engleski

Gertrude Bell’s Spring in Dalmatia, 1910

The British archaeologist Gertrude Bell visited Dalmatia during a study trip in 1910. The art of this region was one in which Western and Eastern influences intertwined, and Bell visited Dalmatia at a time when comparative research into non-Western and Western cultures in the cultural and anthropological disciplines was rapidly developing. This essay reconstructs Bell’s week-long stay in Dalmatia through her letters and photographs. While she mostly uses her camera to record subjects of professional interest, her letters are more personal and anecdotal. Both constitute valuable documents which help us reconstruct places, people, monuments, and Bell’s impressions of the coastal cities. The letters simultaneously served as a guide in the reconstruction of the social and political circumstances of Dalmatia in the first decades of the century. Bell’s evaluation of Dalmatian heritage, through a comparison with the monuments of Anatolia and Mesopotamia, provides a platform for promoting transcultural dialogue, during which artworks can be contextualised in multiple ways. Her comparative formal analysis of monuments during historical processes of cultural exchange offers both a compelling methodology for global art histories, and reveals Dalmatia – a space of historical clash and exchange – as a particularly rewarding object of study.

Gertrude Bell, Frane Bulić, travel writing, Dalmatia, Diocletian's Palace, world art history, global art history, transculturalism

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