Gender and Self-Fashioning at the Intersection of Art and Science : : Agnes Block, Botany, and Networks in the Dutch 17th Century / / Catherine Powell-Warren.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Amsterdam University Press Complete eBook-Package 2023
• VerfasserIn: Powell-Warren, Catherine,
• Place / Publishing House: Amsterdam : : Amsterdam University Press, , [2023]; ©2023
• Year of Publication: 2023
• Language: English
• Series: Studies in Early Modernity in The Netherlands ; 1
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (302 p.)

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 us. This book seeks to write Block and her contributions into the art and cultural history of the seventeenth-century Netherlands, highlighting the need for and advantages of a multifaceted approach to research on early modern women. Examining Block’s achievements, relationships, and objects reveals a woman who was independent, knowledgeable, self-aware, and not above self-promotion. Though her gender brought few opportunities and many barriers, Agnes Block succeeded in fashioning herself as Flora Batava, a liefhebber at the intersection of art and science.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Studies in Early Modernity in the Netherlands -- Table of Contents -- List of Figures and Photographic Credits -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- 1. Vijverhof and the Pursuit of Nature -- 2. Vijverhof in Context -- 3. Vijverhof as a Space of Knowledge Creation, Exchange, and Relationships -- 4. Becoming Flora Batava -- 5. Flora Batava in Context -- 6. The Bloemenboek and Block’s Watercolours: Self-Fashioning at the Intersection of Art and Science -- 7. The Bloemenboek as a Meeting Place and Visual Manifestation of Agnes Block’s Artistic Network -- Conclusion -- Appendix A -- Bibliography -- Index