People, Books, and Models: The Order of St John and the Circulation of Architectural Ideas between Malta and Europe
A three day conference {available remotely) on the circulation of architectural ideas, through treatises, drawings, and models, between Malta and various European centers in the 16th through 18th centuries.
Registration link: https://www.um.edu.mt/events/peoplebooksmodels2024/registration/
Zoom link: https://universityofmalta.zoom.us/j/93503465337
This conference aims at encouraging a multidisciplinary discussion, set in a broad European and Mediterranean context, of the spread of ideas, models for architecture, and construction techniques in Malta during the early modern age, via the networks of the Order of St John. In particular, it intends to investigate this dissemination of architectural theoretical and technical knowledge through the circulation of sources such as books, treatises, manuals of mathematics and geometry, catalogues and collections of architectural images and drawings, as well as people, from architects to patrons, from engineers to intellectuals. The conference also aims to address a thorny methodological issue: the origin, dispersion, and fragmentation of the Hospitaller conventual library and, at the same time, the genesis of the library collections in Malta that include architectural sources, especially -but not only- at the National Library, for a better understanding of their provenance and context.
Taking Valletta and its architecture and historical construction sites as the main starting point of this investigation, the key role played by the city-convent was twofold. On one hand, the city was the core of the Hospitaller network, mirroring in its palaces, construction sites, and library collections the European dimension of the Order’s political, social, and cultural relationships. For this reason, the intense exchange between Malta and the Hospitaller offices in Europe will also be considered as well as the reciprocal influences between the Order and various political powers. On the other hand, there were also in Malta other important political stakeholders -from the Diocese to the Inquisition, from the many religious orders (like the Jesuits) to private individuals and travelers- that diversified the cultural scenario in Malta. These all need to be further investigated.
Finally, interpreting the Order as a powerful engine for the European circulation of drawings, books, and architectural models, the conference aims at serving as a forum where new research and methodologies can be discussed and fostered, not only to explore Malta and the other European nodes of the Hospitaller network, but also to better understand the broader European context from an original perspective.
Contributions delving into the following key topics are very welcome, with a preferential attention to religious and civil architecture: migration of architectural languages, construction techniques, and circulation of drawings for architectural projects between the Maltese environment and Europe; analysis of architectural models from printed sources in the context of Hospitaller patronage; the genesis of the Maltese and Hospitaller libraries and book circulation and production (with a focus on architectural sources).
