Synopses & Reviews
Written in jargon-free, reader-friendly language, this is one of the first volumes to make art historical theory accessible to those at the introductory level. A review of contemporary theory of art history provides readers with lucid prose and concrete examples. Discussion of eighteenth- and nineteenth- century theories that are important to art history offers readers a review of historically important issues in philosophy. Illustrations of well-known works of art show readers how theory has application to images. Art historians and educators.
About the Author
VERNON HYDE MINOR was the first to recognize and respond to the growing need for art historical theory made accessible at the introductory level, offering a reader-friendly introduction to historical writings about art history, including contemporary theory, and providing background on aesthetics to demonstrate that art history arises from general philosophical questions.
Now in this second edition of his work, the author has expanded his survey to include the American critic Clement Greenberg, developed his treatment of New Art History and Visual Culture, and added a special essay on the learned art historian Erwin Panofsky and his contribution to Iconography and Iconology. Minor then considers the concepts of influence, originality, and greatness.
Table of Contents
I. THE ACADEMY. II. WHAT IS ART? ANSWERS FROM ANTIQUITY TO THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. 1. Ancient Theory.
2. Medieval Theory: Christianity, the Human, the Divine.
3. The Renaissance (1300—1600).
4. Nature, the Ideal, and Rules in Seventeenth-Century Theory.
III. THE EMERGENCE OF METHOD AND MODERNISM IN ART HISTORY. 5. Johann J. Winckelmann and Art History.
6. Empiricism.
7. Immanuel Kant (1724—1804)
8. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770—1831).
9. Alois Riegl (1858—1905).
10. Heinrich Wölfflin (1864—1945).
11. Visual Supremacy: Connoisseurship, Style, Formalism.
12. Sociological and Marxist Perspectives.
13. The New Art History and Visual Culture.
14. Feminism.
15. Reading Art History: Word, Image, Iconology, Semiotics.
16. Deconstruction.
17. Psychoanalysis and Art History.
18. Culture and Art History.
19. Influence, Originality, Greatness: A Case for Intertextuality.
Credits.
Index.