AHIS10003 Chap.6 Early Modern Materiality and Modern Objecthood
Early Modern Materiality and Modern Objecthood
Week 5 pairs the two smallest-seeming objects in the subject with its largest claim: that what a thing is made of, and whether it counts as an object of analysis at all, are art-historical questions rather than preliminaries to them. A working notebook of 1866, 14.3 by 7.4 centimetres, holds financial accounts, diary entries and drawings in the same pages, and the week argues it deserves analysis in its own right.
A feathered headdress of the early sixteenth century was catalogued by European collections as a Moorish hat, an Indian hat, an Indian apron, a garment and cloak, a fan-like banner, an old Mexican splendid standard and finally a headdress. Both objects sit awkwardly in the category artwork, and the week's term objecthood names what that awkwardness reveals.
What this chapter covers
- 01
Materiality and objecthood as the week's two organising terms
- 02
Two objects that resist the category artwork for opposite reasons
- 03
A catalogue fact the university's own records do not settle: paper or cardboard
- 04
The 1866 voyage, and five explanations advanced against two the artist gave
- 05
Separating classes of evidence before weighing them
- 06
Aestheticism, the nocturne, and musical titling as an argument about autonomy
- 07
Japonaiserie against japonisme: surface borrowing against structural absorption
- 08
Ma, the charged interval, and what it lets you say about empty areas
- 09
The sketchbook as evidence: accounts, diary and drawings read together
- 10
Seven names in three centuries, and each one an interpretation
- 11
The Wunderkammer as the object's first institutional home
- 12
Vitrines as arguments, a copy in Mexico City, and the grounds for restitution
- 13
Featherwork as structure: the amanteca, frame-and-cord construction, 1,544 metal parts
What the inventories prove, and what they do not
- 1List the sequence and look for the pattern rather than summarising it.
- 2Show that it does not converge steadily on the right answer: the earliest entry assimilates an American object to the nearest familiar category of non-European luxury, and an 1879 entry still cannot decide between clothing and banner.
- 1Name what the labels actually track, and connect it to the object's first institutional home in a cabinet of wonders.
- 1State which source class is better evidence for Mexica use.
Key terms
- Materiality
- Meaning carried by the physical substance of a work rather than by its imagery.
- Objecthood
- A thing's standing as an object of analysis, including things art history has treated as mere artefacts.
- Aestheticism
- The doctrine that art needs no narrative or moral justification, summarised as art for art's sake.
- Nocturne
- The artist's own name for tonal, twilight, near-abstract marine pictures, borrowed from a musical form.
- Japonaiserie
- Surface borrowing of Japanese motifs.
- Japonisme
- Structural absorption of Japanese design principles, which is a different and deeper claim than japonaiserie.
- Ma
- A Japanese aesthetic term the lecture quotes with its published source, for the charged interval or betweenness separating people, sounds and objects.
- Wunderkammer
- The early-modern cabinet of wonders, a collection organised precisely around things that fit no existing category.
Early Modern Materiality and Modern Objecthood FAQ
Is the notebook made of paper or cardboard?
The subject's own records are divided two against two. The lecture programme and the week overview say paper covered with fabric; the caption page and the tutorial slides say cardboard covered with fabric. There is no basis in the materials for preferring either, so name both if the support matters to your argument, and make the argument survive either resolution.
Why did the artist sail to Valparaiso in 1866?
It is genuinely unresolved, and the lecture uses that. It sets out five explanations advanced about him, including health, escaping an artistic influence, family conflict, a whim and espionage, against two versions he gave himself. The exercise is not to pick a favourite but to notice that these are different classes of evidence and that the shape of the uncertainty is itself the finding.
What is the difference between japonaiserie and japonisme?
Japonaiserie is the surface use of Japanese motifs; japonisme is the structural absorption of Japanese design principles into how a picture is organised. Getting the pair the wrong way round is a recognisable first-year error, and the concept of ma, the charged interval, is what connects the empty areas of these pictures to japonisme rather than to mere emptiness.
Does it matter that Mexico City displays a copy?
The tutorial treats it as a real question rather than a concession. The replica is accessible, it is in the country the object came from, and it is hung upright and set low enough that visitors can pose for photographs beside it. Arguing that a copy can carry meaning is a defensible position, and museum staging is treated throughout the week as curatorial argument rather than as logistics.
Exam move
Two habits carry this week. First, read every catalogue line as evidence rather than as paperwork, since both objects here make their argument partly in their material specification. Second, when a record is divided, write the sentence that survives either resolution and name the division in passing.
For the headdress, learn the shape of the naming sequence rather than the seven labels individually, and be ready to sort restitution arguments into legal, ethical, conservation-related and political kinds, which is far more useful than arguing for or against in general.
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