Society for the History of Technology (SHOT) Annual Meeting, Milan, 24-27 October 2019

Open Session Proposal
Title: Technology and Luxury

Panel Organizer: Dr. Artemis Yagou
Deutsches Museum, Munich

Luxury has existed in a variety of forms throughout history, whenever individuals could have access to items beyond the limits of necessity: fine wines and foodstuffs, magnificent residencies, sumptuous furniture, lavish fabrics, precious jewelry, expensive watches, instruments or gadgets, extravagant cars and yachts, valuable works of art. Artefacts of luxury are nowadays kept in museums and private collections all over the world.
The history of luxury has been typically connected with monarchs and leaders, dominant social classes and various elites. At the same time, the economic growth since the 17th century, especially in Western Europe, and the resulting diffusion of semi-luxury goods to wider segments of the population has led to the introduction of the concept of popular luxury.
Arguably, all manifestations of luxury are inextricably related to
technology. The proposed panel seeks to interrogate the multifarious relationship between technology and luxury, broadly interpreted. The panel is expected to contribute to the Annual Meeting’s focus on exploring the interface between technology, art, and design.

Potential themes are:
- The relationship between luxury products and technologies for material
extraction and processing
- The interplay between luxury production and the development of
specialist technical skills
- The connection between industrialization and luxury production
- The perception of an artefact as luxurious on the basis of its
technical novelty
- Visual or literary representations of technology-related luxury
- Collecting technical artefacts as a form of luxury
Other themes connecting technology with luxury are also welcome.
Proposals may deal with any time period or geographical area.

Please send your proposals (one-page abstract of 500 words max and short CV of 300 words max) with current contact information to: a.yagou@deutsches-museum.de until March 25, 2019.