Humanities and Social Sciences

Art History

Staff Directory

Dr Ursula Betka

Lecturer Room: David Myer Building East, Room E101 Tel: 9479 2380 Fax: 9479 1942 Email: U.Betka@latrobe.edu.au Qualifications: BA (Hons), BEd (Hons), PhD, Melb

Dr Usula Betka is currently teaching Art and Cultural history of Medieval Europe c600-1200, Early Christian Rome & Byzantium, and Medieval & Early Renaissance Italy.

Her research interests include: Icons and Marian devotion in Trecento Italy; The Orders and the role of the laity in artistic patronage; Confraternity devotional ritual and social service in late medieval Italy; Illuminated Laudario manuscripts in fourteenth century Italy; Pilgrimage sites and cult objects in early Byzantine Syria; Byzantine and early Italian icon paintings on wood – theology, methodology and workshop methods.

>>Research Projects

‘The Laudesi confraternity of Sant’Agnese in Florence – artistic patronage and the illuminated hymn book in context’ in Imagination, Books and Community in Medieval Europe, proceedings from the Exhibition Conference, SLV 29-31 May 2008.

‘The Laudario: A Choir Book for the Laity’ in Margaret M. Manion, History of the Italian Illuminated Choir Book (Macmillan, Australia, 2009).
The Medieval Italian Workshop. Painters, Illuminators and Patrons (Monograph).

>>Research Publications

Selected publications include:

Marian Images and Laudesi Devotion in Late Medieval Italy, ca.1260-1350. Ph.D dissertation, The University of Melbourne, 2001 (UMI Michigan, 2002).

Co-editor with J. Burke, P. Buckley, K. Hay, A. Stevenson & R. Scott, Byzantine Narrative. Papers in Honour of Roger Scott, Eds. J AABS, Byzantina Australiensia 16 (Melbourne 2006).

‘Icon and Narrative. Commemorating Saint Francis in Assisi’ in Byzantine Narrative. Papers in Honour of Roger Scott, Eds. J. Burke, with U. Betka, P. Buckley, K. Hay, A. Stevenson & R. Scott, AABS, Byzantina Australiensia 16 (Melbourne 2006), 303-319.

Catalogue entries, with S.Panayatova, Three miniatures from a Laudario, (Melbourne 2008), Macmillan, Catalogue Entry.

>>Full Profile (pdf 100kb)