Publications

At once collector, botanist, reader, artist, and patron, Agnes Block is best described as a cultural producer. A member of an influential network in her lifetime, today she remains a largely obscure figure. The socioeconomic and political barriers faced by early modern women, together with a male-dominated tradition in art history, have meant that too few stories of women's roles in the creation, production, and consumption of art have reached ...

While the terms ‘agency’, ‘collectivity’, and ‘social networks’ may seem anachronistic for the study of early modern women, these concepts were very much alive in that era and essential to women’s self-actualization. Using social network theory, feminist calls for intervention into his-tory, and conceptions of feminist collectivity (as derived from the 1970s Woman’s Building), we examine two examples of women’s involvement in professional arts. ...

Agnes Block (1629-1704) was an impressive individual: she assembled a large collection of books and naturalia; commissioned in excess of four hundred watercolors of flora and fauna; she was portrayed on canvas and paper and cast in metal as Flora Batava. She established Vijverhof, a country estate southeast of Amsterdam, where she developed her reputation for botanical knowledge and expertise. As a patron, collector, and amateur botanist, she ...

Although we are frequently confronted with an image of early modern Dutch women as existing primarily, if not exclusively, within the realm of household management, the reality was far more nuanced. A case study of Agnes Block (1629-1704) shows that by focusing on relationships, she succeeded in participating in the creation and dissemination of knowledge of botany in the public sphere and achieved recognition in that sphere, notwithstanding the ...

The wave of iconoclasm that swept through the Netherlands in the second half of the sixteenth century fundamentally altered the nature of religious artworks displayed in Dutch reformed churches. This cleanse, however, did not create a complete pictorial vacuum. If one looks closely at Pieter Saenredam's depictions of airy, whitewashed churches, one sees that the churches are not altogether unadorned: rectilinear panels in black, blue, or yellow, ...