Lecture 1: What is Art History? Taking Stock of an Ever-Expanding Field

Ernst Gombrich, ‘Introduction’, The Story of Art (1950)

Historical Context & Main Arguments

Historical context

• First published right after WW2

  • Consolatory/humanist project?

  • European civilisation has a glorious history & is continuing rather than perishing

• Influential: many famous art history textbooks still use a similar narrative structure

Main arguments

1. There are no wrong reasons for liking an artwork, but there ARE wrong reasons for disliking an artwork (e.g. habit/prejudice)

• The value of a picture does NOT solely lie in aesthetic/realistic beauty

2. The mystery of the artist genius

• ‘Poor artists did not achieve anything when trying to follow laws of art, YET great masters could break them and yet achieve a novel kind of harmony/beauty’

Ernst Gombrich, ‘Introduction’, The Story of Art (1950)

Strengths & Weaknesses

Strengths

• Encourages viewers to approach art w/ an open mind

  • ‘Art (with a capital ‘A’) has no existence’; made-up construct which in reality has no one definition

Weaknesses

• Singular master narrative of Western Art History

• Privileges the discussion of individual artists > artworks/art itself

  • Opening sentence: ‘There really is no such thing as Art. There are only artists.’

• Implicit biases

  • Eurocentric

    • Exclusion of minority groups: gives only a very brief description of Islam, India, & China

    • Exoticism: chapter title ‘Strange beginnings: Prehistoric & Primitive Peoples of Ancient Americas’

    • Teleological progression establishes an artistic hierarchy in terms of race, where the end goal is naturalism

  • Anti-feminist

    • 1st female only appears in the 16th edition

    • Issues of gender are not mentioned at all (e.g. why there aren’t any other women in the book)

Ernst Gombrich, ‘Introduction’, The Story of Art (1950)

James Elkins: 5-Act play

Act I: human proportions were studied mathematically

Act II: the near-loss of that knowledge in the Middle Ages

Act III: the rediscovery of Classical knowledge in the Middle Ages

Act IV: the elaborations of Classical knowledge in the Renaissance

Act V: the ambiguous, partly tragic ending, in which Modern Art deliberately turned against its naturalistic heritage

Katy Hessel, ‘The Story of Art without Men’ (2022)

Main Arguments

1. Women have been excluded in Art History

• Men have prioritized the narratives that benefitted them

• ‘How stories are told is dependent on power. Power is the ability not just to tell the story of another person, but to make it the definitive story of that person.’

2. It is important that we acknowledge diversity in Art

• ‘If we aren’t seeing art by a wide range of people, we aren’t really seeing society/history/culture as a whole.’

Katy Hessel, ‘The Story of Art without Men’ (2022)

Strengths & Weaknesses

Strengths:

1. Serves as a promising 1^st step towards a more inclusive & diverse History of Art

• Tries to break down hierarchies/assumptions of art history

• Inclusion of previously-excluded groups (e.g. self-taught artists, e.g. non-binary artists)

2. Shows how narratives in Art History influence the real world

• E.g. the way the art market places monetary value on art

• E.g. the way art history is taught in schools

Weaknesses:

1. Co-opted Gombrich’s original narrative structure, reworking his titles

• ‘We need to enter into established spaces & structures in order to break them down’

• Vs. American author & radical feminist Audre Lorde: ‘the master’s tool will never dismantle the master’s house’

2. Implicit biases:

• Eurocentric: non-European artists are included, but few and far between

• Privileges painting: BUT some attempt to acknowledge & destabilise this hierarchy (e.g. section on quilts)

  • Important because women have long been excluded from the visual arts (e.g. painting/sculpture)

3. Marketed as an accessible book for non-professionals

   • Introductory guide

   • BUT non-professionals may fall into a trap of considering only the 2 guides to form a ‘comprehensive’ knowledge of art history

Olympia (1863) by Édouard Manet

Oil painting

1. Issues of race

• 15 years after the abolition of enslavement in France

• Relegation of coloured/black figures to the background (literally & metaphorically)

  • Anonymous, subservient

  • The only individual named is the white figure (‘Olympia’)

    • Painting was retitled for the Musee d’Orsay show (‘Laure’)

  • Literal blending of skin tone with dark background emphasises her invisibility

    • BUT stands close to the foreground, where she competes for attention

  • Clothing is pale-coloured, akin to Olympia’s skin

    • As if the black slave owes something to her white owner/is always intrinsically referenced to her white owner

2. Issues of feminism

• Profanation of the idealised nude w/ the image of a known prostitute

  • E.g. wearing a single slipper = conventional symbol for loss of innocence

  • E.g. orchid in her hair = believed to have the qualities of an aphrodisiac

  • Direct gaze places the spectator in the role of the prostitute’s client

• Nude paintings were considered acceptable only when the subject was presented as a classical goddess/nymph (however thin the disguise)