A major new project exploring the changing fashion trends in Europe from the Renaissance to the late 18th century has secured a grant of nearly €1m from Humanities in the European Research Area (HERA), facilitated in the UK by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).
The three-year project, entitled ‘Fashioning the Early Modern: Creativity and Innovation in Europe, 1500-1800’, is launched this month, and will be led by Professor Evelyn Welch, of the School of English and Drama at Queen Mary University London, in conjunction with the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Professor Welch, an expert in early modern visual and material culture, will explore how and why fashion accessories, such as wigs and ruffs and textiles like lace and silk, came into vogue across Europe while others failed.
The research will explore how governments promoted, or in some cases, tried to stop these goods from moving across Europe. The project will feed into the major re-development of the ‘Europe 1600-1800’ galleries at the V&A, offering an opportunity for close collaboration between museum curators and Queen Mary academics.
Professor Welch and her team will also be working with contemporary fashion designers and students to stimulate new creative initiatives.
Professor Welch explained, “I’m asking why it made sense for men from Spain to Sweden to shave off their own hair and wear someone else’s – we explain this with the term ‘fashion’, but what prompted this popularity?”
The project uses a range of techniques from mathematical modelling to hands-on curatorial investigation to track the innovation, development and spread of other fashionable goods such as textiles, brands of perfume, knitted stockings and starched ruffs.
Competition for the HERA research grants has been particularly fierce, with 55 project teams chasing funding and only 19 being successful. Of those, 18 have either UK humanities researchers or partners involved, claiming the lion’s share of €16.5m available (up to €1m per project) to explore cultural dynamics and creativity.
Other collaborators on this project include senior scholars, curators and postdoctoral researchers from the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Danish National Foundation’s Centre for Textile Research, University of Copenhagen, The National Museum of Denmark, The Centre for Fashion Studies, University of Stockholm, and the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies.
Professor Welch is the new Vice-Principal for Research and International Affairs at Queen Mary. She is also the programme director of the Arts and Humanities Research Council’s £5.5m strategic programme, Beyond Text: Performances, Sounds, Images, Objects.
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AHRC Media contact: Jake Gilmore, Communications Manager, 01793 416021; j.gilmore@ahrc.ac.uk
Image: Robe and petticoat, Sash back gown, Dress, France, 1775-1780 © V&A Images
Notes to Editors:
Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC): Each year the AHRC provides approximately £112 million from the Government to support research and postgraduate study in the arts and humanities, from languages and law, archaeology and English literature to design and creative and performing arts. In any one year, the AHRC makes approximately 700 research awards and around 1,300 postgraduate awards. Awards are made after a rigorous peer review process, to ensure that only applications of the highest quality are funded. The quality and range of research supported by this investment of public funds not only provides social and cultural benefits but also contributes to the economic success of the UK.
HERA – Humanities in the European Research Area - is a partnership between fifteen Humanities Research Councils across Europe and the European Science Foundation, with the objective of firmly establishing the humanities in the European Research Area and in the 6/7th Framework Programmes. HERA has been designed to deliver new levels of co-operative research policy and practice in the humanities by embarking on an ambitious programme of communication, enquiry and sharing of expertise. Over a period of four years (2004-2008) partners were dedicated to the establishment of best practise in funding mechanisms, research priorities, humanities infrastructure and the development of a transnational funding programme. HERA is financed by the EU Framework programme 6's ERA-NET scheme and was established from the ERA-NET ERCH (European Network for research Councils in the Humanities) formulated by the Danish, Dutch and Irish Research Councils.