Practices of Comparing. Towards a New Understanding of a Fundamental Human Practice

Epple A, Erhart W, Grave J, eds. Practices of Comparing. Towards a New Understanding of a Fundamental Human Practice. BiUP General. 1st ed. Bielefeld: Bielefeld University Press; 2020.Practices of comparing shape how we perceive, organize, and change the world. Supposedly innocent, practices of comparing play a decisive role in forming categories, boundaries, and hierarchies; but they can also give an impetus to question and change such structures. Like almost no other human practice, comparing pervades all social, political, economic, and cultural spheres. This volume outlines the program of a new research agenda that places comparative practices at the center of an interdisciplinary exploration. Its contributions combine case studies with overarching systematic considerations. They show what insights can be gained and which further questions arise when one makes a seemingly trivial practice - comparing - the subject of in-depth research

Belagerte Moderne: Krieg und Kommune in der französischen Druckgraphik 1870/71 ; Begleitheft zur Ausstellung

Der Deutsch-Französische Krieg und die gewaltsamen Auseinandersetzungen um die Pariser Kommune stellen einen denkbar scharfen Kontrast zum kulturellen Leben der modernen Metropole Paris in den Jahren vor 1870 dar. Die 1860er Jahre waren auch in den bildenden Künsten von einem produktiven Aufbruch gekennzeichnet: Édouard Manet hatte mit ersten Skandalen in Ausstellungen auf sich aufmerksam gemacht; Maler wie Claude Monet und Camille Pissarro begannen damit, den Impressionismus herauszubilden; und eine Reihe von ambitionierten Druckgraphikern hatte die Radierung als anspruchsvolles und durchaus modernes Bildmedium wiederbelebt. Während Krieg und Kommune in der offiziellen Kunst und im Impressionismus vergleichsweise wenige Spuren hinterlassen haben, lassen sich die einschneidenden Ereignisse der Jahre 1870 und 1871 in der Druckgraphik gut nachvollziehen. Radierungen von Adolphe Martial Potémont, Maxime Lalanne oder François Pierdon führen vor Augen, wie die Künstler mit ihren zuvor entwickelten künstlerischen Mitteln auf die radikal veränderte Situation zu reagieren versuchten. Ausstellung und Begleitheft stellen ausgewählte Druckgraphiken von französischen Künstlern ins Zentrum, um einen etwas anderen Blick auf den Deutsch-Französischen Krieg und die Kommune zu richten

Gender and Weight Shape Brain Dynamics during Food Viewing

Hemodynamic imaging results have associated both gender and body weight to variation in brain responses to food-related information. However, the spatio-temporal brain dynamics of gender-related and weight-wise modulations in food discrimination still remain to be elucidated. We analyzed visual evoked potentials (VEPs) while normal-weighted men (n = 12) and women (n = 12) categorized photographs of energy-dense foods and non-food kitchen utensils. VEP analyses showed that food categorization is influenced by gender as early as 170 ms after image onset. Moreover, the female VEP pattern to food categorization co-varied with participants' body weight. Estimations of the neural generator activity over the time interval of VEP modulations (i.e. by means of a distributed linear inverse solution [LAURA]) revealed alterations in prefrontal and temporo-parietal source activity as a function of image category and participants' gender. However, only neural source activity for female responses during food viewing was negatively correlated with body-mass index (BMI) over the respective time interval. Women showed decreased neural source activity particularly in ventral prefrontal brain regions when viewing food, but not non-food objects, while no such associations were apparent in male responses to food and non-food viewing. Our study thus indicates that gender influences are already apparent during initial stages of food-related object categorization, with small variations in body weight modulating electrophysiological responses especially in women and in brain areas implicated in food reward valuation and intake control. These findings extend recent reports on prefrontal reward and control circuit responsiveness to food cues and the potential role of this reactivity pattern in the susceptibility to weight gain

Historicism and constructionism: rival ideas of historical change

Simon ZB. Historicism and constructionism: rival ideas of historical change. History of European Ideas. 2019;45(8):1171-1190.A seemingly unitary appeal to history might evoke today two incompatible operations of historicization that yield contradictory results. This article attempts to understand two co-existing senses of historicity as conflicting ideas of historical change and rival practices of temporal comparison: historicism and constructionism. At their respective births, both claimed to make sense of the world and ourselves as changing over time. Historicism, dominating nineteenth-century Western thought and overseeing the professionalization of historical studies, advocated an understanding of the present condition of the human world as developing out of past conditions. Constructionism, dominating the second half of the twentieth century, understood the present condition as the recent invention of certain ‘historical’ environments, without prior existence. As competing ideas of historical change, they both entail a comparison between past and present conditions of their investigated subjects, but their practices of temporal comparison are irreconcilable and represent two distinct ways of historicization

Carlo Mense zwischen den "Werkleuten auf Haus Nyland" und der europäischen Avantgarde. Zu den Entstehungsumständen der Großstadt-Mappe

Grave J. Carlo Mense zwischen den "Werkleuten auf Haus Nyland" und der europäischen Avantgarde. Zu den Entstehungsumständen der Großstadt-Mappe. In: Grave J, ed. Das Doppelgesicht der Großstadt. Carlo Mense, Josef Winckler und die Werkleute auf Haus Nyland. Steinfurt; 2002: 10-20

Einblicke in das »Ganze« der Kunst. Goethes graphische Sammlung

Grave J. Einblicke in das »Ganze« der Kunst. Goethes graphische Sammlung. In: Bertsch M, Grave J, eds. Räume der Kunst. Blicke auf Goethes Sammlungen. Ästhetik um 1800, 3. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht; 2005: 255-288

Zeichnung ohne Zug. Über das Unzeichnerische in der deutschen Kunst um 1800

Grave J. Zeichnung ohne Zug. Über das Unzeichnerische in der deutschen Kunst um 1800. Zeitschrift für Ästhetik und allgemeine Kunstwissenschaft. 2008;53:233-260

À l'oeuvre. La théologie de l'image de Caspar David Friedrich

Grave J. À l'oeuvre. La théologie de l'image de Caspar David Friedrich. Passerelles, Série française. Paris: Éd. de la Maison des sciences de l'homme; 2011