Women and the Art and Science of Collecting in Eighteenth-Century Europe (The Histories of Material Culture and Collecting, 1700-1950)

"Through both longer essays and shorter case studies, this book examines the relationship of European women from various countries and backgrounds to collecting, in order to explore the social practices and material and visual cultures of collecting in eighteenth-century Europe. It recovers their lives and examines their interests, their methodologies, and their collections and objects -- some of which have rarely been studied before. The book also considers women's role as producers, that is creators of objects that were collected. Detailed examination of the artefacts -- both visually, and in relation to their historical contexts -- exposes new ways of thinking about collecting in relation to the arts and sciences in eighteenth-century Europe. The book is interdisciplinary in its makeup and brings together scholars from a wide range of fields. It will be of interest to those working in art history, material and visual culture, history of collecting, history of science, literary studies, women's studies, gender studies, and art conservation"-- Provided by publisher Cover Half Title Series Title Copyright Dedication Contents List of Illustrations List of Tables List of Plates List of Contributors Acknowledgements Introduction: Women and the Cultures of Collecting Part I Artificialia and Naturalia 1 Science, Gender and Collecting: The Dutch Eighteenth-Century Ladies’ Society for Physical Sciences of Middelburg 2 Between Art and Science: Portraits of Citrus Fruit for Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici 3 Anne Vallayer-Coster’s Still Life With Sea Shells and Coral Part II Travel, Borders, and Networks 4 Maria Sibylla Merian: A Woman’s Pioneering Work in Entomology 5 Sarah Sophia Banks’s Coin Collection: Female Networks of Exchange 6 Conversing With Collecting the World: Elite Female Sociability and Learning Through Objects in the Age of Enlightenment 7 Portrait of Charlotte de France: From Naples to Sicily, a Collection in Transit 8 The Collecting Activity of Catherine II in Eighteenth-Century Russia: Pioneering Action or Sheer Demonstration of Power? Part III Displaying, Recording, and Cataloguing 9 ‘I Made Memorandums’: Mary Hamilton, Sociability, and Antiquarianism in the Eighteenth-Century Collection 10 Eleanor Coade, John Soane, and the Coade Caryatid 11 Anne Wagner’s Album (1795–1805): Collecting Feminine Friendship 12 An Art Cabinet in Miniature: The Dollhouse of Petronella Oortman Part IV Beyond the Eighteenth Century 13 Collection, Display, and Conservation: The Print Room at Castletown House 14 Olivia Lanza di Mazzarino (1893–1970): A Lady’s Collection of Eighteenth-Century Folding Fans Index