What to do with the “Most Modern” Artworks? Erwin Panofsky and the Art History of Contemporary Art
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5195/contemp.2014.81Keywords:
contemporaneity, history, historiography, panofsky, barr, exil-geschichteAbstract
In the 1930s, when the world-renowned Medieval and Renaissance art scholar Erwin Panofsky became acquainted with the New York contemporary art scene, he was challenged with the most difficult dilemma for art historians. How could Panofsky, who was firmly entrenched in the kunstwissenschaftliche study of art, use his historical methods for the scholarly research of contemporary art? Can art historians deal with the art objects of their own time? This urgent and still current question of how to think about “contemporaneity” in relation to art history is the main topic of this paper, which departs from Panofsky’s 1934 review of a book on modern art. In his review of James Johnson Sweeny’s book Plastic Redirections in 20th Century Painting, Panofsky’s praise for Sweeney’s scholarly “distance” from contemporary art developments in Europe is backed by a claim for America’s cultural distance, rather than a (historical) removal in time. Taking a closer look at Panofsky’s conflation of historical/temporal distance with geographical/cultural distance, this paper demonstrates a politically situated discourse on contemporaneity, in which Panofsky proposes the act of writing about the contemporary as a redemptive act, albeit, as this paper will demonstrate, without being able to follow his own scientific method.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
- The Author retains copyright in the Work, where the term “Work” shall include all digital objects that may result in subsequent electronic publication or distribution.
- Upon acceptance of the Work, the author shall grant to the Publisher the right of first publication of the Work.
- The Author shall grant to the Publisher and its agents the nonexclusive perpetual right and license to publish, archive, and make accessible the Work in whole or in part in all forms of media now or hereafter known under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License or its equivalent, which, for the avoidance of doubt, allows others to copy, distribute, and transmit the Work under the following conditions:
- Attribution—other users must attribute the Work in the manner specified by the author as indicated on the journal Web site;
- The Author is able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the nonexclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the Work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), as long as there is provided in the document an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post online a prepublication manuscript (but not the Publisher’s final formatted PDF version of the Work) in institutional repositories or on their Websites prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work. Any such posting made before acceptance and publication of the Work shall be updated upon publication to include a reference to the Publisher-assigned DOI (Digital Object Identifier) and a link to the online abstract for the final published Work in the Journal.
- Upon Publisher’s request, the Author agrees to furnish promptly to Publisher, at the Author’s own expense, written evidence of the permissions, licenses, and consents for use of third-party material included within the Work, except as determined by Publisher to be covered by the principles of Fair Use.
- The Author represents and warrants that:
- the Work is the Author’s original work;
- the Author has not transferred, and will not transfer, exclusive rights in the Work to any third party;
- the Work is not pending review or under consideration by another publisher;
- the Work has not previously been published;
- the Work contains no misrepresentation or infringement of the Work or property of other authors or third parties; and
- the Work contains no libel, invasion of privacy, or other unlawful matter.
- The Author agrees to indemnify and hold Publisher harmless from Author’s breach of the representations and warranties contained in Paragraph 6 above, as well as any claim or proceeding relating to Publisher’s use and publication of any content contained in the Work, including third-party content.
Revised 7/16/2018. Revision Description: Removed outdated link.