The importance of images is certainly one of the most striking features of the early modern sciences. The wide range of strategies and styles employed in this new trend towards visualization is especially notable in the picturing of life, as new demands – both scientific and practical, aesthetic as well as social – urged to reconsider the phenomena of life and how to depict living beings.

Most early modern artists, scientists and practitioners did not intend their images just to support their texts but used them to rephrase, supplement, integrate or entirely substitute them. When adapted to different genres of scientific texts and contexts, these illustrations could expand, reshape or even question the original authors’ very doctrines.

The presentations will investigate various strategies in depicting living beings – from fossils up to the human animal. They will study the problematic interplay between epistemology, aesthetics and the different styles of visualisation as well as the struggle to access structures and processes invisible to the naked eye – because of their microscopic size, or location (as in the inner recesses of the brain). Thereby the workshop will shed new light on the role of images in science.

Code of Conduct
Please note the following instructions during the event / Bitte beachten Sie während der Veranstaltung folgende Hinweise:

• Turn your camera off. The speakers will share their screen to make their presentation visible. / Bitte schalten Sie die Kamera während des Vortrags aus. Die Referentinnen und Referenten werden ihren Bildschirm teilen, um ihre Präsentation sichtbar zu machen.
• The microphone should be switched off during the lecture in order to avoid background noise. / Das Mikrofon sollte während des Vortrags ausgeschaltet sein, um störende Hintergrundgeräusche zu vermeiden.
• In the subsequent discussion, requests to speak can be displayed via the chat. The moderator maintains a list of speakers according to the running order in the chat and invokes each one to pose their question. / In der anschließenden Diskussion können Wortmeldungen über den Chat angezeigt werden. Der Moderator führt eine Redeliste und erteilt jeweils das Wort.
• In the discussion, the camera can be turned on. Especially when speaking, this is desirable so that the speakers can also see who is asking the questions or comments. / In der Diskussion kann die Kamera gerne eingeschaltet werden, insbesondere beim Vortragen von Wortmeldungen ist dies gewünscht, damit die Referentinnen und Referenten auch sehen können, wer die Fragen oder Anmerkungen stellt.