The Retrieval of Revival: Recollecting and Revising the Evan Roberts Wax Cylinder

Revivalism in art, design and architecture is a foundational aspect of modernism, though it has often been overlooked. This volume seeks to investigate the diverse dimensions of revivalism, exploring its meanings and impacts across cultures and media between c.1850 and 1950. Bringing together case studies that highlight revivalism in fields as diverse as Armenian architecture, German glassware and contemporary tattooing, Revival: Memories, Identities, Utopias counteracts perceptions of revivalism as a practice opposed to canonical modernism, instead highlighting its international and interdisciplinary presence. This book challenges established viewpoints on intersections between past and present, offering new perspectives on what makes revivalism a force for innovation and not a mode of conservatism. Revivalism, this collection argues, looks forward into a present and indeed a future that is built upon persistent echoes of history. The book’s 12 essays represent leading research in diverse zones of art history. Its authors’ ideas were first developed in a series of events at The Courtauld Institute of Art in 2012. The conference from which these essays stem – Revival: Utopia, Identity, Memory held at The Courtauld in November 2012 – was a core element of The Courtauld Research Forum’s flagship project for that year. The initiative, led by Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow Ayla Lepine, brought together a group of international scholars who shared their expertise on revivalism, retro, nostalgia, and historicism. The project revealed new ways of understanding how these concepts operate in art, architecture, and design worldwide from c.1800 to the present. Revival: Memories, Identities, Utopias is the final outcome of this fruitful process.