{"word_count": 230, "character_count": 1917}
Rotterdam, The Netherlands, July 27 - 31, 2015Deadline: Jun 16, 2014CFP: “The International Thread: Lace and Commerce in Eighteenth-CenturyEurope”Opening Markets: Trade and Commerce in the Eighteenth CenturyISECS Quadrennial Congress, on the Enlightenment, Rotterdam, theNetherlands, 27 - 31 July 2015Chairs: Tara Zanardi, (Department of Art &#38; Art History, HunterCollege/CUNY 695 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10065;tzanardi@hunter.cuny.edu), and Michael Yonan, (Department of ArtHistory and Archaeology, University of Missouri, 21 Parker Hall,Columbia, MO, 65211; yonanm@missouri.edu)Enormous amounts of lace flooded the marketplaces of eighteenth-centuryEurope, which fostered a vibrant international trade. This marketplacecentered on competition between the Low Countries (especially theregions that now comprise Belgium) and northern France, two areas thatincluded Europe’s most technically accomplished lacemaking centers,including Alençon, Argentan, Brussels, Mechlin, and Valenciennes.These towns exported huge quantities of lace to an internationalclientele and competed with locally manufactured lace. Our panel seekspapers that examine how lace operated within eighteenth-centurymercantile networks, economic systems, and black markets. What werethe trade factors the affected the distribution of lace, both locallyand globally, and how did those factors affect working conditions,design choices, and the objects created? How did these marketconditions affect what lace was used for, be it garments, decorativeitems, or household textiles? Topics might include treatments of laceand lace making in gendered terms, as statements of regional ornational pride, labor practices in lacemaking, techniques andmaterials, and the industry’s global ambitions. Interdisciplinarypapers are especially welcome.For more information, see the congress websites:http://www.openingmarkets.eu/http://isecs2015.wordpress.com/