The Greek Revolution: 1821 and the Making of Modern Europe
A Virtual Seminar | Zoom: November 4, 2021

In the year of the bicentennial of the Greek Revolution, it is important to reconsider the importance of the Greek Revolution and the enduring reasons of what it changed in world history. Mark Mazower, the Ira D. Wallach Professor of History at Columbia University, discussed his forthcoming book on the Greek War of Independence. He covered the challenges and complexities of writing about the subject, the current state of research, and why the events of 1821 need to be understood in both their Ottoman and international contexts.

Mark Mazower is the author of over a dozen works on modern Greek history, twentieth century Europe, and international organization. He has a BA and doctorate in Classics and Philosophy from the University of Oxford, as well as an MA in International Affairs from Johns Hopkins University. He lives in New York City and contributes regularly for the Financial Times and other newspapers and journals. He is the founding director of the Columbia Institute for Ideas and Imagination in Paris and the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Public Humanities Initiative.

A video of the event is available, free of charge, on our website.

Justinian’s Hagia Sophia
A Virtual Seminar | Zoom: May 13, 2021

We were pleased to have Professor Robert G. Ousterhout join us to discuss Emperor Justinian’s Hagia Sophia. Completed nearly 1,500 years ago, the Hagia Sophia is both an architectural masterpiece and a cultural icon of Byzantine and Eastern Orthodox civilization. At the time of its construction, it was the world’s largest interior space and among the first to build a fully pendentive dome. Professor Ousterhout addressed the transformation of the basilica as an architectural form and its subsequent impact on architecture in the eastern Mediterranean. Justinian’s Hagia Sophia represents a critical point in architectural history in terms of form, meaning, and aesthetics.

Nestor the Chronicler reported that travelers to the Hagia Sophia in 987 AD were awestruck with the structure remarking “we knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth…for on earth there is no such splendor or such beauty, and we are at a loss how to describe it. We only know that God dwells there among men...”

Professor Emeritus in the History of Art at the University of Pennsylvania, Ousterhout is the author or co-author of over 20 books on the art and architecture of the Byzantine world and has contributed to over 70 more. His extensive fieldwork has concentrated on Byzantine architecture, monumental art, and urbanism in Constantinople, Thrace, Cappadocia, and Jerusalem. This year he was awarded the prestigious Haskins Medal by the Medieval Academy of America for his distinguished book on eastern medieval architecture.

A video of the event is available, free of charge, on our website.