August 23–December 22, 2024

The Middle Ages is often thought of as a period of heightened religious devotion, especially in the Catholic regions of Western Europe. Looking to the Joan of Arc Chapel at the heart of Marquette’s campus and pulling from the collections of the Haggerty Museum of Art and the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, Material Muses: Medieval Devotional Culture and its Afterlives considers how artists since the end of the Middle Ages have looked back toward art from this period as inspiration for creating “authentic” devotional objects into the present day. Material Muses explores the allure of medieval material religion as it converses with and energizes post-medieval religious narratives.  

Material Muses was curated by Abby R. Armstrong Check, Claire Kilgore, and Tania Kolarik, PhD candidates in the Department of Art History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.