[ebooks] Philadelphia: South of Market and East of Broad (Postcard History) by Gus Spector in Arts-Photography

Description

Spectacular Miracles confronts an enduring Western belief in the supernatural power of images; for example the belief that a statue or painting of the Madonna can fly through the air; speak; weep or produce miraculous cures. Although discomforting to widely-held assumptions; the cults of particular paintings and statues held to be miraculous have persisted beyond the middle ages into the present; even in a modern European city such as Genoa; the primary focus of this book. Spectacular Miracles draws upon rich documentation from northwest Italy and elsewhere to show how; in a range of historical contexts; these images lsquo;workrsquo;. Ritual animation of the image is vividly evoked; as is the phenomenology of the beholderrsquo;s experience. The subversive potential of the miraculous image to bypass clerical and secular authority is a central theme. Reproducibility enhances this power: devotion is hard to control when a copy of a venerated image (even in a digital form mediated by the internet) is held to carry the same supernatural potential as the original.Spectacular Miracles engages with the history; anthropology and visual culture of images and religion; and is a convincing study of the power of faith and art.