Cynthia Robinson, Professor of History of Art & Visual Studies, will present at UK Association for Art History Annual Conference on April 8th 2026. She will speak in the panel "Art History: Facts and Fiction?" about her forthcoming project in a presentation titled, "An Angelic Apparition in the Generalife: Alhambra Scholar Goes Rogue, Starts Writing Novels…Wherein Her Characters Perform Visual Analysis (subtly…)."
About the Panel:
This panel explores a neglected tradition in art history: the strategic use of fictional elements in art historical writing. It examines the scope of this underexplored practice, considering its benefits, challenges, and intellectual legacies in art history, visual culture, and material culture studies in the context of their intersections with broader interdisciplinary currents in the humanities.
The use of such elements in art history is long-standing. Vasari, for instance, drew on Italian novelistic traditions in The Lives of the Artists to craft compelling historical narratives, an aspect of art-historical writing often overlooked. Yet, as Hayden White noted, the writing of history is ‘at once poetic, scientific and philosophical.’
Across the humanities more broadly, by contrast, scholars have strategically adopted fictional perspectives to challenge prevailing conceptions and address archival gaps. Examples include Clifford Geertz’s ‘faction,’ which addresses the fiction of the neutral anthropological observer, and Saidiya Hartman’s critical fabulation, which blends historical research with critical theory and fictional narrative to amplify the suppressed voices of the enslaved. Donna Haraway’s speculative fabulation also deserves mention, combining fact and fiction to explore complex issues and imagine possible futures. Likewise, Gerald Vizenor’s ‘Native American slipstream’ employs time travel and alternate realities to explore ‘Indigenous’ worldviews, perspectives on history and conceptions of futurity, raising questions about art history’s engagement with such practices.
The session will feature presentations that engage the creative and critical possibilities of fictional strategies in art history through case studies, methodological reflection and accounts of personal scholarly practice.
