Maialen Maugars
Thesis title: Collecting early modern decorative art for late nineteenth-century Birmingham
Supervisors: Prof. Louise Bourdua and Prof. Rosie Dias (University of Warwick); Dr. Rebecca Bridgman and Victoria Osborne (Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery).
My PhD is the result of a Collaborative Doctoral Award project between the University of Warwick and Birmingham Museums Trust, funded by Midlands4Cities and the Art and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).
Doctoral research:
My doctoral research focused on the early modern Italian decorative arts collection at the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery (BMAG). The collection is constituted of 378 objects, mainly purchased in Italy by John Charles Robinson (1824-1913) and Whitworth Wallis (1855-1927) between 1881 and 1889. It was one of the first collections to be acquired for and displayed at BMAG when it opened in 1885. The collection, which is constituted of furniture, metalwork, textiles, ceramics and glass objects, was intended to educate and inspire Birmingham's artisans, industrial designers, and art students. This thesis had several aims: to examine BMAG's collecting strategy; to study Robinson's and Wallis's acquisition practices; to investigate the provenance of the collection, including the export of the objects from Italy to Britain; and to analyse the collection's reception and role in artistic training and industrial design in late nineteenth-century Birmingham.
Research interests: History of Collecting; Museum formation; Nineteenth-century art market; Decorative arts.
Background:
- 2017-2018: MA in Art History, Curatorship, and Renaissance Culture (Warburg Institute)
- 2013-2016: BA in History (UCL)
Before starting my PhD, I worked in the Impressionist and Modern Art department at Christie’s London.
Other research interests include:
- Exchanges across the Mediterranean in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries
- Renaissance material culture
- Expositions Universelles / Great Exhibitions
Teaching:
- 2024-2025: 'Fakes and Forgeries' (HA1B6)
- 2023-2024: 'Renaissance Europe II: Arts, Culture, and Knowledge of the Renaissance' (RS200 and RS300)
Contact: maialen.maugars@warwick.ac.uk
https://www.midlands4cities.ac.uk/student_profile/maialen-maugars/Link opens in a new window
