The editors of SEQUITUR, the graduate student journal published by the Department of History of Art & Architecture at Boston University, invite current and recent graduate students to submit content around the theme of “Threads” for our Fall 2023 issue.
The editors of SEQUITUR, the graduate student journal published by the Department of History of Art & Architecture at Boston University, invite current and recent graduate students to submit content for our Fall 2023 issue.
This issue’s theme is made to be pulled on: unraveling the myriad of ways in which the concepts of “threads” can be applied within the humanities. Just as thousands of threads can be woven into an elaborate tapestry, so too are human communities and societies made up of the threads of relationships that connect individuals to one another. Anthropologist Clifford Geertz drew on the connective power of threads when he theorized that “man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun.” Links between people near and distant have always had a significant impact on artistic production and meaningful exchanges, which appear in storytelling through symbolic patterns, development of new forms, and gifting networks. Returning to a material framework, the fibers, design, and labor surrounding textiles are all intertwined in the numerous constructs of art and society. In spite of a thread’s material or figurative fragility, its integrative power grants it the ability to survive for generations as a testament to craft, visual culture, and the essential labors of creation and human connection.
