Anne-Valérie Dulac at the conference ‘Esther Inglis in Contexts and Culture’

Team member Anne-Valérie Dulac is giving a colour-related paper at the Esther Inglis symposium held in Edinburgh on 19-20 Octobre 2024. This two-day conference marks the quatercentenary of the death of 17th century manuscript artist and writer Esther Inglis.

About the conference

Esther Inglis (1570-1624) is a uniquely important writer and artist. A refugee from religious persecution, she and her family moved initially to England before settling in Edinburgh during her childhood; here she acquired the skills in calligraphy, drawing, and embroidery that combined to create the extraordinary manuscript books for which she is still famed, and which grace the collections of some of the finest libraries in the world. In her own day, she was known to be one of the finest calligraphers then working, sometimes called the 'mistress of the golden pen', and the regard in which her skills were held made her books valuable components in the pursuit of personal, religious and political interests. But while Inglis’s life and work are far from unfamiliar to both academic and wider audiences today, and she continues to inspire contemporary writers and artists, there is still much to be done to understand the multiple forces and contexts which shaped her activity and her own singular place within the culture of her time.

Support and speakers

In the quatercentenary of her death, the University of Edinburgh, with the generous support of the FEATHERS project at the University of Leiden, is hosting a two-day conference to bring together researchers working on different aspects of Esther Inglis’s life and work, and on the crafts, media and cultural contexts in which she worked. The event is part of a project that has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant agreement No. 864635, FEATHERS). Key speakers include leading Inglis specialists Georgianna Ziegler and Jamie Reid-Baxter. For more information on this event, please visit the conference website.