I specialise in interdisciplinary research on late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century visual and material culture, science, and the occult in Britain and the US.
My PhD thesis focused on the spiritualist art and automatic writings of English artist Evelyn De Morgan (1855–1919) in relation to late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century physics, mathematics, psychology, philosophy of science, and psychical research.
I co-host Drawing Blood, a podcast about visual culture, the history of science and medicine, and the macabre.
Education
- PhD History of Art, The Courtauld Institute of Art (2017 – 2021): ‘Imponderable: Physics, Mathematics, Psychical Research, and Evelyn De Morgan’s Spiritualist Art, 1885–1910’, supervised by Professor Caroline Arscott and examined by Professor Sally Shuttleworth and Dr Suzannah Biernoff
- MA History of Art, The Courtauld Institute of Art (2017): ‘The Sensate Body: Consciousness in Albert Moore’s Art’
- BA Art History and Archaeology, Columbia College, Columbia University (2015)
Postdoctoral and Doctoral Fellowships
- Terra Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow, Centre for American Art, The Courtauld Institute of Art (2022)
- Postdoctoral Research Fellow, ‘The Media of Mediumship: Encountering the Material Culture of Modern Occultism in Britain’s Science, Technology, and Magic Collections’, Science Museum Group, Senate House Library, and University of Stirling (2021–22)
- Research Continuity Fellow (Doctoral Research), Paul Mellon Centre (2021)
- Research Continuity Fellow (Doctoral Research), Paul Mellon Centre (2020)
- Visiting Research Fellow, Yale Center for British Art (2018)
Teaching
- 2021 – 2022: Associate Lecturer, Body Politics: Art, Gender and Class in the Victorian Metropolis (BA3), The Courtauld Institute of Art
- 2020: Teaching Assistant, Summer University: ‘Art and Identity’ (pre-BA, non-selective state schools), The Courtauld Institute of Art
- 2019 – 2020: Teaching Assistant, Core Methodologies (MA), The Courtauld Institute of Art
- 2019 – 2020: Guest Lecturer, Victorian Science and Aesthetic Movement Art (MA), The Courtauld Institute of Art
- 2017 – 2018: Guest Lecturer, Victorian Science and Aesthetic Movement Art (MA), The Courtauld Institute of Art
Grants and Awards
- Seed Funding Research Grant for the project ‘Biomedicine and Belief: Spiritualism, Observation, and Margery Crandon’s Extraordinary Body c. 1920–35′, International Research Network for the Study of Science and Belief in Society (2022–23)
- Oppenheimer Memorial Trust Grant for International Study (2017–2020)
- Lord Jacob Rothschild Scholarship, The Courtauld Institute of Art (2018–2020)
- Research Support Grant for project ‘Evelyn De Morgan in Florence, 1895–1914,’ Paul Mellon Centre (2019)
- Friends of The Courtauld Institute of Art Scholarship, The Courtauld Institute of Art (2017–2018)
- Paule Vézelay Award for Best Dissertation in Modern and Contemporary Art, The Courtauld Institute of Art (2017)
- Edmond J. Safra Scholarship, The Courtauld Institute of Art (2016–2018)
- Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society, Columbia University (2015)
Professional Activities
- Co-Organiser, Third Year PhD Symposium Online (Conference), 2020
- Editorial Intern in Academic Publishing Online, 19: Interdisciplinary Studies in the Long Nineteenth Century, 2019 – 2020
- Associate Editor and Reviews Editor, immediations, 2019
- Graduate Research Assistant, The Courtauld Institute of Art, 2018 – 2019
- Curatorial Research Assistant, The Frick Collection, 2015 – 2016
Publications
- Merkling, E. ‘“Symbols Bewitched”: Evelyn De Morgan’s Symbolic Logic’, in Evelyn & William De Morgan: A Marriage of Arts & Crafts, ed. by Margaretta S. Frederick (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2022), pp. 129–39, in press.
- Merkling, E. Elizabeth Prettejohn. Modern Painters, Old Masters: The Art of Imitation from the Pre-Raphaelites to the First World War. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press in association with the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, 2017. 288 pp.; 130 color ills.; 30 b/w ills. Cloth $55.00 (9780300222753). caa reviews (2019). DOI: 10.3202/caa.reviews.2019.129
- Merkling, E. Review of ‘Annie Swynnerton: Painting Light and Hope,’ Manchester Art Gallery. 19: Interdisciplinary Studies in the Long Nineteenth Century (2019). DOI: http://doi.org/10.16995/ntn.851
- Merkling, E. (contributing author) The Scher Collection of Commemorative Medals, edited by Stephen K. Scher (New York: The Frick Collection, 2019)
- Merkling, E. ‘The Sensate Body: Consciousness in Albert Moore’s Art.’ immediations 4.3 (2018): 50-70.
Blogs and Media
- Co-Host, Drawing Blood, an Experimental Humanities Collaborative Network-funded podcast on visual culture, history of science and medicine, and the macabre, 2021–present
- Guest, ‘Fingerprinting Ghosts: Science, Technology & the Occult’, Science & Belief in Society podcast (International Research Network for the Study of Science and Belief in Society, University of Birmingham), 2021
- ‘Eros, Thanatos, and the Throuple: Alfred Gilbert’s Mors Janua Vitae (1908)’, Gender and Sexuality Research Group Blog (The Courtauld Research Forum), 2020
- ‘Evelyn De Morgan and the Art of the Imponderable: An Interview with Emma Merkling’, The Thinker’s Garden (digital storytelling project), 2020
- ‘Evelyn De Morgan’s Reading Lists: A Discovery in the Archives’, De Morgan Foundation Blog (The De Morgan Foundation), 2019
Conference Papers & Invited Lectures
- ‘The Occult History of the X-Ray’, Science Museum Lates, 2021
- ‘Ghost-Written: Art, Spirit Transcripts, and the Limits of Embodiment c. 1900’, Art Writing and the Body (Goldsmiths, University of London), 2021
- ‘Self as Boundless Surface: Ether and Alternative Geometries in Evelyn De Morgan’s Portrait of her Husband (1909)’, New Directions in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Art (Digital Seminar Series), 2020
- ‘Bodily Rhythms, Albert Moore’s Beads (1875), and Victorian Physiology’, The British Association of Victorian Studies Annual Conference (University of Dundee), 2019
- ‘Formal Logic and the Real in Evelyn De Morgan’s Art and Spirit Writings’, Science and Spiritualism, 1750-1930 (Leeds Trinity University), 2019
- ‘Formal Logic and the Real in Evelyn De Morgan’s Art and Spirit Writings’, Evelyn De Morgan Centenary Symposium: Feminist, Spiritualist, Pacifist Radical (Guildhall Art Gallery), 2019
- ‘Energy and Exhaustion: Entropy in the Work of Tennyson, Evelyn De Morgan, and H. G. Wells’, with Dr Melissa Dickson (Birmingham), Shows of London (King’s College London), 2018
- ‘The Idyllic in Julia Margaret Cameron’s Maud (1875)’, Midsummer Idyll Symposium (The Courtauld Institute of Art), 2018
- ‘Entropy, Eternity, and the “Heat Death” of the Universe in Evelyn De Morgan’s Mermaid Paintings’, The British Association of Victorian Studies Annual Conference (University of Exeter), 2018
- ‘Energy Physics and Water in Evelyn De Morgan’s Mermaid Paintings’, The London Nineteenth Century Studies Graduate Conference (University of London), 2018
- ‘Bodily Rhythms, Albert Moore’s Beads (1875), and Victorian Physiology’, Rethinking Albert Moore Conference (University of York), 2017
Research Interests
- Visual culture, science, and alternative science
- Physics, mathematics, psychical research, physiological psychology, medicine, and philosophy of science
- History and theory of photography
- Fin-de-siècle art
- Spiritualism, Theosophy, and Esotericism
- Occult history and histories of magic
- Histories of death
- Queer and women artists