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Staff Profiles

Dr Flavia Vanni

British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow

Background

I have a background in Byzantine Studies with a specialisation on material culture and art history.

Before joining Newcastle University as a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow, I was a postdoctoral researcher at Koç University in Istanbul (2024), the University of Salerno (2023), a Richard McConnell Student at the British School at Athens (2023), and a Junior Fellow at Dumbarton Oaks (2019-2020).

During my PhD in Byzantine Studies at the University of Birmingham (2016-2021), I worked on the first comprehensive study on plaster reliefs (stuccoes) for the 9th -15th century Byzantium, which I am now transforming into a monograph.




Research

My research interests are threefold:

  • How materials were perceived in the Late Antique and Medieval period.
  • Processes of negotiations and collaborations between artisans and patrons in the Ancient and Medieval world
  • Developing inclusive strategies to communicate and teach cultural heritage to visually impaired and blind people


In my current British Academy project Sculpting light in Byzantine Greece: workshops, climate, and devotion I investigate the manipulation of natural light through processes of negotiations between artisans and patrons that led to artistic innovations in shaping Byzantine sacred spaces. Employing an almost unknown corpus of material evidence (window transennae) in rural contexts, the project challenges the traditional assumption that after the triumph of Orthodoxy (843 CE) the construction and experience of the Byzantine sacred space was standardised across urban and rural areas. This corpus demonstrates that rural communities were not passive recipients of urban models, as previously assumed, but rather exercised full agency in innovating and shaping Byzantine architecture to meet their practical, religious, and theological needs. I analyse the corpus using a cross-disciplinary methodology that combines liturgical and theological literature with the study of the transennae and 3D building reconstructions to understand how the interaction of natural and artificial light in rural churches, mediated by transennae, shaped sacred space.


I also study stucco (and moulded plaster) decorations both from the artistic point of view (iconography and technique), and as 'ephemeral' material which offers an insight into economic history (élite and non-élite customer demand), as well as the history of guilds and workshops between the 9th and 15th centuries. I am curating an edited volume on recent studies on stucco in the Mediterranean world that are reassessing the field in terms of analytical technique and future direction of studies. The volume brings together the studies presented at the international conference Connecting Stucco in the Mediterranean (c. 300 BCE- c. 1200 CE) Methodological approaches and the State of Research organised at Bilkent University (Ankara).


Since 2016, I have been a collaborator on the At the Crossroads of Empires project, where I am developing a tactile and synesthetic visitor path to the wall paintings of the Longobard church of S. Ambrogio at Montecorvino Rovella (SA). Some preliminary results of the project were presented during the conference TOUCH THIS! Accessibility and Inclusivity in the Cultural Heritage of Campania. I have led workshops to train local museum guides in tactile visits and organised synesthetic experiences connected to exhibitions.




Teaching

2025-26

  • Module leader for CAC1012 - Greek and Roman Art and Archaeology
  • Lecturer for HCA 1007 - Stuff: Living in a material world
  • Lecturer for ARA 8394 - Past Bodies
  • Supervisor for ARA8107 - Independent Study in Archaeology


2024-25

  • Lecturer for HIS 2240 - Greece from Ancient to Modern
  • Lecturer for HCA 1007 - Stuff: Living in a material world


Guest Lecturer for the Programme Erasmus + (Blended Intensive Programmes - BIP) CAPES – Cultural Heritage and Academia: Public Engagement for Social Impact in the EU.

Lecturer for the Postgraduate Byzantine Archaeology and History Course summer school at the British School at Athens


Publications