Giulia Zanon
- Position: LAHRI Short Term Post Doc Fellow
- Areas of expertise: Early modern Italy; social, cultural and religious history; artistic patronage
- Email: G.Zanon@leeds.ac.uk
Profile
I hold my BA in Cultural Heritage (2011) and MA in History and Geography of Europe (2014) from the University of Verona, Italy.
In 2020, I obtained my PhD in History at the University of Leeds, funded by the Leeds Anniversary Research Scholarship and supervised by Alex Bamji (School of History) and Richard Checketts (School of Fine Arts, History of Art and Cultural Studies). My doctoral dissertation, entitled ‘Citizenship, Social Networks and Artistic Patronage in Early Modern Venice’ explores the construction of middling sorts identity through the lens of social relationships and the commission of artworks in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Venice.
By adopting an interdisciplinary approach that combines deep archival research with a multitude of artistic and architectural artefacts, my work breaks new ground in contextualizing the part played by social networks and the arts in publicly affirming and displaying the prestige of the Venetian middling sorts, and uncovers the incredible efforts they went through in order to improve their social position and the ways in which they were perceived by the State and nobility alike.
My research sheds light on our grasp of social hierarchy and the possibilities for social and cultural mobility in pre-modern Europe.
I am currently a Leeds Arts and Humanities Research Institute (LAHRI) Postdoctoral Fellow.
Research interests
I am a social and cultural historian of early modern Italy and my research interests cross the field of history and history of art. My current research project investigates the role played by the Counter-Reformation in the diffusion of new religious orders.
Publications
Exhibition catalogue entries
- ‘Madonna col Bambino in trono e santi, detta Pala Bonaldi’, in Paolo Veronese. L’illusione della realtà (Paolo Veronese: The illusion of reality), catalogue of the exhibition (Verona, Palazzo della Gran Guardia, July 5-October 5), eds. Bernard Aikema and Paola Marini, Milano 2014, cat. 2.10, pp. 142–143.
Journal Articles
- ‘L’islam a Venezia. La ricezione del mondo musulmano nelle opere d’arte’, Quaderni di Parentesi Storiche, 1 (2013), 15–29.
Books
- Cittadini, Artistic Patronage and Social Networks in Early Modern Venice (forthcoming).
Prizes and Awards
- AHC Faculty Research Dissemination Award, University of Leeds (2019).
Selected Grants and Funding
- The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, Venetian Research Program – British & Commonwealth (2021)
- The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, Venetian Research Program – British & Commonwealth (2020)
- Centro Vittore Branca ‘Residential Centro Branca Scholarship’ (2020)
- RHS Conference Travel Grant (2019)
- RSA Travel Grant, for presenting at Renaissance Society of America Annual Meeting, Toronto (2019)
- The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, 2018/19 Venetian Research Program – British & Commonwealth (2018)
- RSA Travel Grant, for presenting at 64th Renaissance Society of America Annual Meeting, New Orleans (2018)
- PGR Extraordinary Fund School of History (2017)
- Leeds Anniversary Research Scholarship (2016–2019)
- University of Verona Scholarship (2008–2011)
Seminar and Conference Papers (*invited speaker)
- ‘Cittadini artistic patronage within the scuole grandi in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Venice’, Renaissance Society of America (RSA) Annual Meeting, online, 2021.
- *‘Artistic patronage within Venetian confraternities in the early modern period’, Appalachian Premodernist Group, East Tennessee State University (USA), 2020.
- ‘Venetian confraternities and artistic patronage in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries’, North West Early Modern Seminar, University of Leeds, 2020.
- ‘Patronage of tokens in Venetian confraternities in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries’, Small is Beautiful: Coins in their Contexts in Ireland, Britain and Europe. Sylloge of Coins of the British isles Symposium on Money and Coinage, 2020.
- ‘The diffusion of the cult of San Francesco di Paola in late medieval Venice’, International Medieval Congress (IMC), University of Leeds, 2019.
- ‘Intellectual circles and cittadini networks in mid-sixteenth century Venice’, Postgraduate Symposium ‘Points of Connection’, University of Exeter, 2019.
- ‘Confraternities, cittadini and social strategies in early modern Venice’, RSA Toronto, 2019.
- ‘“A hive of intriguing factions”: The role of lay confraternities for the construction of cittadini identity in early modern Venice’, The Cabinet of Curiosities Spring Colloquium, University of York, 2019.
- *‘Cittadini networks and social bonds in early modern Venice’, Venetian Seminar, St John’s College, University of Cambridge, 2018.
- ‘Confraternities, cittadini, and the cult of San Francesco di Paola in early modern Venice’, RSA New Orleans, 2018.
- ‘Leadership, family and social identity in Venice’s confraternities, c. 1500-1700’, PGR Annual Colloquium, University of Leeds, 2017.
Qualifications
- PhD in History, University of Leeds (2020)
- MA in History and Geography of Europe, University of Verona, Italy (2014)
- BA in Cultural Heritage, University of Verona, Italy (2011)
Professional memberships
- 2014 – present: Member of the Renaissance Society of America (RSA)
- 2017 – present: Early Career Member of the Royal Historical Society (RHS)
- 2020 – present: Italian Art Society (IAS)
- 2020 – present: Society for Renaissance Studies (SRS)
Student education
Teaching
- 2019/2020: Teaching assistant for core first year module ‘A Story of Art’ in the School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies at the University of Leeds. (teaching design and deliver, marking, examining).
- 2017/2018: Teaching assistant for core first year module ‘Primary Sources for the Historian: An Introduction to Documentary History’ in the School of History at the University of Leeds. Module strand entitled ‘Casanova: Sexuality, Sociability and Society in Eighteenth-Century Europe’ (strand design, teaching design and deliver, marking, examining).
Professional Recognition
- Associate Fellow of Advance HE (2020)
Research groups and institutes
- Leeds Arts and Humanities Research Institute