Art and Lived Religion

Art and Lived Religion explores the dynamic relationship between medieval and early modern religion and art, integrating the lived religion approach with Gillian Rose’s critical visual methodology (CVM) to reveal how religious artworks actively shaped cognition, emotion, and action.

Offering a groundbreaking framework for understanding the multisensory and relational nature of religious experience, this book presents case studies spanning Western Christian, Orthodox Christian, Hindu, and Aztec contexts. All chapters highlight the “dynamism of forces” between art, religion and human encounter across diverse temporal, geographic, and cultural settings, emphasizing the interplay of visual, material, social and embodied dimensions in the creation of experience.

Methodologically and conceptually ideal for students and scholars in art history, religious studies, and interdisciplinary research, this book is tailored to those seeking to explore the experiential dynamics of art and devotion across diverse cultural, temporal, and geographic settings.

The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons [Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC BY-NC-ND)] 4.0 license.

Karen E. McCluskey is Associate Professor of Art History at the University of Notre Dame, Australia. Her research investigates how art shapes and is shaped by lived experience. Recent publications: New Saints in Late-Mediaeval Venice (2020).

Raisa Maria Toivo is Professor of History at Tampere University, Finland. She works on the history of religious conflicts and witchcraft in early modern Europe and experience as an approach to history. Recent publications include Lived Religion and Gender in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe (co-authored with Sari Katajala-Peltomaa, 2021, Routledge) and Histories of Experience in the World of Lived Religion (co-edited with Sari Katajala-Peltomaa, 2022).