I specialise in interdisciplinary research on late nineteenth-century art, science, and the occult in Britain.
My PhD thesis focused on the art and automatic writings of English artist Evelyn De Morgan (1855–1919) in relation to Victorian physics, mathematics, philosophy of science, and psychical research.
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
- 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)
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
Awards, Grants, and Fellowships
- Research Continuity Fellowship for project ‘Imponderable: Physics, Mathematics, and Psychical Research in Evelyn De Morgan’s Spiritualist Art, 1885–1914’, Paul Mellon Centre (2021)
- 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 Fellowship for project ‘Physics, Metaphysics, and Mathematics in Evelyn De Morgan’s Art, 1883–1919’, Paul Mellon Centre (2020)
- Lord Jacob Rothschild Scholarship, The Courtauld Institute of Art (2018–2020)
- Oppenheimer Memorial Trust Grant for International Study (2017–2020)
- Research Support Grant for project ‘Evelyn De Morgan in Florence, 1895–1914,’ Paul Mellon Centre (2019)
- Visiting Research Fellow, Yale Center for British Art (2018)
- 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”: Algebraic Form and Symbolic Logic in Evelyn De Morgan’s fin-de-siècle Spiritualist Allegories’, in William and Evelyn De Morgan, ed. by Margaretta Frederick (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2022), 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
- ‘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
- ‘Ghost-Written: Art, Spirit Transcripts, and the Limits of Embodiment c. 1900’, Art Writing and the Body (Goldsmiths, University of London), 2021 (forthcoming)
- ‘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
- Art and science
- Late Victorian art
- Physics, mathematics, psychical research, physiological psychology, and philosophy of science
- History and theory of photography
- Fin-de-siècle art in Europe
- Symbolist art
- Spiritualism, Theosophy, and Esotericism
- Occult history and histories of magic
- Histories of death
- Queer and women artists
- Interdisciplinarity