Material Selves

What do Persian robes of honour, 20th-century still-life painting, fur garments, and 18th-century porcelain all have in common? Prized, possessed and modelled, they highlight the deep connections we share with cultural objects.
Establishing new connections between people and things via artistic media and material culture, this highly interdisciplinary volume brings together both established and emerging scholars in the fields of art history, material culture, museum and heritage studies and literary studies to investigate the intersection of the personal with the material.
Raising vital questions of cultural identity, belonging and selfhood, Material Selves is the first book of its kind to consider the relationship between people and things across transcultural and transhistorical contexts. It employs innovative methodologies across ten chapters and critically expands on current models for understanding the dynamic relationship between people and things by tracing the central role objects have played in the construction, creation and performance of identity throughout history.
Structured around four key sections exploring biography and narrative; adornment and ornament; reclamation and intervention; and subjects and objects, the volume presents a global selection of case studies that explore, amongst other things, Margaret Olley's enduring fame, the significance of the Khil'a in Safavid Persia and early modern Europe, and 17th-century French painter Charles LeBrun's royal portraiture. Fusing these with contemporary theories of identity, the contributors provide analyses informed by posthumanism, the environmental humanities, race and gender. At the same time, they confront vital questions of identity, agency, and materiality, and highlight the way in which we use objects to tell stories, construct myths and make sense of our place in the world. In doing so, the book illuminates a wide range of cultural and chronological settings whilst giving close attention to the mobility of people and things between, across, and through time and place.

Alex Burchmore is Lecturer in Art History and Curatorial Studies at the Australian National University, Australia. He is the author of New Export China: Translations Across Time and Place in Contemporary Chinese Porcelain Art (2023).

Introduction, Alex Burchmore (Australian National University, Australia, Australia)
Part One: Biography and Narrative
1. The Entangled Lives of Still Life: Margaret Olley, Objects, Display, and Art, Chiara O'Reilly (University of Sydney, NSW, Australia)
2. Self Extension: Material Agency, Intimacy, and Chance in Sophie Calle's Object Relationships, Vanessa Berry (University of Sydney, NSW, Australia)
Part Two: Adornment and Ornament
3. Refashioning the Khila' in Safavid Persia and Early Modern Europe, Samantha Happé (University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia)
4. Materiality, Self, and Portraiture: Charles LeBrun's Boîte à Portrait of Louis XIV, Robert Wellington (Australian National University, Australia)
5. 'Furland': Global Fur and Empires of Fashion Materialities in 1930s London, Cheryl Roberts (University of the Arts, London, UK)
Part Three: Reclamation and Intervention
6. Upcycling Chaney: The Colonial Detritus of St. Croix, Jessica Priebe (National Art School, Sydney, Australia)
7. Chairman Mao's Good Soldier: Red Collecting, Lei Feng, and Revolutionary Selfhood in Contemporary China, Emily Williams (Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, China)
8. A Female Embodiment: Gendered Materiality in Chinese Contemporary Art Practices, Luise Guest (University of New South Wales, Australia)
Part Four: Subjects and Objects
9. Framing the Self in Early Modern Curatorial Strategies of Porcelain Display, Alex Burchmore (Australian National University, Australia)
10. Furnishings of Legal Lives, Jessie Hohmann (University of Technology Sydney, NSW, Australia) and Daniel Joyce (University of New South Wales, Australia)
Index