- Room 102, 6 Portland Villas, Drake Circus, Plymouth, PL4 8AA
- +44 1752 585124
- gemma.blackshaw@plymouth.ac.uk

Profiles
Professor Gemma Blackshaw
Honorary Professor
School of Society and Culture (Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business)
- Art history
- Austrian art
- European modernism
- Art and medicine
- Medical history
- History of exhibitions
Email publicrelations@plymouth.ac.uk to enquire.
Biography
Biography
Qualifications
Professional membership
AAH (Association of Art Historians)
Teaching
Teaching
Teaching interests
Gemma Blackshaw's teaching interests lie in 19th- and 20th-century European art (Austria; Germany; France). Survey modules are frequently extended into field-trip modules to cities such as Vienna, Munich and Paris. Drawing on her supervisory experience and curatorial expertise, she also oversees the Art History dissertation module, and offers modules on gallery and museum studies.
Staff serving as external examiners
External Examiner for the MA in Art History & Theory and MA in Curatorial Studies, University of Essex (2014-2018).
External Examiner for the MA in History of Art at Birkbeck College, University of London (2009-12).
Research
Research
Research interests
- Austrian art (1800-1918)
- Modernism and Medicine
- Portraiture and Figuration (1800-1918)
- History of Exhibitions and Collecting
- Gender Politics and Identity
- Historiography
Research degrees awarded to supervised students
3 PhD completions, 1 as DoS; 6 MRes/ResM completions.
Grants & contracts
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Insight Grant (2017) for ‘Edvard Munch, Modernism, and Medicine’, led by Principal Investigator Dr Allison Morehead (Queen's University, Canada). I am one of eight international collaborators.
Leverhulme Research Fellowship (2010) for book project Exhibiting Portraiture in Vienna 1900.
British Academy Award (2007) to support the conference ‘Journeys into Madness: Representing Mental Illness in the Arts and Sciences, 1850-1930’.
Wellcome Trust Award (2007) to support the conference ‘Journeys into Madness: Representing Mental Illness in the Arts and Sciences, 1850-1930’.
Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Major Research Project Grant (2003) for ‘Madness and Modernity: Art, Architecture and Mental Illness in Vienna and the Habsburg Empire 1890-1914’.
Creative practice & artistic projects
Publications
Publications
Books:
Facing the Modern: The Portrait in Vienna 1900, edited book (London: National Gallery Company in association with Yale University Press, 2013).
Co-Edited Books:
Journeys into Madness: Mapping Mental Illness in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, co-edited book with Sabine Wieber (New York: Berghahn, 2012).
Madness and Modernity: Mental Illness and the Visual Arts in Vienna 1900, co-edited book with Leslie Topp (London: Lund Humphries, 2009). This is also available in German as Madness and Modernity: Kunst und Wahn in Wien um 1900 (Vienna: Christian Brandstätter, 2010).
Chapters in Books:
'Egon Schiele's Passion: Spirituality and Sexuality, 1912-15' in Tobias Natter (ed), Egon Schiele: The Complete Paintings (Munich: Taschen, 2017), 196-297.
'Introduction' (with Sabine Wieber) in Journeys into Madness, 1-9.
'Peter Altenberg: Authoring Madness in Vienna c. 1900' in Journeys into Madness, 109-129.
'Scrutinised Bodies and Lunatic Utopias: Mental Illness, Psychiatry and the Visual Arts in Vienna, 1898-1914' (with Leslie Topp) in Madness and Modernity, 14-37.
'Mad Modernists: Imaging Mental Illness in Viennese Portraits' in Madness and Modernity, 46-65.
'Gustav Jagerspacher: Portrait of Peter Altenberg' in Madness and Modernity, 66-75.
Articles:
Personal
Personal
Reports & invited lectures
'Mapping Mental Illness in Vienna 1900: Journeys of an Exhibition', research paper, University of Nottingham, (17 March 2010).
Participant in the round-table discussion for the AAH event 'Don't Ask For the Mona Lisa: Exhibition Collaborations Between Academics and Museums & Art Galleries', University of Leeds (18 March 2010).
Conferences organised
'Modernism and Medicine', College Art Association Annual Conference, Washington DC (February 2016). Co-chaired with Dr. Allison Morehead (Queen's University, Canada).
'Journeys into Madness: Representing Mental Illness in the Arts and Sciences, 1850-1930', Wellcome Trust (October 2007). Co-chaired with Dr. Sabine Wieber (University of Glasgow).
Other academic activities
- Curating
- Collaborations with contemporary figurative artists