ARTES / CEEH Scholarships Awards (2023-2024)
The four scholarships offered by ARTES with the support of the CEEH have been granted:
Travel scholarships
Philip Muijtjens, Cambridge University – £750 for travel to Burgos
A Spanish Patron in Fifteenth-Century Rome and Burgos: Bishop Juan Díaz de Coca (d.1477)
Born into a family of conversos, Juan Díaz de Coca (1389-1477) started his ecclesiastical career in Burgos and worked his way up to the papal court in Rome. During his life, Juan remained an important contact for political and artistic patronage between the Cathedral of Burgos, his alma mater, and the papal circles of Rome. As a result, Juan can be connected to several important instances of patronage in both cities. This project focuses on newly found documentary evidence on Juan de Coca’s artistic patronage in Burgos and Rome.
Megan Smith, Durham University – £850 for travel to Madrid, Toledo and Seville
In Ictu Oculi: Curation, Representation and Facsimiles in the Factum Foundation Display at Bishop Auckland’s Spanish Gallery
The Factum Foundation’s display in Bishop Auckland’s Spanish Gallery is the focus of my undergraduate dissertation. Factum have produced facsimiles of selected early modern Spanish works to create an immersive display intended to give a glimpse into the Spanish ‘Golden Age’. My research analyses Factum’s curatorial approach regarding the selection of artworks for replication, their assembly in an artificial gallery environment, and the meanings the works acquire in facsimile format and outside their original context. My project examines how visitors understand early modern Spain through the exhibit, and the effectiveness of a full-facsimile display of Spanish art in England.
Helena Santidrián Mas, Courtauld Institute of Art – £400 for travel to Santiago de Compostela
Two Annunciations from the Museo de la Catedral de Santiago de Compostela reconsidered: iconography, original placement and current display.
The aim of this project is to study two sculptural groups originally placed in the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, now held in its museum. One of them was made by a local workshop, the other one in Coimbra and probably brought to Santiago by Saint Isabel of Portugal in 1325. Their location inside the church and its chapels has changed over the centuries. The objective of my research is to reconstruct these location changes and the causes that provoked.
Scholarship for students studying for a PhD in the UK
Daniela Castro Ruiz, Durham University – £3000
The Bestiario de Don Juan de Austria in the Context of Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Spanish Illuminated Manuscripts
My PhD examines the Bestiario de Don Juan de Austria (c.1570), the only extant bestiary composed in Castilian and the only one that is extensively illustrated, offering depictions of a range of creatures, from the mythical (the unicorn, the phoenix, etc) through to the exotic (the parrot, the hippopotamus, etc) and the everyday (the dog, the dolphin, etc) in a range of natural landscape settings completed by signifiers of society. The aim is to understand the relationship between image and the text, looking principally at questions of visual reception.
Scholarship for the holder of a PhD from Spain
Dr Emma Cahill, University of Murcia – £3000
Portraiture, Gender, and the Construction of the Image of Power in the Beginning of the Royal Collection Trust and the Prado Museum.
This project studies the beginning of the Spanish and British royal collections with a special emphasis on portraiture and gender. Starting with Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand or Aragon and Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, the portrait exchanges between the Tudor dynasty and the Spanish Monarchy were the foundation of the extensive collections amassed by the royal houses of Great Britain and Spain. Women played an important role in this development but have been often overlooked. This study will vindicate their trailblazing role as patrons of the arts in the construction of the image of royal power.
