Prof. Dr. Isabelle Dolezalek
Junior professor for the History of Art (Middle Ages)
Office hours: appointment via e-mail
Office E.09
Phone: +49 (0)3834 420 3258
Mail: i.dolezalekuni-greifswaldde
Board member of the Mittelalterzentrum Greifswald
Key areas of teaching and research
European and Islamic arts of the medieval and early modern periods
Pre-modern art in the Mediterranean and Baltic Sea regions
Object biographies and medievalism
Theft and translocations of art and material culture
Medieval textiles
History of museums and museum education
The junior professorship covers the arts of the Middle Ages and of the Early Modern period. Within this frame, the focus lies on transcultural and global issues, as well as on interdisciplinary research. Teaching activities aim to convey a contextual understanding of how art was produced and perceived at different stages of its reception until today. Students will gain an awareness of art historical methods. Project-based teaching offers insights into museum work and academic practice.
| 2023 | Heinz Maier-Leibnitz-prize of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft |
From 10/2019 | University of Greifswald, junior professor for the history of medieval art. |
Since 05/2019 | Elected member of the Junge Akademie at the Berlin-Brandenburgische Academy of Sciences and Humanities and the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina. |
Since 10.2018 | Technische Universität Berlin, fellow in the research-cluster Translocations. Historical Enquiries into the Displacement of Cultural Assets, directed by Prof. Bénédicte Savoy. |
| 2016-2019 | TU Berlin, assistant at the chair of modern art history (Prof. Bénédicte Savoy). |
| 2012-2018 | Museum project Objets in Transfer. Concepts for the museographical display of transcultural interchange, SFB-Episteme in Motion (Freie Universität Berlin) and Museum für Islamische Kunst (SMB). |
| 05.2013 | Completion of PhD (summa cum laude), FU Berlin. |
| 2008-2012 | FU Berlin, doctoral researcher in the DFG Emmy Noether-junior research group Kosmos-Ornatus. Ornamente in Persien und Frankreich im Vergleich, directed by Dr. Vera Beyer. |
| 2006-2007 | Université Lyon II. Master 2 Histoire comparée des societés médiévales chrétiennes et musulmanes. |
| 2004-2005 | Warburg Institute, University of London, MA Cultural and Intellectual History 1300 – 1650. |
| 2001-2004 | Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London, BA in the History of Art. |
Treasure Finds as Translocal Heritage - part of the research cluster "Shared heritage" at the Interdisciplinary Centre for Baltic Sea Region Research at the University Greifswald (IFZO) in cooperation with the Stralsund Museum.
The Icelandic Artist Ólafur Elíasson is currently designing windows for the St. Nikolai cathedral in Greifswald. His designs are inspired by the works of Caspar David Friedrich. The windows are going to be first shown to the public in 2024 in celebration of Friedrich's 250th birthday.
An article by the NDR with more information can be found here [article is in German].
Member since 2022.
Das Netzwerk tritt an, den Umgang mit Vergangenheiten – spezifischer: mit Artefakten vorangegangener Zeiten – in der Zeit von 800 bis 1500 neu zu beschreiben. Die Phänomene, um die es uns geht, sind bisher unter verschiedenen Schlagworten innerhalb der Disziplinen verhandelt worden. Es sind einerseits historische Begriffe wie renovatio, auctoritas oder translatio, aber auch moderne Konzepte wie Kopie, Zitat, Adaption, Rezeption oder Retro-Stil, mit denen die historisch arbeitenden Fächer die bewusste Präsenz des Vergangenen in der eigenen Gegenwart zu greifen versuchen. Im Netzwerk werden die mit der Praxis der politischen und religiösen Indienstnahme „alter“ Objekte einhergehenden Konstruktionen und Konzeptionen von Zeitlichkeit diskutiert. Um vergleichbare Phänomene greifen zu können, macht das Netzwerk den Begriff der Zeitfuge im zweifachen Sinn fruchtbar, da mit ihm Brüche sichtbar werden und dennoch ein Zusammenhalt bedeutet werden kann. Uns interessiert die Frage nach der ästhetischen Wahrnehmung und Wertschätzung, die sich in der bewussten Sichtbarhaltung des Älteren ausdrückt, und die eigene Potentialität der so geschaffenen Verbindungen und Anpassungen. Diese Zeitfugen werden im Netzwerk analysiert und in einen eigenen theoretischen Rahmen gesetzt.
For more Information, click here.
| 03.2023 | Panel „Pre-modern provenance research: narratives of object transfers and appropriations“, in the context of the Forum Kunstgeschichte Italiens, Institute for Art History, University of Leipzig (organisation with Armin Bergmeier). |
| 09.2021 | Workshop "E-Topia. New worlds for teaching and research", gamelab, Berlin (organisation with Simon W. Fuchs and Michael Saliba, as part of an interdisciplinary virtual reality project of the Young Academy). |
| 08.2020 | Workshop "Introduction to the Digital Humanities", University of Greifswald [online due to pandemic] (organisation with Valeska Huber and Simon W. Fuchs, as part of a project of the Young Academy). |
| 11.2019 | Panel "What Makes a Rightful Ruler?", Israel Academy of Science, Jerusalem. Organisation with Tawfiq Da'adli (Hebrew University of Jerusalem), in the context of the international conference Positioning Self and Society, German-Israeli Frontiers of Humanities Symposium of the Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung. |
| 09.2018 | International conference „Heritage Revisited. Rediscovering Objects from Islamic Lands in Eighteenth Century Europe”, University of Vienna (organisation with Mattia Guidetti). |
| Wikingergold – Eine Auseinandersetzung mit kulturellem Erbe und Identitäten im Kunstunterricht (with Klara Fries), Greifswald, 2023: nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:gbv:9-oa-000019-4. |
| Rediscovering Objects from Islamic Lands in Enlightenment Europe, Hgg. Isabelle Dolezalek, Mattia Guidetti, New York 2022, www.routledge.com/Rediscovering-Objects-from-Islamic-Lands-in-Enlightenment-Europe/Dolezalek-Guidetti/p/book/9780367609474. |
| Beute - Eine Eine Anthologie zu Kunstraub und Kulturererbe, Hgg. Isabelle Dolezalek, Bénédicte Savoy, Robert Skwirblies, Matthes & Seitz, Berlin, 2021, www.matthes-seitz-berlin.de/buch/beute-12963.html. |
| Arabic Script on Christian Kings. Textile Inscriptions on Royal Garments from Norman Sicily, Das Mittelalter. Beihefte 5, eds Ingrid Baumgärtner, Stefan Conermann, Thomas Honegger, De Gruyter, Berlin, 2017, www.degruyter.com/view/product/477244. |
| Objects in Transfer. A Transcultural Exhibition Trail through the Museum für Islamische Kunst in Berlin, eds Vera Beyer, Isabelle Dolezalek, Sophia Vassilopoulou, Januar 2017, www.objects-in-transfer.sfb-episteme.de. |
| „Contextualising Choices: Islamicate Elements in European Arts”, The Medieval History Journal, Themenheft, eds Vera Beyer, Isabelle Dolezalek, Monica Juneja, 15/2, 2012. |
| „A Church Bell in the Great Mosque of Fez“, in: Translocations. Histories of Dislocated Cultural Assets, Ed. Bénédicte Savoy, Felicity Bodenstein, Merten Lagatz, Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, [submitted and accepted]. |
| „Oluf Gerhard Tychsen – Orientalist and Object Interpreter in Rostock”, in: Rediscovering Objects from Islamic Lands in Enlightenment Europe, Ed. Isabelle Dolezalek, Mattia Guidetti, Abingdon/New York: Routledge, 2022, 77-100. |
| „Transkulturelle Objekte, ‚islamische Kunst‘ und die Identitätspotentiale von Museen“ (with Vera Beyer), in: Begegnungen. Kunstpädagogische Perspektiven auf Kunst- und Bildgeschichte, Ed. Johannes Kirschenmann, Frank Schulz, München: kopaed, 2021, 344-353. |
| „Introduction“ (with Mattia Guidetti), in: Rediscovering Objects from Islamic Lands in Enlightenment Europe, Ed. Isabelle Dolezalek, Mattia Guidetti, Abingdon/New York: Routledge, 2021, 1-20. |
| „The Font of the Interdict: Reconsidering the Function of Ornament on the Baptismal Font of San Giovanni in Pisa”, Gesta, 59/1, 2020, 73-90. |
| „Transkulturelle Objekte, ‚islamische Kunst‘ und die Identitätspotentiale von Museen“, in cooperation with Vera Beyer (forthcoming in the volume Doppelkongress Kunst, Geschichte, Unterricht). |
| „Introduction: Transcultural Relations, Global Biographies – Islamic Art?” (in cooperation with Vera Beyer und Sophia Vassilopoulou), in: Objects in Transfer. A Transcultural Exhibition Trail through the Museum für Islamische Kunst in Berlin, eds Vera Beyer, Isabelle Dolezalek, Sophia Vassilopoulou, January 2017, pp. 7-10, www.objects-in-transfer.sfb-episteme.de. |
| „Alternative Narratives. Transcultural Interventions in the Permanent Display of the Museum für Islamische Kunst in Berlin”, in: Objects in Transfer. A Transcultural Exhibition Trail through the Museum für Islamische Kunst in Berlin, eds Vera Beyer, Isabelle Dolezalek, Sophia Vassilopoulou, January 2017, pp. 23-34, www.objects-in-transfer.sfb-episteme.de. |
| „Comparing Forms, Contextualising Functions. Arabic Inscriptions on Textiles of the Norman King William II and Fatimid Ṭirāz”, in: Oriental Silks in Medieval Europe, Riggisberger Accounts 21, eds Juliane von Fircks, Regula Schorta, Riggisberg, 2016, pp. 80-91. |
| „Wissenswandel – Statuswandel: Objekte im safawidischen Stil zwischen Kunstmuseum, ethnologischer Sammlung und Depot”, in: Wissen in Bewegung.Institution – Iteration – Transfer, eds Eva Cancik-Kirschbaum, Anita Traninger, Wiesbaden, 2015, pp. 430-44, www.harrassowitz-verlag.de/dzo/artikel/201/001/1330_201.pdf |
| „Textile Connections? Two Ifrīqiyan Church Treasures in Norman Sicily and the Problem of Continuity across Political Change”, in: Al-Masaq, 2013/1, eds Alexander Metcalfe, Mariam Rosser-Owen, pp. 92-112. |
| „Fashionable Form and Tailor-Made Message. Transcultural Approaches to Arabic Script on the Norman Kings’ Mantle and Alb”, in: The Medieval History Journal, 15/2, 2012, eds Vera Beyer, Isabelle Dolezalek, Monica Juneja, pp. 243-68. |
| Review: Francesca Dell’Acqua; Anthony Cutler; Herbert L. Kessler et al. (eds), The Salerno Ivories. Objects, Histories, Contexts, Berlin 2016, in: sehepunkte 19 (2019), nr. 5, www.sehepunkte.de/2019/05/29034.html. |
| „Kirchenglocken in der Großen Moschee in Fès“, in: Translocations. Ikonographie, transliconog.hypotheses.org/kommentierte-bilder-2/1333-1337-kirchenglocken-in-der-grossen-moschee-von-fez, July 8th, 2019. |
| „Eine Ersatznische in Konya“, with Sophia Vassilopoulou, in: Translocations, Ikonographie. transliconog.hypotheses.org/kommentierte-bilder-2/2009-vor-eine-ersatznische-in-konya, July 8th, 2019. |
| „Die Plünderung Ktesiphons: Symbolische Beute vergangener Herrscher“, in: Translocations. Anthologie: Eine Sammlung kommentierter Quellentexte zu Kulturgutverlagerungen seit der Antike, translanth.hypotheses.org/ueber/ktesiphon, October 10th,2018. |
| „Beuteteilung in den Siete Partidas von Alfons X“, in collaboration with Gero Dolezalek, in: Translocations. Anthologie: Eine Sammlung kommentierter Quellentexte zu Kulturgutverlagerungen seit der Antike,https://translanth.hypotheses.org/ueber/siete-partidas, October 10th, 2018. |
| „Heiligenreliquien aus Byzanz - Gesta episcoporum Halberstadensium“, in: Translocations. Anthologie: Eine Sammlung kommentierter Quellentexte zu Kulturgutverlagerungen seit der Antike, translanth.hypotheses.org/ueber/halberstadt, July 12th, 2018. |
| „Medieval Ivories in the Bode-Museum (Staatliche Museen zu Berlin)“, in: Curator. The Museum Journal, a guide to the museum’s ivory artifacts, eds Cheryl Braunstein, Scott Miller, Marjorie Trusted, 61/1, 2018, onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/cura.12233. |
| „Trendy Trade with Blue-and-White Dishes. Early Networks of Ceramic Exchange between East and West”, in: Early Capitals of Islamic Culture: The Artistic Legacy of Umayyad Damascus and Abbasid Baghdad (650-950), exhibition catalog (Sharjah, Museum for Islamic Art, Oktober 2014), eds Stefan Weber, Ulrike Al-Khamis, Susan Kamel, Berlin, 2014. |
| „Enluminure” in: Dictionnaire européen des ordres militaires au Moyen-Age, eds. Nicole Bériou, Philippe Josserand, Paris, 2009. |
| „Mécénat”, in: Dictionnaire européen des ordres militaires au Moyen-Age, eds. Nicole Bériou, Philippe Josserand, Paris, 2009. |
In the museum
- Planned: „Schatzpolitik / Treasure Politics“. The exhibition project is based on the findings of the research project „Wikingergold. Schatzfunde als translokales Erbe“ and is planned to be shown as a travelling exhibition in different stations around the Baltic Sea region from winter 2024 onwards.
"Perfect Match!”, an app about object biographies in the Bode-Museum, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. Design and contents of the app were conceived in a teaching-project during the wintersemester 2019/20 in cooperation with María López-Fanjul y Díez del Corral, outreach curator and the developer team of museum4punkt0.
"Museen als Weltbildermaschinen" in Salon Sophie Charlotte der BBAW, 18. Januar 2020. A feature by Andreas Beckmann (Deutschlandfunk): https://ondemand-mp3.dradio.de/file/dradio/2020/01/23/weltbilder_dlf_20200123_2012_091cd077.mp3 .
- Lecture "Activating Museum Data: Possibilities of Digital Data in Museums", 11. August 2020.
In school
- The Open-Access publikation Wikingergold – eine Auseinandersetzung mit kulturellem Erbe und Identität(en) im Kunstunterricht (ed. with Klara Fries, Greifswald 2023) provides worksheets and educational material for classes 7.-10.
Miscellaneous (selection)
- 19. Juli 2023 Wikipedia-Workshop in the Pommerschen Landesmuseum: „POMMERN REMASTERED. Studierende im Museum“ (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:GLAM/Pommern_Remastered).
6. Mai 2023 „Das Mittelalter lebt!“, a commentated Public Viewing on occasion of Charles' III coronation.
Digital (high-)culture in times of Corona / Live-discussion panel and performance 10.06.2020.
In the museum
- Planned: „Schatzpolitik / Treasure Politics“. The exhibition project is based on the findings of the research project „Wikingergold. Schatzfunde als translokales Erbe“ and is planned to be shown as a travelling exhibition in different stations around the Baltic Sea region from winter 2024 onwards.
"Perfect Match!”, an app about object biographies in the Bode-Museum, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. Design and contents of the app were conceived in a teaching-project during the wintersemester 2019/20 in cooperation with María López-Fanjul y Díez del Corral, outreach curator and the developer team of museum4punkt0.
"Museen als Weltbildermaschinen" in Salon Sophie Charlotte der BBAW, 18. Januar 2020. A feature by Andreas Beckmann (Deutschlandfunk): https://ondemand-mp3.dradio.de/file/dradio/2020/01/23/weltbilder_dlf_20200123_2012_091cd077.mp3 .
- Lecture "Activating Museum Data: Possibilities of Digital Data in Museums", 11. August 2020.
In school
- The Open-Access publikation Wikingergold – eine Auseinandersetzung mit kulturellem Erbe und Identität(en) im Kunstunterricht (ed. with Klara Fries, Greifswald 2023) provides worksheets and educational material for classes 7.-10.
Miscellaneous (selection)
- 19. Juli 2023 Wikipedia-Workshop in the Pommerschen Landesmuseum: „POMMERN REMASTERED. Studierende im Museum“ (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:GLAM/Pommern_Remastered).
6. Mai 2023 „Das Mittelalter lebt!“, a commentated Public Viewing on occasion of Charles' III coronation.
Digital (high-)culture in times of Corona / Live-discussion panel and performance 10.06.2020.