Materia, UNTREF)

Imágenes Supervivientes: Relatos Biográficos, Viajes Interoceánicos y Trayectorias Locales de Imágenes y Objetos de Culto Ignacianos (Siglos XVIII-XIX)

13:15 LUNCH

SESSION 3: TRANSCULTURAL EXCHANGE FROM THE NEW WORLD TO EUROPE

Chair: Peter Mason (Independent Scholar)

14:30 Guillermo Alfonso de la Torre y Lucquin (Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne)

Devotional and Travelling Jewelry from New Spain. The Franciscan Agency though a Tiny, Precious, and Desirable Object at the Early Modern period

15:10 Raphaèle Preisinger (University of Zurich)

The Global Circulation of the Martyrs of Japan. Disseminating the News of the 1597 Crucifixion via Religious Networks

15:50 Antonio De Caro (University of Zurich)

The Global Navigations of the Holy Mother. Early Modern Global Marian Devotional Images from Rome to Beijing

16:30 PAUSE

Chair: Samir Boumediene (Institut d'Histoire des Représentations et des Idées dans les Modernités, Lyon)

16:40 Renata Maria de Almeida Martins (Universidade de São Paulo- Projeto JP2 FAPESP Barroco-Açu)

Lacas y Marfiles de la Amazonía. Objetos Itinerantes y sus resignificaciones a partir de colores, barnices y plantas en los talleres de las misiones jesuíticas

17:20 Corinna Gramatke (Independent Researcher, Germany)

Transatlantic Circulation of Objects Obtained by Jesuit Procurators in the 18th Century and their Transcultural Linkage

Wednesday, 2025, February 5

Morning activity: visit to Museo Francescano - Istituto Storico dei Cappuccini (speakers only)

SESSION 4: RELIGIOUS AGENTS CONNECTING THE IBERIAN WORLD TO HOLY LAND AND ROME

Chair: Margarita Ana Vázquez Manassero (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid)

14:30 Paul Nelles (Carleton University)

«Grani benedetti». Papal Rosary Beads and Jesuit Networks in the Sixteenth Century

15:10 José Araneda Riquelme (Università degli studi Roma Tre - Proyecto “Misglob") and Mattia Corso (Università degli Studi Roma Tre)

From the Holy Land to the New World: Franciscan Almsgiving and Devotional Objects between the Middle East, Rome, and Spanish America (17th century)

15:50 Josefina Schenke Reyes (Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Santiago de Chile)

«They come from there blessed and touched in the Holy Sepulcher»: Relics and Sacred Objects from the Holy Land in the Viceroyalty of Perú (18th century)

16:30 PAUSE

16:40 Minou Schraven (Amsterdam University College- Real Academia de España en Roma)

The Lure of Rome and Papal Blessings: Spanish Nuns and the Careful Positioning of their Blessed Objects in Early Modern Catholic Devotional Worlds

17:20 Jorge Fernández-Santos Ortiz-Iribas (Universidad Rey Juan Carlos)

«Because the City is a Model of the Heavenly Kingdom»: The Devotional Agenda Underpinning the Model of Jerusalem the Jesuit Villalpando sent from Rome to be presented to Philip II of Spain

18:15 CLOSING REMARKS

Margarita Ana Vázquez Manassero (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid)

Elena Amerio (Bibliotheca Hertziana-Max Planck Institute for Art History / UAM)