Swiss Rococo Cultures

This project studies the architecture and material culture of East Switzerland and specifically the cantons of St. Gallen and Appenzell Innerrhoden and Ausserrhoden in the 18th and early-19th centuries to understand how the Rococo was adopted by different social classes and groups and generated multiple idioms of ornament that expressed different social identities.

Aims: The project’s main aims are (1) to trace how certain decorative patterns moved from one object or medium to another and how they transformed in the process and (2) to examine how  various groups appropriated, disseminated, and transformed those patterns.

The study combines objects of art and  architecture with folk art and everyday material culture. Methodologically it blends approaches from art and architectural history and ethnography with a digital research platform. Additional outcomes will include publications, conference presentations, and symposia.

Scientific and Social Context of the Research Project:
At the epicenter of Swiss proto-industrialization and subject to renewed campaigns of confessionalization, East Switzerland in the 18th century was a region divided by class and confession. At the same time, it was unified by a nearly unanimous adoption of the Rococo repertoire across different objects and buildings, from monumental churches to farmhouse furniture. The project hypothesizes that this broad dissemination of the style should not be read simply as the result of some cultural hegemony, as is often assumed by the existing literature, but rather as different social classes actively adapting it to their circumstances, views and aspirations, thus generating distinct and culturally embedded ornamental idioms.