קונגרס העולמי ה-18 למדעי היהדות

Secrets and Magic: The Art and Design of Encrypted Amulets

author.DisplayName

From antiquity and medieval, artists and designers of amulets used verbal and visual codes.

Contemporary artists who design amulets also tend to encrypt the verbal content, but the method of encryption and design is different. In the lecture I will compare the visual encryption products of medieval amulets and contemporary amulets, in order to understand how well contemporary artists are familiar with the ancient encryption practices, and whether, and for what purpose, they rely on them.