Harriet Sonne De Torrens headshot

Harriet Sonne De Torrens

Title/Position
Visual Resource and Liaison Librarian (Fine Arts, Visual Studies, Cinema)
Department of Visual Studies & UTM Hazel McCallion Academic Learning Centre.

Visual Resource and Liaison Librarian (Fine Arts, Visual Studies, Cinema), Department of Visual Studies & UTM Library and Administrator, Visual Resource Librarian.
2019-present. Instructor, VST410 Internship Course, DVS.

Scholarship:
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0840-9877
https://utoronto.academia.edu/HarrietSonnedeTorrens

Digital Humanities Research Project

BSI Digital Humanities Project
European Association For Digital Humanities

Contact:
Email preferred: harriet.sonne@utoronto.ca
905-569-4610
CCT 3021, UTM

Education

1991 B.A. Hon., Graduated with High Distinction, University of Toronto (Art History).
1995 M.A. University of Toronto (Centre for Medieval Studies and the Department of Art History).
2001 MISt. University of Toronto (dual programs: archival studies and library studies, with museum electives)
2003  Ph.D. Institute of Art History, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Dissertation: "De fontibus salvatoris: A Liturgical and Ecclesiological Reading of the Representation of the Childhood of Christ on the Medieval  Fonts from Scandinavia." Dissertation advisers: Dr. Axel Bolvig, Dr. Søren Kaspersen at the University of Copenhagen and Dr. Jill Caskey at the University of Toronto.
2006 (L.M.S.) Licentiate in Mediaeval Studies, a post-doctoral thesis awarded with "Magna Cum Laude" from the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, University of Toronto. Thesis: “The Female Body, Sexuality and Baptism in Medieval Iberia.”

Awards and Academic Honours

2014-2015   Awarded the Academic Librarian Award, Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations (OCUFA). October 24, 2015. I am the first librarian at the University of Toronto to receive this award.

2005-2006 Awarded Post Doctoral Research Fellowship, Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, University of Toronto

2004 Awarded the Leonard F. Boyle Dissertation Prize by the Canadian Society of Medievalists for my Ph.D. Dissertation.

2002 Appointed Doctoral Stipendium, Institute of Art History at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark

Current Research Projects

Founder and Co-director, Baptisteria Sacra: An Iconographic Index of Baptismal Fonts: http://www.library.utoronto.ca/bsi/

Publications

2023 (in-press). Crusader Rhetoric and the Infancy Cycles on Medieval Baptismal Fonts in the Baltic Region. Brepols. ISBN 978-2-503-59938-0. eISBN 978-2-503-59939-7.

2023. “Remapping the Political Terrain of Baltic Medieval Studies,” Kunstiteaduslikke Uurimusi ; Tallinn Vol. 32, Iss. 1/2, (2023): 213-217,246.

2021. “The Mysterious Paimpol Triptych from the Beauport Abbey: A Work by a Follower of the Hans Memling Workshop?” Nottingham Medieval Journal.
https://doi-org.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/10.1484/J.NMS.5.131516

 

2020. “ A Legacy of Resistance: The Case of the Freckenhorst Baptismal Font.” ICO Iconographisk Post. Nordisk tidskrift för bildtolkning – Nordic Review of Iconography[S.l.], n. 3-4, p. 6-47, july 2020. ISSN 2323-5586. Available at: https://ojs.abo.fi/ojs/index.php/ico/article/view/1684.

2020. “The Miracle of the Harvest : Iconographical Evidence for Supporting a Later Date for Gotland’s Hegwald Workshop” (in press), ed. Torsten Svensson, collection of papers presented at Gotland Conferences 1917-1919, Visby.

2018 -2019. “Representations of Marriage: Iconographical Origins and Trends” in the book Cultural History of Marriage (medieval  period covering from 500 to 1500 A.D.) ed. Dr. Frederik Pedersen (University of Aberdeen), pp. 147-165. https://www.abdn.ac.uk/sdhp/people/profiles/f.pedersen published by Bloomsbury Publishing. https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/a-cultural-history-of-marriage-9781350001916/ .

2018  “Academic Freedom and Professional Autonomy: Librarians’ Research and Scholarship in Canadian University Libraries” College & Research Libraries, Pre-Print Available, Jan. 2018.

2015   “Une proclamation de foi: les retables commandés au XVII siècle par le prieur Vincent Royer pour l’abbaye prémontrée de Beauport” in ed. Cédric Jeanneau Un Scriptorium et son époque : les chanoines de Beauport et la société bretonne au Moyen Âge. Brest : Centre de Recherche Bretonne et Celtique, Université de Bretagne Occidentale, 2015,  pp. 269-318.

2015   Co-authored with Mary Kandiuk “Librarians in a Litigious Age and the Attack on Academic Freedom” in Current Issues in Libraries, Information Science and Related Fields. Published June 15, 2015, pp. 3-45.

2014   “Academic Librarianship: The Quest for Rights and Recognition at the University of Toronto” in eds. Mary Kandiuk and Jennifer Dekker, In Solidarity : Academic Librarian Labour Activism and Union Participation in Canada Sacramento, CA: Library Juice Press, pp. 81-106, 314-324.

2013   Co-author and co-editor, Visual Culture of Baptism in the Middle Ages: Essays on the Medieval Fonts, Settings and Beliefs. Ashgate Press (to be released in July 2013), see ISBN 978-1-4094-5675-9 http://www.ashgate.com/default.aspx?page=637&calcTitle=1&isbn=9781409456759&lang=cy-gb

2013   “Reconsidering the Date of the Baptismal Font in San Isidoro, León, Spain” in eds. Harriet Sonne de Torrens and Miguel A. Torrens, Visual Culture of Baptism Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate Publishing Limited, pp. 3-76.

2013  Co-authored with Miguel A. Torrens, “Introduction” in The Visual Culture of Baptism in the Middle Ages: Essays on Medieval Fonts, Settings and Beliefs (Farnham, England: Ashgate Press, 2013), pp. 1-10.

2013   Co-authored with members of the Steering Committee at CAPAL “CAPAL: The Formation of a Professional Organization for Canadian Academic Librarians” Partnership: The Canadian Journal of Library and Information Practice and Research vol. 8:2, pp. 1-3., see URL CAPAL: The Formation of a Professional Organization for Canadian Academic Librarians

2011 “Academic Librarianship: A Crisis or an Opportunity” co-authored with Mary Kandiuk, Diane Granfield, Partnership:  the Canadian Journal of Library and Information Practice and Research, vol. 6, no. 2, pp.1-6.

2010 "Aakirkeby Baptismal Font" for the online Medieval Dictionary of Art & Architecture published by Grove Art Online, Oxford University Press. Invited by the editor, Dr. C. Hourihane to write on this topic.

2010 "Simris Church, Skåne" for the online Medieval Dictionary of Art & Architecture published by Grove Art Online, Oxford University Press. Invited by the editor, Dr. C. Hourihane to write on this topic.

2010 "Bjäesjö Baptismal Font" for the online Medieval Dictionary of Art & Architecture published by Grove Art Online, Oxford University Press. Invited by the editor, Dr. C. Hourihane to write on this topic.

2010 "Jutland" for the online Medieval Dictionary of Art & Architecture published by Grove Art Online, Oxford University Press. Invited by the editor, Dr. C. Hourihane to write on this topic.

2010 "Viklau Madonna" for the online Medieval Dictionary of Art & Architecture published by Grove Art Online, Oxford University Press. Invited by the editor, Dr. C. Hourihane to write on this topic.

2009 “Illicit Sex and Alcahuetas in the Medieval Kingdom of Castile:The Pictorial Program on the Rebanal de Las Llantas Baptismal Font” La Coronica: A Journal of Medieval Hispanic Languages, Literatures and Cultures, vol. 38:1 (Fall, 2009): 97-120.

2009  “Fovea Peccati et Utero Ecclesiae: The Symbiotic Nature of Female Sexuality on Medieval Baptismal Fonts” in From the Margins II: Women of the New Testament and Their Afterlives eds. Christine Joynes and Christopher Rowland (Sheffield Phoenix  Press, 2009), pp. 334-361.

2006 "The Stadil Altar Frontal: A Johannine Interpretation of the Nativity of Christ" in Decorating the Lord’s Table: On the Dynamics between Image and Altar in the Early and High Middle Ages eds. Søren Kaspersen and Erik Thunø (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanums Press, 2006). See website: www.mtp.hum.ku.dk for more information on the text.

2003  “The Three-Headed Trinity and Divine Wisdom in the Cloister Program at Alquézar (Spain)” published in Spanish as “Sabiduría Divina y Teología Trinitaria: El programa del claustro del monasterio de Alquézar” in a collection of essays edited by Dr. Rocío Sánchez-Ameijeiras and Dr. José Luis Senra Gabriel y Galán, El Tímpano Romaníco: imágenes, estructura y audiencias. (Santiago de Compostela, Xunta de Galicia,  2003).

2003 "De fontibus salvatoris: A Survey of Twelfth and Thirteen Century Baptismal Fonts Ornamented with Events from the Childhood of Christ" article for Objects, Images and the Word: Art in the Service of the Liturgy, ed. Colum Hourihane (Princeton, N.J.: Index of Christian Art, Department of Art and Archaeology, Princeton University Press), pp. 105-137.

Harriet's bookcover