Description
Book SynopsisArt history: A critical introduction to its methods provides a lively and stimulating introduction to methodological debates within art history. Offering a lucid account of approaches from Hegel to post-colonialism, the book provides a sense of art history’s own history as a discipline from its emergence in the late-eighteenth century to contemporary debates. By explaining the underlying philosophical and political assumptions behind each method, along with clear examples of how these are brought to bear on visual and historical analysis, the authors show that an adherence to a certain method is, in effect, a commitment to a set of beliefs and values. The book makes a strong case for the vitality of the discipline and its methodological centrality to new fields such as visual culture.
This book will be of enormous value to undergraduate and graduate students, and also makes its own contributions to ongoing scholarly debates about theory and method.
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
1. Introduction
2. A variety of interpretations: a preview
3. Hegel and the birth of art history
4. Connoisseurship
5. Formalism: Heinrich Wölfflin and Alois Riegl
6. Iconography – Iconology: Erwin Panofsky
7. Marxism and the social history of art
8. Feminism
9. Psychoanalysis
10. Semiotics
11. Postcolonialism
12. Conclusion
