Robert Wallis
My research interests concern the archaeology and anthropology of art and religion, the re-presentation of the past in the present, and the anthropology and archaeology of falconry.
My current work, in preparation for a monograph, examines the perceived interface between shamanism and art from prehistory to the present. A second monograph in preparation examines the origins of and earliest evidence for falconry.
My books include:
- Shamans / neo-Shamans: Ecstasy, Alternative Archaeologies and Contemporary Pagans (Routledge 2003, short-listed for the Folklore Society Prize 2003)
- Historical Dictionary of Shamanism, with Graham Harvey (Scarecrow Press, second edition 2016)
- Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/Rights: Pagan Engagements with Archaeological Monuments, with Jenny Blain (Sussex Academic Press, 2007)
- A Permeability of Boundaries: New Approaches to the Archaeology of Art, Religion and Folklore, co-edited with Kenneth Lymer (Oxford BAR 2001)
- Antiquaries and Archaists: The Past in the Past, the Past in the Present, co-edited with Megan Aldrich (Spire Press 2009)
I have published articles internationally, including in 'Antiquity', 'The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute', 'World Archaeology', 'World Art', 'Journal of Material Culture', ''Public Archaeology', 'The Archaeological Journal of the Royal Archaeological Society', and 'Folklore'.
I have contributed chapters to a number of edited volumes including 'The Oxford Illustrated History of Witchcraft and Magic', 'Handbook of Contemporary Animism', 'Sculpture and Archaeology', 'Archaeology of Shamanism', 'Archaeology of Spiritualities' and 'Handbook of Contemporary Paganism'.
With Dr Jenny Blain at Sheffield Hallam University (now retired), I co-directed the Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/Rights Project, examining pagan engagements with the past (see www.sacredsites.org.uk), 2001-2011. The findings of the first five years of the project were published as Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/Rights: Pagan Engagements with Archaeological Monuments (Sussex Academic Press 2007).
I currently lead the Research Centre for International Visual Arts and Cultures at Richmond University: https://www.richmond.ac.uk/faculty-research/ivac/
I have delivered over 100 research papers at a wide variety of international academic and professional conferences, and public events, including the Royal Anthropological Institute (RAI) Conference, Theoretical Archaeology Group (TAG), Association of Social Anthropologists (ASA), European Association of Archaeologists (EAA), World Archaeological Congress (WAC), College Art Association (CAA), British Association for the Study of Religion (BASR), Cambridge Heritage Seminar, British Sociological Association Study Group on Religion, British Rock Art Group (BRAG), Folklore Society, Popular Culture Association (PCA) and International Federation of Rock Art Organisations (IFRAO). I have given papers at, for example, the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research (Cambridge), Society of Antiquaries of London, University of Edinburgh, University of East Anglia, University of Bristol, University of Durham, University College Dublin, University of Southampton, University of Vienna, University of Lisbon, Liaocheng University of China, University of Groningen, University of Iceland, University of Helsinki and University of Mary Washington. I have also given presentations at various public and private museums and art institutions including the Henry Moore Institute, Wellcome Collection, National Portrait Gallery, Institute for Contemporary Art, Manchester Museum, and a number of commercial art galleries.
Address: 1 St Alban's Grove
London
W8 5PN
My current work, in preparation for a monograph, examines the perceived interface between shamanism and art from prehistory to the present. A second monograph in preparation examines the origins of and earliest evidence for falconry.
My books include:
- Shamans / neo-Shamans: Ecstasy, Alternative Archaeologies and Contemporary Pagans (Routledge 2003, short-listed for the Folklore Society Prize 2003)
- Historical Dictionary of Shamanism, with Graham Harvey (Scarecrow Press, second edition 2016)
- Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/Rights: Pagan Engagements with Archaeological Monuments, with Jenny Blain (Sussex Academic Press, 2007)
- A Permeability of Boundaries: New Approaches to the Archaeology of Art, Religion and Folklore, co-edited with Kenneth Lymer (Oxford BAR 2001)
- Antiquaries and Archaists: The Past in the Past, the Past in the Present, co-edited with Megan Aldrich (Spire Press 2009)
I have published articles internationally, including in 'Antiquity', 'The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute', 'World Archaeology', 'World Art', 'Journal of Material Culture', ''Public Archaeology', 'The Archaeological Journal of the Royal Archaeological Society', and 'Folklore'.
I have contributed chapters to a number of edited volumes including 'The Oxford Illustrated History of Witchcraft and Magic', 'Handbook of Contemporary Animism', 'Sculpture and Archaeology', 'Archaeology of Shamanism', 'Archaeology of Spiritualities' and 'Handbook of Contemporary Paganism'.
With Dr Jenny Blain at Sheffield Hallam University (now retired), I co-directed the Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/Rights Project, examining pagan engagements with the past (see www.sacredsites.org.uk), 2001-2011. The findings of the first five years of the project were published as Sacred Sites, Contested Rites/Rights: Pagan Engagements with Archaeological Monuments (Sussex Academic Press 2007).
I currently lead the Research Centre for International Visual Arts and Cultures at Richmond University: https://www.richmond.ac.uk/faculty-research/ivac/
I have delivered over 100 research papers at a wide variety of international academic and professional conferences, and public events, including the Royal Anthropological Institute (RAI) Conference, Theoretical Archaeology Group (TAG), Association of Social Anthropologists (ASA), European Association of Archaeologists (EAA), World Archaeological Congress (WAC), College Art Association (CAA), British Association for the Study of Religion (BASR), Cambridge Heritage Seminar, British Sociological Association Study Group on Religion, British Rock Art Group (BRAG), Folklore Society, Popular Culture Association (PCA) and International Federation of Rock Art Organisations (IFRAO). I have given papers at, for example, the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research (Cambridge), Society of Antiquaries of London, University of Edinburgh, University of East Anglia, University of Bristol, University of Durham, University College Dublin, University of Southampton, University of Vienna, University of Lisbon, Liaocheng University of China, University of Groningen, University of Iceland, University of Helsinki and University of Mary Washington. I have also given presentations at various public and private museums and art institutions including the Henry Moore Institute, Wellcome Collection, National Portrait Gallery, Institute for Contemporary Art, Manchester Museum, and a number of commercial art galleries.
Address: 1 St Alban's Grove
London
W8 5PN
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Papers by Robert Wallis
the origin of religion and shamans are characterized as the first artists, leaving their infamous mark in the cave art of Upper Palaeolithic Europe. Despite a disconnect of several millennia, modern artists too, from Wassily Kandinsky and Vincent van Gogh, to Joseph Beuys and Marcus Coates, have been labelled as inspired visionaries who access the trance-like states of shamans, and these artists of the ‘white cube’ or gallery setting are cited as the inheritors of an enduring tradition of shamanic art. But critical engagement with the history of thinking on art and shamanism, drawing on discourse analysis, shows these concepts are not unchanging, timeless ‘elective affinities’; they are constructed,
historically situated and contentious. In this paper, I examine how art and shamanism have been conceived and their relationship entangled from the Renaissance to the present, focussing on the interpretation of Upper Palaeolithic cave art in the first half of the twentieth century—a key moment in this trajectory—to illustrate my case.
the origin of religion and shamans are characterized as the first artists, leaving their infamous mark in the cave art of Upper Palaeolithic Europe. Despite a disconnect of several millennia, modern artists too, from Wassily Kandinsky and Vincent van Gogh, to Joseph Beuys and Marcus Coates, have been labelled as inspired visionaries who access the trance-like states of shamans, and these artists of the ‘white cube’ or gallery setting are cited as the inheritors of an enduring tradition of shamanic art. But critical engagement with the history of thinking on art and shamanism, drawing on discourse analysis, shows these concepts are not unchanging, timeless ‘elective affinities’; they are constructed,
historically situated and contentious. In this paper, I examine how art and shamanism have been conceived and their relationship entangled from the Renaissance to the present, focussing on the interpretation of Upper Palaeolithic cave art in the first half of the twentieth century—a key moment in this trajectory—to illustrate my case.