lic. Dr. Dan-Vladimir Ivanovici MA PhD

I studied ancient history at the University of Bucharest and at the Freie Universität Berlin. I have PhDs in ancient history (2011) and art history (2014), I was postdoctoral fellow at the Bibliotheca Hertziana–Max Planck Institut für Kunstgeschichte Rom (2015-2017), and Summer fellow at Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection (2019). Since 2015 I am lecturer at the Accademia di architettura di Mendrisio, Università della Svizzera italiana.

My work explores the ways in which ancient and late antique societies staged encounters with the divine, with particular focus on living bodies as theophanic media.

Crafting Emotion:
 The Late Antique Panegyris as Embodied Experience (ca. 330-ca. 500) 

Monographs

• Manipulating theophany: Light and ritual in north Adriatic architecture (ca. 400-ca. 800) [Ekstasis: Religious Experience from Antiquity to the Middle Ages series 6] (Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, 2016).

Edited volumes/special issues

• Alice Isabella Sullivan & Vladimir Ivanovici, eds., Light in Medieval Churches between Byzantium and the West [East Central and Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages, 450-1450] (Leiden: Brill).
• Vladimir Ivanovici, Roberto Leggero, Adrian Brändli, eds., Christian Belief and Practice in the Alps (ca. 250-ca. 600). In Search of a Topography of Faith, special issue of Zeitschrift für schweizerische Archäologie und Kunstgeschichte 77/4 (2022).
• Michele Bacci & Vladimir Ivanovici, eds., From Living to Visual Images. Paradigms of Corporeal Iconicity in Late Antiquity, RIHA Journal Special Issue, 2019
• Chiara Croci & Vladimir Ivanovici, eds., Entre terre et ciel. La coupole de l’Antiquité Tardive au haut moyen âge: structure, fonction, décoration, Études de lettres Special Issue, 2/2018
• Daniela Mondini & Vladimir Ivanovici, eds., Manipulating light in premodern times. Architectural, artistic, and philosophical aspects (PDF) (Mendrisio Academy Press-Silvana Editoriale, Cinisello Balsamo-Milano, 2014)
• Ilarion Tiu, Filip-Lucian Iorga, Vladimir Ivanovici, eds., Revista Erasmus 15 (PDF)(2009)

Articles

• “Piedmont, Lombardy, Ticino: Recurrent patterns of dissemination”, in Zeitschrift für schweizerische Archäologie und Kunstgeschichte Special Issue, 77/4 (2022).
• Alice Isabella Sullivan, Gabriel Herea, Vladimir Ivanovici, “Space, image, light: Toward an understanding of Moldavian architecture in the fifteenth century”, Gesta 60/1 (2021) 81-100.
• Vladimir Ivanovici & Nathan S. Dennis, “Light, vision(s), transformation. Experiencing baptism in canopied fonts (ca. 230-ca. 500)”, Hortus Artium Medievalium 26 (2020), 97-108.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Solar effects in cultic architecture: A very short introduction”, in Gabriel-Dinu Herea, The Symbolic Presence of the Sun at Patrauti (Timisoara, Ed. Univ. de Vest, 2020), 9-17.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Pseudo-Dionysius and the staging of divine order in sixth-century architecture”, in Francesca Dell’Acqua & Ernesto Mainoldi (eds.) Pseudo-Dionysius and the Origins of Christian Visual Culture (London, Palgrave, 2020), 177-210.
• Bogdan G. Bucur & Vladimir Ivanovici, “‘The image of Adam’s Glory’: Observations on the early Christian tradition of luminosity as iconic garment”, RIHA Journal (2019)
• Vladimir Ivanovici & Sissel Undheim, “Consecrated virgins as living reliquaries in Late Antiquity”, RIHA Journal (2019)
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Iconic presences. Late Roman consuls as imperial images”, Convivium 6.1 (2019) 128-47.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Reuniting the waters, separating the lands. Windows and liminality in late antique baptism”, Hortus Artium Medievalium 24.1 (2018) 386-395.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Soleils nocturnes. Visions progressives dans les édifices à coupole de l’Antiquité tardive”, Études de lettres 2 (2018) 103-122
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “The ritual display of gospels in Late Antiquity”, in David Ganz & Barbara Schellewald (eds.) Clothing Sacred Scripture. Book Art and Book Religions in the Middle Ages (Berlin, Walter de Gruyter, 2018), 221-232.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Divine light through earthly colours: mediating perception in Late Antique churches”, in Chloë N. Duckworth & Anne E. Sassin (eds.) Colour and Light in Ancient and Medieval Art (Routledge, Abingdon-New York, 2018), 79-91.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “The prison of the mind. Growing up with myths in communist Romania”, Convivium 4.1 (2017) 128-141.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Building prestige. Processions, visual codes, and episcopal power in fifth-century Rome”, in N. Zimmermann, T. Michalsky, A. Wieczorek, S. Weinfurter (eds.) Die Päpste und Rom zwischen Spätantike und Mittelalter. Formen päpstlicher Machtentfaltung (Mannheim, Schnell+Steiner, 2017), 11-27.
• Daniela Mondini (in collaboration with Vladimir Ivanovici), “Luce e luci a Santa Maria Antiqua e nelle chiese altomedievali di Roma”, in Maria Andaloro et al. (eds.) Santa Maria Antiqua tra Roma e Bisanzio (Milano, Electa, 2016), 378-385.#
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Visceral and induced reactions to art: the Late Antique case”, in Véronique Alexandre Journeau & Christine Vial Kayser (eds.) Notions esthétiques (II): la perception sensible organisée (Paris, L’Harmattan, 2015), 307-318.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Luce renobatus: Speculations on the placement and importance of lights in Ravenna’s Neonian Baptistery" (PDF), in Daniela Mondini & Vladimir Ivanovici (eds.) Manipulating light in premodern times. Architectural, artistic, and philosophical aspects (Mendrisio Academy Press, Cinisello Balsamo, 2014), 18-29
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Capturing light in Late Antique Ravenna. A New Interpretation of the Archbishops’ Chapel”, Zog raf 37 (2013) 17-22 
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Windows and church space in Early Medieval Byzantium and West”, Opuscula Historiae Artium Supplementum 62 (2013) 38-47.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Competing paradoxes: Martyrs and the spread of Christianity revisited”, Studia Patristica 62.10 (2013) 231-244.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Christianity’s plea for the good barbarian. On the Roman barbarophobia and Christianity’s role in appeasing it”, Analele Facultatii de Istorie (2009) 95-114.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “Between Word and Image. Early Christianity’s Road From Aniconism to Representing God”, Analele Facultatii de Istorie (2008) 3-17.
• Vladimir Ivanovici, “On Abraham and Agamemnon. Short essay on pride and self-sacrifice in the Ancient World”, Erasmus 15 (2006/09) 7-20.

Other

• Michele Bacci & Vladimir Ivanovici, “Introduction”, in Michele Bacci & Vladimir Ivanovici (eds.) From Living to Visual Images. Paradigms of Corporeal Iconicity in Late Antiquity, RIHA Journal Special Issue, 2019.
• Chiara Croci & Vladimir Ivanovici, “Introduction”, in Chiara Croci & Vladimir Ivanovici (eds.) Entre terre et ciel. La coupole de l’Antiquité Tardive au haut moyen âge: structure, fonction, décoration (Lausanne, 2018), 7-14.
• Daniela Mondini & Vladimir Ivanovici, “Introduction”, in Daniela Mondini & Vladimir Ivanovici (eds.) Manipulating light in premodern times. Architectural, artistic, and philosophical aspects (PDF) (Mendrisio Academy Press-Silvana Editoriale, Cinisello Balsamo-Mendrisio, 2014), 6-15.

Book reviews

• Review of Mark J. Johnson, San Vitale in Ravenna and Octagonal Churches in Late Antiquity (Wiesbaden 2018), Jahrbuch für Antike und Christenum 61 (2018) 297-298.
• Review of Nadine Schibille, Hagia Sophia and the Byzantine Aesthetic Experience (Farnham-Burlington, Ashgate, 2014), Speculum 93.1 (2018) 262-264.