Art History & Visual Material Culture webinar - ANN-SOPHIE LEHMANN (RUG): "Between Words and Things. Crispijn van de Passe’s Illustrates a Latin Primer for Johan Amos Comenius"

Prof. Dr. Ann-Sophie Lehmann, University of Groningen
‘Between Words and Things. Crispijn van de Passe’s Illustrates a Latin Primer for Johan Amos Comenius’

Abstract

When the eminent educator and religious reformer Comenius moved to Amsterdam in 1657, Crispijn de Passe II, who had an equally international pedigree and much experience with translating epistemic concepts into pictures, illustrated one of his Latin primers. In return for the generous support Comenius received from prominent Amsterdam citizens, he taught their sons Latin, using the said book. The exceptionally ‘thick’ historical context allows us to get a glimpse at how Comenius’ teaching philosophy was brought into practice. In particular, we may reconstruct how De Passe's engravings that differ entirely from the woodcuts made for the famous Orbis Pictus and have never been subject to art historical investigation, meticulously served an educational approach that advocated ‘learning by doing’.

About the speaker

Ann-Sophie Lehmann is professor for art history & material Culture at the University of Groningen, where her research explores how materials, tools, and practices partake in the meaning making of art. Lehmann studied art history at the of Universities of Vienna and Utrecht. She is editor of the series Studies in Art & Materiality (Brill) and serves on the editorial boards of the Netherlands Yearbook for History of Art and Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte.