Carola Hicks
Carola Hicks | |
|---|---|
| Occupation | Art Historian |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | University of Edinburgh |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Art History |
| Institutions | Newnham College, Cambridge |
Carola Hicks (7 November 1941 – 23 June 2010) was a British art historian. She was a pioneer in the field of biographies of objects, which is the exploration of the history of objects and the ways in which their reception has changed throughout time.[1]
She was born Carola Brown in Bognor Regis, West Sussex, and educated at the Lady Eleanor Holles School and the University of Edinburgh, where she took a first in archaeology in 1964. Carola returned to Edinburgh and gained her PhD, in 1967, on "Origins of the animal style in English Romanesque art".[2] Hicks worked at the British Museum researching the Sutton Hoo ship burial, before becoming a research fellow at Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge, and then curator of the Stained Glass Museum at Ely Cathedral. She became a fellow at Newnham College, Cambridge, where she taught until her early death.[3]
In 2006, her book on the history of the Bayeux Tapestry proposed a new theory on its origins, that is was commissioned in England by Edith Godwinson, the sister of King Harold and widow of Edward the Confessor. [1]
Angela Thirlwell describes Hicks as a "glamorous academic and a serious populariser of art", who "swept the dust off old masterpieces, explained their cultural contexts and infused them with life for a new public".[3] Her book on the stained glass of King’s College Chapel at Cambridge, was serialized as the Christmas book of the week on Radio 4 in 2007, by the BBC.[1]
Major Works
Hicks wrote and edited several books:
- England in the Eleventh Century (editor, 1992), from the "Harlaxton Medieval Studies" series (vol. II)
- Animals in Early Medieval Art (1993)
- Cambridgeshire Churches (editor, 1997)
- Discovering Stained Glass (2005), by John Harries and revised by Carola Hicks, from the Shire series
- Improper Pursuits: The Scandalous Life of Lady Di Beauclerk (2001), about Lady Diana Beauclerk
- The Bayeux Tapestry: The Life Story of a Masterpiece (2006), in which she suggested Edith of Wessex as the author of the Bayeux Tapestry[4]
- The King's Glass: A Story of Tudor Power and Secret Art (2007), about the stained-glass windows of King's College Chapel
- Girl in a Green Gown: The History and Mystery of the Arnolfini Portrait (2011), about Jan van Eyck's Arnolfini Portrait. She died before the book was completed and it was finished by her Husband.[5]
References
- ^ a b c "Carola Hicks". web.archive.org. 30 January 2025. Retrieved 30 January 2025.
- ^ Brown, Carola (1968). Origins of the animal style in English Romanesque art (Thesis). University of Edinburgh. hdl:1842/23751.
- ^ a b Thirlwell, Angela (27 July 2010). "Carola Hicks obituary". The Guardian. Retrieved 25 October 2015.
- ^ "New Contender for The Bayeux Tapestry?". BBC Radio 4. 22 May 2006. Retrieved 25 October 2015.
- ^ Conrad, Peter (15 October 2011). "Girl in a Green Gown: The History and Mystery of the Arnolfini Portrait by Carola Hicks – review". The Observer. ISSN 0029-7712. Retrieved 30 January 2025.
