Metaphor, Making, and Mysticism

2019 Annual Conference of Mystical Theology Network

February 28th - March 3rd, 2019
Boston College

*Please Note: Registration and the opening event on Thursday, Feb. 28th, will take place at Gasson Hall.*

This interdisciplinary conference brings together theologians, philosophers, artists, art historians, historians, poets, musicians, literary scholars, and contemplative practitioners to examine the ways in which metaphor and artistic production have been used to express the mystical. The conference also includes a mini-symposium on John Scotus Eriugena.

We welcome proposals for papers, panel discussions, and creative presentations that address how transformation of the material world and creative imagination can approach mystical consciousness of the Divine,  as well as other interdisciplinary engagements with metaphor, making, and mysticism.

Colorful art

Photo Credit: Hilma af Klimt

Colorful image

Photo Credit: Hildegard of Bingen

2019 Annual Conference of Mystical Theology Network

February 28th - March 3rd, 2019
Boston College

This interdisciplinary conference brings together theologians, philosophers, artists, art historians, historians, poets, musicians, literary scholars, and contemplative practitioners to examine the ways in which metaphor and artistic practice have been used to express and experience the mystical. The conference will also include a mini-symposium on John Scotus Eriugena.

Emphasis will be placed on drawing connections between creative practices and contemplative practices, and the domain of creativity within various mystical traditions.

The hope is the conference will reflect the plurality of inspired approaches to Christian mystical theology. Papers, panel discussions, and creative presentations will address how transformation of the material world, creative imagination and experiential “making” can approach mystical consciousness of the Divine, as well as other interdisciplinary engagements with metaphor, making, and mysticism.

Leading academics and practitioners will explore the importance of metaphor and art-making from historical, philosophical, pastoral, theological, literary, and artistic perspectives.

Confirmed speakers:

  • Jeff Bloechl (Boston College)
  • Amira El-Zein  (Georgetown, Qatar)
  • Veerle Fraeters (University of Antwerp)
  • Catherine Keller (Drew University)
  • Fanny Howe (poet)
  • Mark Patrick Hederman (OSB, Glenstal Abbey)
  • Sheila Gallagher (Boston College)
  • Rob Faesen, SJ, (Katholieke Universiteit,Leuven)
  • Richard Kearney (Boston College)
  • Racha Kirakosian (Harvard University)
  • Bernard McGinn (The University of Chicago Divinity School)
  • Dermot Moran (Boston College)
  • Louise Nelstrop (York St. John/ Oxford University)
  • Willemien Otten (University of Chicago)
  • Andrew Prevot (Boston College)
  • Marc de Kesel (Radboud University)
  • Brian Treanor (LMU)
  • Catherine Keller (Drew University)


For more information, please contact Sheila Gallagher gallagso@bc.edu

Boston College invites abstracts for Metaphor, Making, and Mysticism, the annual conference of the Mystical Theology Network. The conference seeks to engage scholars and creative practitioners in a multi-disciplinary examination of the ways in which metaphor and artistic practices have been used to express or experience the mystical. The conference will also include a mini-symposium on John Scotus Eriugena.

This interdisciplinary conference will highlight a plurality of inspired approaches to Christian mystical theology. We welcome proposals for papers, panel discussions, and creative presentations in a variety of styles from diverse traditions and disciplines including: theology, philosophy, art history, history, contemporary art practice, cultural theory, material culture studies, feminist theory, literature, poetry, music, and other creative and contemplative practices. Proposals should explore the domain of creativity within the mystical tradition. We encourage interdisciplinary approaches that engage both historical and contemporary conversations.

Photo Credit: Hildegard of Bingen

Photo Credit: Hildegard of Bingen

Possible themes may include:

  • The role of metaphorical and symbolic mediation in the experience and expression of the mystical
  • The relationship between “making” practices and contemplative practices
  • Reflections on John Scotus Eriugena’s God of Self-creation
  • Pictorial and material expressions and the teachings of Christian mystics
  • Strategies for communicating the unsayable
  • Creative transformation of matter and its relationship to Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s ‘cosmogenesis’
  • Materiality and meaning-making
  • Medieval “female mysticisms” and “craft” practices
  • Art making and kenosis

 

All proposals should include:

1. Full name

2. E-mail

3. Current institution and/or academic affiliation

4. Academic degree / year of study)

5. Title of the paper or project

6. Technical equipment needs

7. Proposal (up to 350 words).

  • Paper proposal — A proposal for presenting a short (15-20 minute) original paper
  • Session proposal — A proposal for a session or roundtable where different papers are presented on a common theme and emphasis is placed on shared discourse. Session proposals should include abstract, name of presider, list of panelists or respondents.
  • Project proposal — A proposal for a presentation, event, exhibition, performance or screening. Project proposals should include description of media and venue/technology requirements.
     

Deadline: October 26, 2018

For further information and to submit proposals, please contact Sheila Gallagher: gallagso@bc.edu

 

Organizing Committee:

  • Jeff Bloechl (Boston College)
  • Boyd Taylor Coolman (Boston College)
  • Catherine Cornille (Boston College)
  • Sheila Gallagher (Boston College)
  • Richard Kearney (Boston College)
  • Racha Kirakosian (Harvard University)
  • Dermot Moran (Boston College)
  • Louise Nelstrop (York St John/Oxford University)
  • Andrew Prevot (Boston College)


2019 Annual Conference of Mystical Theology Network: Metaphor, Making, and Mysticism

February 28 - March 3, 2019


Registration Deadline: February 15, 2019

Register Here

2019 Annual Conference of Mystical Theology Network

February 28th - March 3rd, 2019
Boston College

 

Jeffrey Bloechl

Jeffrey Bloechl, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Boston College

Jeffrey Bloechl is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Boston College, Honorary Professor of the Australian Catholic University, and founding director of the joint MA program in philosophy and theology at Boston College. His teaching and research concentrate in contemporary European philosophy, especially phenomenology and psychoanalysis, as well as Christian philosophy. His lecture on John of the Cross extends a longstanding interest in Christocentric mysticism. Previous efforts in this line include essays on Paul of Tarsus and Francis of Assisi.

Amira El-Zein

Amira El-Zein, Associate Professor of Arabic Literature and Culture, Georgetown University in Qatar

Amira El-Zein is an Associate Professor of Arabic Literature and Culture at Georgetown University in Qatar. She is the author of Islam, Arabs, and the Intelligent World of the Jinn, Creativity and the Sacred, and the co-editor of Culture, Creativity, and Exile. As a poet, she has published, The Book of Palm Trees, Bedouins of Hell, and lately, Is This Devastation For Me Alone? All three books are in Arabic. She also published The Jinn and Other Poems in English.  Among her numerous translations are Les Tarahumaras by Antonin Artaud (from French into Arabic), Le Clezio’s La guerre (from French into Arabic), and a co-translation of the poetry of Mahmud Darwish titled Unfortunately it Was Paradise (From Arabic to English). El-Zein has published more than a dozen articles in refereed journals and has authored several book chapters on an ample range of topics including Sufism in medieval and contemporary Islam, gender in Islam, Francophone literature, Arabian Nights, and contemporary Arabic poetry and fiction.

She is currently working on a new book tentatively tiled The Metamorphoses of Mecca while also preparing for another book of poetry in English.

Rob Faesen

Rob Faesen, Professor, Department of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven

Rob Faesen, S.J. (Tilburg, 1958) is Professor at the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, KU Leuven, holder of the Jesuitica Chair, and member of the Ruusbroec Society at the University of Antwerp. He is also Professor at Tilburg University, where he is holder of the Francis Xavier Chair. His research focuses on the history of the Middle Dutch mystical literature. He was a member of the editorial team that prepared the critical edition of John of Ruusbroec’s Opera omnia, published in the Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediaevalis series. In 2008, he published Late Medieval Mysticism of the Low Countries in collaboration with Rik Van Nieuwenhove and Helen Rolfson, in the Classics of Western Spirituality series (New York, Paulist Press). He edited A Companion to Ruusbroec (Leiden, Brill) in cooperation with John Arblaster.​

Veerle Fraeters

Veerle Fraeters, Professor at the Ruusbroec Institute for the History of Spirituality in the Low Countries, University of Antwerp

Veerle Fraeters is Professor at the Ruusbroec Institute for the History of Spirituality in the Low Countries, University of Antwerp. Her main research area is medieval mystical literature, with a special focus on the visionary genre and woman authors. Among her current projects is ‘Medieval Mysticism and Modern Identities’ which studies the modern reception and appropriation of the Middle Dutch writer Hadewijch. Together with Frank Willaert, she is the author of a new edition with translation and full commentary of Hadewijchs Verzamelde Werken (Historische Uitgeverij Groningen). The prize winning first volume Liederen (Songs) was publised in 2009 and has been translated into German, Hungarian, French and Spanish. The second volume Visioenen (Visions) is under preparation. She is co-editing, with Patricia Dailey, the Brill Companion to Hadewijch (forthcoming).

Sheila Gallagher

Sheila Gallagher, Interdisciplinary Artist and Curator , Boston College

Sheila Gallagher is an interdisciplinary artist and curator whose work explores perception, belief, and different modes of representation. A hybrid practitioner known for her inventive exploration of materials, she works in many media including video, smoke, drawing, animation, live flowers, and light projections. She has had numerous solo­ exhibitions, and has exhibited widely in galleries, museums, and universities in the U.S. and internationally, including the Moving Image Festival, London; The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston; The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Crystal Bridges Museum, Bentonville, AR; and the Dodge Gallery in New York City.

Sheila Gallagher

Mark Patrick Hederman, Monk of the Benedictine order and former Abbot of Glenstal Abbey

Mark Patrick Hederman is a monk of the Benedictine order and former Abbot of Glenstal Abbey, Co Limerick. His published work in mystical theology and the philosophy of art and literature include the following: Manikon Eros: Mad Crazy Love (2000), Anchoring the Altar: Christianity and the Work of Art (2002), The Haunted Inkwell: Art and our Future (2003), Walkabout: Life as Holy Spirit(2005) and The Opal and the Pearl (2017).

 

Fanny Howe

Fanny Howe, American poet, novelist, and writer

Fanny Howe is an American poet, novelist, and writer. She is recipient of the 2009 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. She is author of more than 20 books, including both poetry and prose. Recent publications include The Needle’s Eye: Passing Through Youth (2016), Second Childhood: Poems (2014), and Come and See: Poems (2011). She has taught at over eight universities and is currently professor emerita of Writing and Literature at UC San Diego.

Richard Kearney

Richard Kearney, Charles Seelig Professor of Philosophy, Boston College

Richard Kearney is currently the Charles Seelig Professor of Philosophy at Boston College. Well known for his numerous books and articles on phenomenology, ethics, literature, and the philosophy of religion, he has also served as an international public intellectual. In the 1980s and 90s he assisted in developing the Northern Irish Peace Agreement, and is currently the international director for the online Guestbook Project which features writing and art on the themes of hospitality and the stranger. He has previously taught at University College Dublin, the University of Paris (Sorbonne), the Australian Catholic University, and the University of Nice.

Catherine Keller

Catherine Keller, George T. Cobb Professor of Constructive Theology in the Graduate Division of Religion, Drew University

Catherine Keller is George T. Cobb Professor of Constructive Theology in the Graduate Division of Religion of Drew University.   Books she has authored  include From a Broken Web: Separation, Sexism and Self, Apocalypse Now & Then;  God & Power;  Face of the Deep: a Theology of Becoming; On the Mystery: Discerning God in Process; Cloud of the Impossible: Negative Theology and Planetary Entanglement; Intercarnations: Exercises in Theological Possibility, and most recently Political Theology of the Earth: Our Planetary Emergency and the Struggle for a New Public. She has co-edited  several volumes of the Annual Drew Transdisciplinary Theological Colloquium.

Racha Kirakosian

Racha Kirakosian is Associate Professor of German and the Study of Religion at Harvard University

Racha Kirakosian is Associate Professor of German and the Study of Religion at Harvard University. She holds a joint appointment in the two disciplines and also serves on the Committee on Medieval Studies. For her research on Gertrude the Great, she has been awarded the Harvard Medical School Milton Award and she has also obtained numerous stipends such as the Herzog Ernst Research Scholarship of the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung, the Gerda Henkel Research Fellowship, and the Huntington Library Mayers Fellowship. In March and April 2017, she was invited to a research residency as the Director's Visiting Scholar at Dumbarton Oaks. She has received a full year's fellowship to spend the academic year 2019-2020 at the Swedish Collegium of Advanced Study in Uppsala.

Her publications include studies on medieval German mysticism, female sanctity, and medieval law. Her first book deals with the biography of a thirteenth-century Premonstratensian nun and has appeared with De Gruyter in the series Hermaea: Die Vita der Christina von Hane: Untersuchung und Edition. The forthcoming book explores material culture and mysticism in the German reception history of Gertrude of Helfta's Legatus divinae pietatis. Many of her articles are online: https://harvard.academia.edu/RachaKirakosian.

Bernard McGinn

Bernard McGinn, Naomi Shenstone Donnelly Professor emeritus, Chicago Divinity School

Bernard McGinn is the Naomi Shenstone Donnelly Professor emeritus from the University of Chicago Divinity School, where he taught for 34 years and retired in 2003. He is currently working on Volume 6, part three of his history of Christian mysticism, The Presence of God.

Dermot Moran

Dermot Moran, Joseph Chair in Catholic Philosophy, Boston College

Dermot Moran currently serves as the Joseph Chair in Catholic Philosophy at Boston College. He is an internationally respected scholar in both medieval and contemporary European philosophy. He has authored nine books and numerous articles and chapters and given many lectures around the world. He is also the Founding Editor for The International Journal of Philosophical Studies, and is currently the President of the International Federation of Philosophical Studies. He has been honored with the Royal Irish Academy Gold Medal in the Humanities (2012) and holds an Honor Doctoral Degree from the National and Kapodistrian University in Athens.

Louise Nelstrop

Louise Nelstrop, Professor of Theology and Religion, Oxford University

Louise Nelstrop is a lecturer at York St. John University and St. Benet's Hall, Oxford University. She specializes in mystical theology, particularly the Middle English. She is co-author of Christian Mysticism: An Introduction to Contemporary Theoretical Approaches (2016), and has recently completed a monograph: 
Deification and Sacred Eloquence in Richard Rolle and Julian of Norwich (Routledge, 2019). She has also edited multiple books on mysticism, most recently Art and Mysticism: Interfaces in the Medieval and Modern Periods (2018), and Christian Mysticism and Incarnational Theology: Between Transcendence and Immanence (2016). She is a coordinator and founder of the Mystical Theology Network.

Willemien Otten

Willemien Otten, Professor of the Theology and History of Christianity, University of Chicago Divinity School

Willemien Otten is Professor of the Theology and History of Christianity at the University of Chicago Divinity School, where she also directs the Martin Marty Center for the Public Understanding of Religion. She previously taught at Loyola University of Chicago, Boston College, and Utrecht University, where she also served as Dean of Theology. Otten’s publications cover the area of early Christian and medieval religious and intellectual culture, and are centrally focused on the dual themes of anthropology/humanism on the one hand and nature and creation on the other. Recently she edited, with Michael I Allen, Eriugena and Creation (Turnhout, 2014) and, with Susan Schreiner, Augustine Our Contemporary. Examining the Self in Past and Present (Notre Dame, 2018). She just completed her book manuscript Thinking Nature and the Nature of Thinking: From Eriugena to Emerson for Stanford University Press. Since 2011 Otten serves as the international president of the Society for the Promotion of Eriugenian Studies (SPES). She has been invited to give the annual Etienne Gilson lecture at the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies in Toronto in the spring of 2020.

Andrew Prevot

Andrew Prevot, Associate Professor of Systematic Theology in the Theology Department at Boston College

Andrew Prevot is Associate Professor of Systematic Theology in the Theology Department at Boston College. His research spans the areas of mystical, philosophical, and political theology, with particular emphases on the meaning of Christian prayer, the use of phenomenology in theology, and the ongoing struggle for racial and social justice. He is the author of two books: Theology and Race: Black and Womanist Traditions in the United States (Brill, 2018) and Thinking Prayer: Theology and Spirituality amid the Crises of Modernity (Notre Dame, 2015), and coeditor of Anti-Blackness and Christian Ethics (Orbis, 2017). His essays have appeared in numerous edited collections, as well as in scholarly journals such as Horizons, Spiritus, Pro Ecclesia, Heythrop, Political Theology, and Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion. He is currently working on a book manuscript called "The Grace of Divine Union: Mystical Theology, Feminist Hermeneutics, and Ordinary Life."

Brian Treanor

Brian Treanor, Charles S. Casassa Chair and Professor of Philosophy, Loyola Marymount University

Brian Treanor is Charles S. Casassa Chair and Professor of Philosophy at Loyola Marymount University, where he also directs the Academy of Catholic Thought and Imagination and was the founding Director of the Environmental Studies program. His scholarship revolves around hermeneutic engagements in a variety of fields, chiefly in environmental philosophy, ethics, and philosophy of religion. He is the author or editor of six books as well as many articles and book chapters. Most recently, he is author of Emplotting Virtue and the co-editor of Being-in-Creation and of Carnal Hermeneutics.

Sarah Bob

Sarah Bob, Active Soloist and Chamber Musician

Hailed as “sumptuous and eloquent” by the Boston Globe, pianist Sarah Bob is an active soloist and chamber musician noted for her charismatic performances, colorful playing and diverse programming. The goal, her strong suit, is to introduce music in a loving, inclusive, and intoxicating way. She is founding director of the New Gallery Concert Series, a series that combines new music and new visual art along with their creators, and  The Nasty Cooperative, numerous pop up dialogue driven artistic events created to build community, help raise funds for organizations in need, and encourage others to do the same.  Sarah is currently Artist-in-Residence of The Music Mansion (Providence), visiting faculty at the Longy School of Music of Bard College (Cambridge) and maintains a private studio at home and at the Community Music Center of Boston . For more information, please go to www.sarahbob.net.

 

Estar (Ser)

Estar (Ser)

About ESTAR(SER): The “Esthetical Society for Transcendental and Applied Realization (now incorporating the Society of Esthetic Realizers)” is an established body of private, independent scholars who work collectively to recover, scrutinize, and (where relevant) draw attention to the historicity of the Order of the Third Bird. The work of ESTAR(SER) has been presented internationally at various events and locations, including the 33rd Sao Paolo Biennial (Brazil), The Museum of Modern Art (New York, NY), SALT (Istanbul),  and the Museo Tamayo (Mexico City). www.estarser.net

 

Katie Ford

Katie Ford

Katie Ford is a mixed media visual artist who uses paper and fabric and to think about relationship, color, and landscape. She has exhibited nationally, and her work has been supported by residencies with the Icelandic Textile Center, the Women’s Studio Workshop, Cabin Time, Have Company, and the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh, among others. She holds a BFA in Printmaking and Drawing from Washington University in St. Louis and currently lives in Catskill, New York.

Simone Kearney

Simone Kearney

Simone Kearney is a Brooklyn-based multidisciplinary artist and writer. She has performed interdisciplinary projects and given readings at the Queens Museum, NADA, St. Anne’s Warehouse, SVA, the Poetry Project, Rachel Uffner Gallery, the Judd Foundation, This Red Door, P.S. 122, Stellar Projects, and Thierry Goldberg Gallery. Recent exhibitions include NURTUREart, Anytime Dept., Torn Page, Re: Art Show, La Mama Galleria, Annex Gallery, Omi International Art Center, and the West Cork Arts Center. Residencies include Paint School, Lighthouse Works, Josef and Anni Albers Foundation, Edward F. Albee Foundation. She is a NYFA grant recipient, and is author of “My Ida,” (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2017) and “In Threes,” (minuteBOOKS, 2013).

Masary Studios:

Masary Studios

Masary Studios: A multidisciplinary collective, Masary Studios specialize in reconsidering environments by creating site-specific installations using sound, light, interactivity, and performance. Whether introducing new instruments, devices, pieces, or using the environment itself as the tool, our work enhances and activates place and purpose.

Clive Moloney

Clive Moloney

Clive Moloney (b. Tipperary, Ireland, 1983) is a visual artist based in Boston. Moloney attained a BFA from Limerick School of Art in 2007 and an MFA from Mass College of Art in 2013. He has exhibited both nationally and internationally, most notably at Gallery Kayafas in Boston, Limerick City Gallery in Ireland and Soulangh Artist Village, Taiwan.

Vinny Roca

Vinny Roca

Vinny Roca (1995 New Haven, CT) is an artist living and working in Boston, MA. His practice takes a wide variety of forms, from private performances to instructional sculpture. The works are often the result of following a set of written or verbal suggestions for a possible work. He holds a bachelor’s degree in studio art from Boston College.

Sue Schardt

Sue Schardt

Sue Schardt is a multimedia producer and musician.  Through her radio program, In the Margin of the Other on WMBR, and her national public media project, Localore, Schardt explores undetermined and aleatoric relationships within the space of sound, music, documentary, and in the physical space of community in order to reveal ultimate interconnectedness.  Schardt’s guiding creeds come from her clarinet teacher Joe Allard who said “to blow is not to play,” and from her cooking mentor Laura Brennan, who taught her “water is the magic ingredient.”

Natalie Surmeli

Natalie Surmeli

Natalie Surmeli is the founding director of The Tribe of Wolves, an organization that curates high vibration gatherings to activate the divine feminine spirit that resides within us all.

Aaron Trant

Aaron Trant

Deemed as both an “engaging” composer as well as a ”sure, adept, and nuanced” percussionist by The Boston Music Intelligencer, Aaron Trant is an active musician in the Boston area and beyond. Cited for his “melodic, if unpitched, voice” (Spendzine), Aaron’s eclectic knowledge of classical, jazz, rock, contemporary and improvised music has made him an asset to many ensembles throughout the United States. Aaron has received great acclaim for his original scores for silent film and is the cofounder, performer and composer for the After Quartet, one of the few groups dedicated to the art of live musical accompaniment of silent film. Aaron acts as the assistant director, percussionist and composer for both the Boston based new music groups Firebird Ensemble and Primary Duo and is an active teacher throughout the area. For more information, please go to www.aarontrant.com.

Melissa Weaver

Melissa Weaver

Melissa Weaver is a mixed-media artist. Informed by her career as a commercial artist (textile design, digital design, videography) but challenged by a personal need to move beyond and explore the mystery, Melissa’s artwork reflects both the discipline and chaos of both worlds.

DEB TODD WHEELER

Deb Todd Wheeler

Deb Todd Wheeler  is an award winning visual artist from the Boston area. Her work generates discreetly intimate experiences through interactive installations, objects, and participatory gatherings. Raised by musicians, and trained as a material craftsman, she has an attitudinal nimbleness that spawns collaboration across disciplines. In her studio, performative objects and experi­ences are generated in relation to the human body- where time, material and interaction are required to explore ideas of labor and loss, artifice and authenticity, and the effects of industry on both the psyche and the landscape. There is a clash between the desire to be productive, to be industrious, to find beauty, to push technology forward, and the fraught consequences this desire reaps: through regret, lament, grief. Her projects act as a vehicle for processing both material and emotion.

Grace Caiazza

Grace Caiazza

Grace Caiazza is an independent curator based in upstate New York.  She is the co-founder of FOUR-D, a curatorial project that centers around immersive exhibition design. You can find her work at 4444-d.com.

poster

Registered Conference Delegates will receive a discount at the door. 

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