Nicolas Valazza
Assistant Professor of French
Office: Ballantine Hall
624
Office phone: 855-5764
Email: nvalazza @indiana.edu
Research areas:
19th century French literature; relationship between painting and literature; history of esthetic forms; art theory of the Italian Renaissance
Education:
- PhD, French Literature, Johns Hopkins University, 2009
- Licence ès Lettres, French and Italian Literatures, University of Geneva, 2004
Background:
My research focuses mainly on the relationship between painting and literature in 19th century France. In my dissertation, entitled Crise de plume et souveraineté du pinceau. Écrire la peinture de Diderot à Proust, I analyze the development of art criticism as a literary genre, from its emergence in Diderot’s Salons, through its assertion in the 19th century with such authors as Baudelaire, Goncourt, Zola and Huysmans, until its fictional dissolution in Proust’s À la recherche du temps perdu. More recently, I have worked on another aspect of 19th century esthetics, somewhat opposed to the critical paradigm I contemplate in my dissertation: the academic tradition led by Ingres, as it is perceived by the writers of the time. In this regard, I am extending my research interests to both the debates of the academy of painting in 17th century France and art theory of the Italian Renaissance.
Publication highlights:
Articles:
“The Flower and the Monster: On Huysmans’ Painters.” In The Beautiful and the Monstrous: Essays in French Literature, Thought and Culture. Oxford: Peter Lang, 2009. (Forthcoming)
“Fleurs pour Des Esseintes.” Bulletin de la Société Joris-Karl Huysmans 101 (2008): 3-16.
“La Chair du Chef-d’oeuvre inconnu.” L’Esprit Créateur 47.3 (2007): 145-154.
“Antonin Artaud et l’essoufflement du logos.” Working papers 1 (2006).
