Description
Book SynopsisIn Religion and the Arts: History and Method, Diane Apostolos-Cappadona presents an overview of the 19th century origins of this discrete field of study and its methodological journey to the present-day through issues of repatriation, museum exhibitions, and globalization. Apostolos-Cappadona suggests that the fluidity and flexibility of the study of religion and the arts has expanded like an umbrella since the 1970s - and the understanding that art was simply a visual exegesis of texts - to now support the study of material, popular, and visual culture, as well as gender. She also delivers a careful analysis of the evolution of thought from traditional iconographies to the transformations once scholars were influenced by response theory and challenged by globalization and technology. Religion and the Arts: History and Method offers an indispensable introduction to the questions and perspectives essential to the study of this field.
Trade Review'This short monograph (...) can be especially recommended to anyone either conducting or contemplating postgraduate research within an increasingly complex subject area (...). More seasoned scholars, too, seeking to identify the provenance, current trends, and future direction of their own research, will learn much from a text which at a mere 80 pages, is a miracle of compressed clarity, cultural breadth, and long-fermented relection. It also includes a wide-ranging, thematic, and up-to-date bibliography.' Graham Howes, Trinity Hall, Cambridge, Art and Christianity 95, autumn 2018 'In the first volume of the new Brill Research Perspectives series, Religion and the Arts: History and Method, editor-in-chief Diane Apostolos-Cappadona presents the reader a remarkable introduction, an overview, and a plethora of future perspectives (...) Although initially appearing as a neatly boxed topic, the relationship between religion and the arts provides an almost endlessly expanding field. As such, this inaugural Brill Research Perspectives volume is a brave undertaking, as well as a welcome resource for scholars trying to find their way in this vast field of opportunity.' Lieke Wijnia, Groningen University and University College Tilburg, Reading Religion, January 2019.
