Sources for the History of Art

or – how to know the history of a painting, a statue or a palace or a church

Teachers: Peter Buday, PhD.; Mgr. Martina Orosová, PhD.

Form of teaching: lecture with seminar (L:1 / S:1)

ECTS: 4

Objective:

The course is aimed primarily at students of art history, aesthetics, archives, museology and digitization of historical heritage, history, archaeology, but also for students interested in the history of art monuments, as well as architecture and urban planning.

They will learn about the importance of the auxiliary historical sciences (PVH) in the process of researching historical sources for art history. They will gain an overview of the functioning of memory institutions preserving relevant sources (archives, museums, galleries). They will be given information on how to obtain from map, pictorial or written sources knowledge about the origin or further existence of an architectural or, in a narrower sense, artistic work. At the end, they will independently collect and analyse this information in the form of a seminar paper.

Brief outline:

An introduction to historical sources in general;
Auxiliary historical sciences and their use in the study of historical sources for art history;
Memory institutions as the main repositories of sources;
Museums and heritage institutes as sources of knowledge of material artefacts;
Archives as repositories of written sources (a brief history of archives and archival organization in Slovakia; Archival holdings, personal holdings and collections; Archival aids and their use for the acquisition of information on the history of art)
Memory portals as a source of knowledge and sources for art history
Analysis, critique and interpretation of selected archival documents on art history (medieval - early modern - modern)
Excursion in a selected memory institution or lecture by a practitioner.

Requirements for completion of the course

Completion of the final colloquium (30% of the grade) and submission of a seminar paper (presentation of map, image and written sources relevant to the research of the selected architectural or pictorial work with commentary). The lecturers will accept a maximum of 3 absences.

Recommended reading:

KAČÍREK, Ľuboš – RAGAČ, Radoslav – TIŠLIAR, Pavol. Múzeum a historické vedy (vysokoškolská učebnica). Krakov : Spolok Slovákov v Poľsku, 2013.
LEHOTSKÁ, Darina. Príručka diplomatiky. Bratislava: SAS, 1972. LEHOTSKÁ, Darina. Základné diplomatické kategórie. Bratislava: UK, 1988.
BUZINKAYOVÁ, Anna et al. Príručka archivára. Bratislava: PT Servis spol. s r.o., 1999.
KOLLÁROVÁ, Zuzana a HANUS, Jozef. Sprievodca po slovenských archívoch. Prešov: Universum, 1999.
STIEBEROVÁ, Mária. Informatívny sprievodca štátnych archívov Slovenskej republiky I. Bratislava: MV SR, 2000;
MIŠOVIČ, Milan. Informatívny sprievodca štátnych archívov Slovenskej republiky II/1, II/2. Bratislava, MV SR, 2001.
RAGAČOVÁ, Júlia. Informatívny sprievodca osobitných archívov Slovenskej republiky. Bratislava: MV SR, 2001.