Conception, materiality and reception of Meister Eckhart’s ideas on space and time are at the heart of the 9th workshop of the Erfurt SpaceTime Research Group (ERZ), for the third time in cooperation with the Max Weber Center of the University of Erfurt (MWK) and the first time with King's College London (AHRC Research Project on Meister Eckhart).

The conveners are concerned primarily with the materiality and experiences of the body, embodiment and corporeality in the conception and reception of Meister Eckhart’s ideas of space and time. Conception and reception relate both to the ideas of space and/or time in Eckhart, as well as to their broader context, relative to figures such as Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas, among others. Furthermore, the materiality of Eckhart’s work-corpus and its environment plays a role: how do the texts as objects and subjects relate to time and space? How does reading and interpretation change once this materiality is understood not solely as additional or marginal, but as texts written on a particular kind of parchment/paper with specific ink, belonging to a certain codex and collection, and consisting of additions and erasures such as palimpsests, context entries, covers, notes of ownership, signatures and other important bibliographical issues?

The aim is not only to consider these issues in chronologically linear studies, but welcomes also comparisons between the Middle Ages and modernity, as the workshop assumes that overarching evaluations are possible and fruitful, particularly when considering space and the resulting consequences on body and embodiment (for example, Merleau-Ponty’s ‘body’).

The workshop is the final event of the British AHRC-funded three-year project on Meister Eckhart and the early University of Paris, dedicated to the new Parisian Quaestiones of Eckhart. The project has been led by Professor Markus Vinzent as the responsible leader (PI), supported by Professor Oliver Davies (Co -I) and carried out with the research assistance of Dr. Christopher M. Wojtulewicz. The workshop will take place on the occasion of the exhibition Performing Bodies. Time and Space in Meister Eckhart and in the Video Installations of Taery Kim (initiated and co-curated by DDr. Jutta Vinzent), which will open in the Galerie Waidspeicher, Erfurt on 23 January 2016 and run until 13 March 2016). Participants in the workshop are cordially invited to the vernissage on Saturday, 23 Jan. 2016, 7 p.m. in the Galerie Waidspeicher1.
Registration for attending the opening of the exhibition (Performing Bodies. Raum und Zeit bei Meister Eckhart und in Performances und Video Installationen von Taery Kim) by 20.01.2016 bei/to Dr Chris Wojtulewicz ([email protected])

Conveners:

  • Dr. Sebastian Dorsch, Erfurter RaumZeit-Gruppe, Universität Erfurt
  • Prof. Dr. Dietmar Mieth, Leiter der Meister-Eckhart-Forschungsstelle des Max-Weber Kollegs Erfurt, Universität Tübingen
  • DDr. Jutta Vinzent, University of Birmingham/Max-Weber Kolleg Erfurt
  • Professor Dr. Markus Vinzent, King‘s College London/ Max-Weber Kolleg Erfurt
  • Dr. Christopher M. Wojtulewicz, King’s College London

Programme

Monday, 25 Jan. 2016 (Venue: Max-Weber-Kolleg, EG, Nordhäuser Strasse, 99084 Erfurt)

09.30 – 09.45 Opening and Introduction: Professor Susanne Rau (Universität Erfurt)
09.45 – 10.30 Discussion of reference texts

  • Introductions: Ben Morgan (Oxford University) & Christian Jung (University of Birmingham/ MWK Erfurt)

10.30 – 12.30 Session 1: Conceptions of Space and Time in Eckhart’s days – Chair: Ben Morgan (University of Oxford)

  • Walter Senner (Pontificia Università San Tommaso d’Aquino, Rome): Thomas und Eckhart
  • Julie Casteigt (Univesité de Toulouse/ MWK Erfurt): 'In the Principle', that is in eternity, 'was the Word'. Time and eternity in Albert the Great's Super Iohannem
  • Alessandra Beccarisi (Università del Salento, Lecce): Virtus cogitativa in Eckhart and Dietrich of Freiberg

12.30 – 13.30 Lunch (catering provided)

13.30 – 15.30 Session 2: Text as Corpus and Materiality – Chair: Andrés Quero-Sánchez (MWK Erfurt)

  • Loris Sturlese (Università del Salento, Lecce), tbc
  • Dietmar Mieth (Universität Tübingen/MWK Erfurt): Das Herz bei Meister Eckhart als verkörperter Intellekt
  • Freimut Löser (Universität Augsburg): Corpus und Materialität des deutschen Eckhart

16.00 – 17.00 Guided Tour of the Amploniana (Thomas Boullion, Leiter der Sondersammlung der UB Erfurt)

18.00 Invitation to the annual academic celebration of the Max Weber Center (Collegium Maius)

  • Key note: Gudrun Krämer (FU Berlin), Selbstkultivierung als islamische Praxis
  • with buffet (Internationales Begegnungszentrum, Michaelisstr. 38, 99084 Erfurt)

Tuesday, 26.01.2016 (9.00-13.00) (Venue: Internationales Begegnungszentrum, Michaelisstr. 38, 99084 Erfurt)

9.30 – 11.00 Session 3: Reception of mystic space and time conceptions – Chair: Sebastian Dorsch (Universität Erfurt, RaumZeit-Gruppe)

  • Maxime Mauriège (Thomas-Institut, Köln): Die Zeitkonzeption im Lehrsystem der deutschen <Dominikaner->Mystik (= Greith’s Traktat)
  • Elisa Rieger (Universität Graz): Zur Logik der Singularität - oder das Werden der tausend Augenblicke/Poetik des Körpers, der Wandernde und Buddhistische Askese

11.00 – 11.15 Coffee Break

11.15 – 12.45 Session 4: Eckhart and modern art

  • Chair/Moderation und Kommentar: Jutta Vinzent (University of Birmingham/MWK Erfurt)
  • Susanne Knorr (Waidspeicher Galerie, Erfurt): Bill Viola und Raum und Zeit
  • Kai-Uwe Schierz (Erfurter Kunstmuseen), Meister Eckhart und Ad Reinhardts Zwölf Regeln für eine neue Akademie

ab 12.45 Concluding discussion

  • Chair: Markus Vinzent (King’s College, London/MWK Erfurt)
  • Lunch if wished

Opportunity to visit the exhibition Perfoming Bodies. Raum und Zeit bei Meister Eckhart und in Performances und Video Installationen von Taery Kim (Performing Bodies. Space and Time in Meister Eckhart and the Performances and Video Installationen of Taery Kim), Gallery Waidspeicher.

We would like to thank our funding bodies: MWK Erfurt, AHRC, UK and the Erfurt SpaceTime Research Group.

Registration until 13 January 2016: sebastian.dorsch[at]uni-erfurt.de

We will discuss the following reference texts/Wir werden die folgenden Texte diskutieren:

  • The fourth Parisian Questio (with English translation)/Meister Eckhart, 4. Pariser Questio (mit Übersetzung in Englisch)
  • Caroline Walker Bynum, Christian Materiality (New York: Zone Books, 2011), 31-6 and 280-6

You will receive a copy of the texts after registration.

Please, be aware that you have to book your own accommodation, if you are not invited as speaker and that Erfurt, despite having many hotels, B&Bs and hostels, can get fully booked due to many events happening at the same time.

  • 1. http://www.galerie-waidspeicher.de/home/