Key points are not available for this paper at this time.
Abstract This essay offers a reflection on the vexed position of the pre-modern visual arts in Kosovo that sees medieval monuments under continuing armed guard. The violence that led to this state of affairs is sadly familiar, but this enduring phenomenon attracts little attention. The essay concentrates on the fate of the Serbian royal foundations in the region and suggests that it has important implications for the discipline of art history, whose established tools risk failing to find purchase on the polarised sectarian readings that have been forced on these monuments. The veneration of some of these nominally Christian sites by Muslims of varying ethnicities was well attested in the former Yugoslavia, but has not been integrated into their historical study. This essay proposes that the neglect of this experience, which is itself receding into an elusive past, raises questions about art history’s methods and scope.
Robert Maniura (Fri,) studied this question.
Synapse has enriched 5 closely related papers on similar clinical questions. Consider them for comparative context: