how can and should a modern museum display artworks that were created for ritual, religious or
utilitarian purposes?
-
1. Art of the Prehistoric or Ancient Mediterranean (Chapter 3.1)
The Black Horse
Basic info:
- Discovered in 1985 by the diver Henri Cosquer
- 300ft complex
- Above water in pre-history
3 Mechanisms
- Dark entrance
- quiet, soft music
- Picture of diver Henri Cosquer with his background in front of the picture
Explanation of the mechanisms
- As you enter the room it will feel calm and dark just like a cave. There
would be soft quiet music playing in the background. In front of the
artwork, there will be diver Henri Cosquer pictured with his background
information stated.
2. Art of India, China and Japan (Chapter 3.3)
-
Terra Cotta Soldiers on the March
Basic info:
- A group of villagers excavating a well in Shaanxi Province, northwest China,
discovered remnants of a clay figure in March 1974. It was an incredible
subterranean find: a life-size army of terra clay soldiers and horses.
3 Mechanisms
- Loud music
- Videos of how it would have actually looked
- Maps of where the art was found
Explanation of the mechanisms
- There would be loud music as you enter this room. Along with that
videos of the Chinese soldiers would be marching together. There
would also be a map infront of the artwork of where it was founded.
3. Art of the Americas (Chapter 3.4)
- Seated Figure
Basic info:
- This sitting figure is most likely a newborn staring skyward with its right hand
raised to its lips. The artist for this infant created a hollow figure out of fine white
clay, which was then embellished with a white slip and red color.
Minimum of 3 mechanisms
- Clay pots and other clay artwork around
- Bright lights on the artwork
- Quotes and poems under the artwork
Explanation of the mechanisms
- There would be clay pots and other clay artwork around this piece. There would
also be bright lights on the artwork. There would be quotes and poems under the
artwork.
4. Art of Africa and the Pacific Islands (Chapter 3.5)
- Great Mosque, Djenne, Mali
Basic info:
- The town of Djenne is the trade center
- It is currently the largest mud-brick in the world
- It uses west Africa architecture practices
Minimum of 3 mechanisms:
- Map of the town
- Drawings that would be inside the town
- 3-D sand and other things to feel like you are in the town
Explanation of the mechanisms:
- There would be a map of the town. As soon as you walk in it would feel
like you are in the town with sand on the ground. Bright/daytime/ colorful
drawings that would be on the walls.
The Validity of Modern Art
Author(s): Ismail Tunali
Source: The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol. 22, No. 2 (Winter, 1963), pp.
161-163
Published by: Wiley on behalf of The American Society for Aesthetics
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/427749
Accessed: 27-07-2018 23:52 UTC
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ISMAIL TUNALi
The Validity of Modern Art
THE BASIC QUESTION in the critical disart, begun by the Impressionists, can be di-
cussion of modern art is not one of evalua-
vided into three stages:
tion but rather of validity: is modern art 1) the reduction of the three dimensional
to the two dimensional, substituting
valid? The answer to this question must be
subjective space for geometrical persought through an existential and essential
spective;
approach. The essential points are: 1) What
is the object that modern art wants to pre- 2) eliminating local color of objects;
sent and what is its place in the order of ex- 3) substituting the light and color effects
of the object for the object itself.
istence? 2) What are its categories? 3) What
aesthetic value does it want to confirm?
The world of Impressionist painting is no
These are philosophical concerns and longer
only the logical, deductive, familiar world
of things but rather a purely sensorial world
philosophy can deal with them.
of appearances.
Modern art begins with the ImpressionThe next step in the development of modists' positivism, a positivism expressed by
ern art is that of Expressionism. While the
Ernst Mach. For the Impressionists, sense
Impressionists are ruled by the optical sendata is fundamental to the reality of existence. The Impressionists start with thesation,
in- the Expressionists seek reality internally,
terpretation of existence along the lines
of within the artist's own ego. Expressionism, like phenomenological philosophy,
positivism, transmitting to the canvas realseparates
the existence of an object from its
ity in terms of color and light sensations.
It
essence, and it is the essence which becomes
is not the object itself, but rather the chrothe object of expression. To work with esmatic and light appearance of the object
that the Impressionists record; hence, sences
the is, of course, to go beyond external
views,
Impressionists' break with conventional
art beyond the sensory data of the world
which concentrated on the reality of theabout
ob- us, to the "thing in itself," the substance, the eidos that phenomena conceal.
ject itself. The conventional (or classical)
philosophy the discipline of essences is
approach to subject matter begins withInthe
metaphysics, and so modern art becomes a
a priori acceptance of a concept of a universort of arta metaphysica in its search for essal whole that is the sum of its parts. The
sences. In this sense, modern art is the most
Impressionists, working inductively, see only
the single visual sensation. Hence, this basic
newmetaphysical art that history has yet
offered. This search for the eidos forces the
optical art eliminates the formal, rational
convention of contour, balance, and order
artist to construct a new perspective, one
that is directed toward the essence of things,
as non-optical elements. This purification of
one that is metaphysically rather than emISMAIL TUNALf, having studied at the Universities
pirically determined. The path of Expresof Istanbul and Vienna, is now an associate prosionism in art can be traced from Vincent
fessor of philosophy at the University of Istanbul.
van Gogh to its culmination in the objecHe has written and translated a number of works
tification of Cubism.
in aesthetics.
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162
ISMAIL
TUNALI
Picasso's
Cubism
at
beauty
(prosti kalon, to use Plato's words),
world
of
but anphenomen
absolute beauty (auto to kalon).
tural
form,
to
its
There is yet another
path in
modern art e
the essence of the existentials, or, in other
that runs parallel to Expressionism and
words, the eidos of existence is geometry. which grew out of Picasso's Cubism, that of
Thus Cubism provides the first full state- Surrealism. Surrealism is not simply an art
ment of the arta metaphysica which is con-style, but a philosophy, a way of life, a motinued in the schools of Constructivism and
rality which depends upon a new interpretation of existence. Andre Breton said, in
Supremetism. Kandinsky in his book Das
Geistige in der Kunst establishes the basic
1929, that "Everything leads us to believe
precepts of modern art. What is non-figurathat there is a place in our soul where life
tive or abstract art? It is art that has been
and death, reality and idea, past and future,
freed from the world of phenomenology,
the expressive and non-expressive, above
Kandinsky answers. He says it this way:
and below are no longer seen as contrary
to each other." This world, then, is one de"When the form stays abstract, it does not
express any object, inversely it is entirely void
an of meaning based on logical order; it is
not a cosmos, but a chaos. The eidos of surabstract essence. Such pure abstract essence
realism is the absurd, the basic substance
is a square, a circle, a triangle, a parallelothat carries reality. Camus says, "I can regram, a rectangle, a trapezoid, and other
forms which do not have mathematical
fuse everything in this world which surnames. All these forms are the citizens who
rounds us, which forces my mind or fascinates me, but I cannot refuse this chaos...."
have equal rights in the country of the abstract...." And he continues, "These forms
This is the philosophy of the absurd; all life
are such a treasure where artists take their
is absurd, and, then, life is hopeless as well
as free-free because there is no logical,
elements of creation" (p. 110). This country
of geometry is an ideal land which existsguiding,
by
restricting order except the finality
itself. "The natural forms dissolve," writes
of death. The logical thread in this world of
Kandinsky, "to find an expression for the fantasy, of the irrational, of the arbitrary,
objective things. Natural forms are chieflyis that of the absurd. De Chirico, Max Ernst,
the limits which are in the way of this ex-and Salvador Dali express the world of the
pression. That is why they are pushed to oneabsurd; dream, reality, abstract, concrete,
side; the purpose is a construction for the far, and near are mixed chaotically. There is
no meaning and no logic in Surrealist art
composition."
for what is conceived is the absurd, nonMalewitsch and Mondrian, who are the
last great figures in this geometric-mathe- sense: ". . the production of art is par exmatic art form, find the aesthetic reality ofcellence absurd pleasure" (Camus).
the art work in the relation of formal eleWe are now prepared to summarize the
ment to each other. Plato, in the Philebus,
nature of modern art. But basic to our un-
offers justification for this mode of abstrac- derstanding is the concept that modern art
tion: "When I say the beauty of form here,has produced new categories, new areas of
I do not mean what the public thinks it tosubject matter. For the Impressionists, the
new area is that of pure phenomena perbe, for example, the beauty of living things
or the beauty of the forms of pictures. Whenceived sensorially. For the Abstractionists,
the new area is that of logical and geometriI say the beauty of forms, I mean the shapes
which are straight or curved according tocal forms. For the Surrealists, the new area
is that of the absurd. Mimesis, the framethe cubes and surfaces, the shapes drawn
work of conventional art, is eliminated. In
with compass, ruler, and protractor. They,
like other things, are not beautiful in rela-the shift from a phenomenological to a
tion to something else. They are eternal,
metaphysical world in art there are found
they exist by themselves, and they are beau- the primary, defining elements of modern
tiful because of their essence." This new
art. Certainly modern art is as real as conventional art. Then why is there this perbeauty of abstract art is not a relative
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The Validity of Modern Art 163
sistent question of cisely
its what
validity?
has happened in Perhaps
the field of art th
answer may be phrased
in the
folas well somewhat
as in the field of physics.
Thus, we
lowing fashion. The
which
determine
havelaws
the attacks
on the physics
of Heisenthe nature of an art
phase
berg.
For similarare
reasonsthe
we havesame
attacks on law
which direct the culture of which it is a
the philosophies of Heidegger and Sartre.
part. Modern culture and its philosophyCertainly
are
modern art presents many probexpressionistic, and its scientific orientation
lems, but that of validity should not be one
is indeterministic. Hence, modern art is of
this kind also. Just as the Newtonian view
of them. "Every production of art is its age's
child, and every age creates a special art
of the world cannot be applied to modern
which cannot be repeated," said Kandinsky.
physics, so also the conventional view of art
To a great extent man does not live in his
cannot be applied to modern art. To look
own
age; he lives in the past, attempting to
with the eyes of a Newton at modern
bring
past standards to bear on the present.
physics, or with the eyes of a critic trained
in conventional art at modern art, would
It is this adherence to the past that poses
the question of the validity of modern art.
and does lead to confusion. This is pre.
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Gratefulness
Art and the Sacred
By Br. David Steindl-Rast, OSB
“Guernica” by Pablo Picasso
I hope this can really be an opening talk in the sense that it opens things up. Remember when
a big apple sometimes, one of those big shiny red apples? We would say to our mother, “You t
we couldn’t get our teeth into it. Once a little bite was taken out of it, we could manage. And e
able to take out of this large apple may be only a very small bite, it may help us all to begin.
As I looked at this over-awing theme, Art and the Sacred, I realized that art alone would alread
teeth into. And the sacred would be too big. So I will concentrate, humbly, on the “ and”. If we
“and” , the connection between the two, it might help us open up our topic. I would like to use
picture – Picasso’s Guernica – to illustrate points about the link between art and the sacred. M
to that place where the two are linked, not just talk about it, and to help each one of us take o
There is a passage that Gilbert Kerr, editor of the Harvard Advocate , wrote about W.H. Auden
text with which to start. Auden believed, said Kerr, that “a poet feels the impulse to create a w
passive awe provoked by an event is transformed into a desire to express that awe in a rite of
say “into a work of art.” He says, “… into a rite of worship.” Art comes in through, the back doo
be fit homage, this rite must be beautiful.” So we start with an awe-inspiring event. What Kerr
this experience is transformed by the artist. That rite of worship, in words, is poetry. In movem
and line, it is painting. In all these forms there is a rite of worship. That would be one way of lo
Three Phases of an awe-inspiring Event
For our understanding we could separate this awe-inspiring event, or moment, into three phas
order to face reality, in whatever form it may be, we have to hold still. What kind of stillness is
clearer, I hope, when I read a few passages from T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets . But at this momen
to think about the examples or about artists, but to appeal to our own experience. What is nec
face reality? Stillness. Let us, right now, each one of us, call to mind the kind of stillness that is
face reality. Call to mind, in a kind of repentant way, how often we rush around and are not stil
Stillness is certainly a precondition for facing anything. When we run we do not have the stead
people, or events, to look at anything face to face.
The next phase of our moment of awe is discovery. Stillness is necessary for discovery, but th
necessary: the letting go of our preconceived notions. This is a deepening of the concept of st
to be mentioned specifically. No matter how still you are externally when you look at things, yo
them unless you disengage yourself from your preconceived notions and allow reality to impre
you open yourself to reality, the moment you allow it to do something to you, you discover an
order. You discover in things an order that existed millions and millions of years before we eve
you discover that mysterious order of the other.
The third phase I would like to single out of that one act of facing reality is what we might call
to be still; it is not enough to open yourself for discovery. To fully face reality you have to say Y
blessing. It is not necessarily the “yes” of approval. Approval may not be the appropriate respo
but blessing is always appropriate. And blessing in this sense is an inner Yes. It is, as I hope you
the essence, in fact, of worship.
I will read our initial text once more and hope in the light of this first survey of the act of facin
little deeper. “The poet feels the impulse to create a work of art when the passive awe provok
transformed into a desire to express that awe in a rite of worship. To be fit homage, this rite m
the terms used in this quotation ought to be examined. We ought to be sure we speak the sam
A Few Points About Art
Perhaps there should be a few points here about art, for instance, just to make sure we are on
Right now, the important thing is that we are talking about a making. Whether it be poetry or
cooking, or anything made with material such as movement and gesture, it is a making. And ye
crafts, which are characterized by making things for a purpose. When I am using “art” now, it i
emphasis on meaning rather than purpose, on celebration rather than use of the thing made. T
ultimately, of the superfluous. The superfluous is somehow celebrated with the deep intuition
important to us humans than the superfluous.
When I speak about the sacred, what matters here is awe, in the sense of a strange and inexpl
fascination. You see it when a very small child stands at the ocean and the waves are coming i
torn between wanting to rush into the ocean and fearfully drawing back. Every time the wave
little frightened, and every time the wave withdraws, the child runs up and gets closer. And the
And beauty—probably we could never finish thinking about it. At this moment I would merely l
of beauty as an aspect of everything there is, as an aspect of all reality. Whatever is, is good. W
ever is, is beautiful. That is just what truth means: reality as faced by the intellect. And beauty,
the senses. Beautiful is, as St. Thomas said, the splendor of truth, the clarity everything has, if
can do just this: be still, open ourselves, and say that inner Yes, and then that splendor breaks
our own limitations determine the measure in which we are able to accept it. The facing of rea
worship. You do not have to add anything special to it. This facing of reality can only be done o
to our knees. Kneeling is the position we feel to be most appropriate at that moment. We nee
that place and we’ll find ourselves on our knees. That is worship. It is not even necessary at thi
considerations to introduce that which receives our worship. It could be introduced; it would fi
will suffice. The awe-struck kneeling is by itself an act through which meaning flows into our li
How can we bless in the midst of disaster? In the midst of the fearfulness that lies at the
things?
B Share
Now up to this point everything looks just really nice and smooth. I think not even Reader’s Dig
difficulty with all this. But now comes the real difficulty. And that’s why I’ve brought to show yo
Guernica which is one of the great pieces of art of our time.
Guernica
It was provoked forty years ago, on April 29, 1937, when for the first time in history a squad of
village. The timing for this saturation bombing, as historians have shown, was deliberately set
the morning when everybody was out of their houses and in the market. The bombers came a
village, unarmed, strategically unimportant, was simply wiped out. A few days later Picasso, un
of this experience, started sketching for Guernica.
For us here the question this event imposes is decisive. Here was certainly an awe-inspiring ev
Here is something to which you can hardly say Yes. Or can you? What was it the artist said to
inner gesture that produced a painting like this? Only when we focus on this most difficult poi
stands between art and the sacred becomes almost impossible to deal with will we be able to
the two. And I must admit I have no glib answer at all. I am not offering you some easy answer
fine then.” No. I’m struggling with it and I invite you to struggle with me. Struggle with these q
bless in the midst of disaster? In the midst of apathy? In the midst of destruction? In the midst
stupidity? In the midst of the fearfulness that lies at the root of so many terrible things?
And yet, nobody can look long at this picture and fail to realize that it is a Yes. It is a Yes that in
the horror of the event captured in this imagery. How could Picasso say this Yes? Certainly he
and say, “Well, it wasn’t really that bad. There were some nice things about it.” He simply faced
else but what we discussed earlier, only he did so in an extreme situation. He held still, but in t
special kind of holding still. It demands extreme courage. He discovered order, but he didn’t di
had the daring of a discoverer, the truth that there was some order he had not yet discovered
he might ever discover. He had the courage to bless, the courage to say yes in the midst of all
is not necessarily one of approval, but it is an affirmation of reality.
Have the courage to be still. Not just externally quiet, but quiet in the ultimate sense of w
B Share
I think the three phases might become clearer when I read three passages from Eliot’s Four Q
won’t exhaust these passages now. Don’t focus on what we are missing. We’ll be missing most
something in it and that’s the important thing. Here is the holding still, the poet confronting re
I said to my soul, be still, and wait without
hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong
thing; wait without love
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and hope are all
in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not
ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
and a few lines earlier:
I said to my soul, be still, and let the dark
come upon you
Which shall be the darkness of God.
There is the sacred. We can feel it. This first phase is no longer just stillness in general, but it is
still.” That means have the courage to be still. “I said to my soul, ‘be still.’” Not just externally qu
ultimate sense of waiting without hope. “Wait without hope, for hope would be hope for the w
love, for love would be love of the wrong thing: there is yet faith but the faith and the love and
waiting. Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought: So the darkness shall be the
dancing.”
Just a very short space after that there is another passage, about discovery.
Shall I say it again? In order to arrive
there,
To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not,
You must go by a way wherein there is
no ecstasy.
In order to arrive at what you do not know
You must go by a way which is the way
of ignorance.
In order to possess what you do not possess
You must go by the way of dispossession.
In order to arrive at what you are not
You must go through the way in which
you are not.
And what you do not know is the only thing
you know
And what you own is what you do not own
And where you are is where you are not.
To arrive at what you do not know, at that order which is not your own, is discovery. But… “In o
do not know, you must go by a way which is the way of ignorance.” The decisive point is to hav
the way of ignorance, by the way in which we are not. That is real courage. To get from where
go by a way wherein there is no ecstasy.” That seems important because, linguistically, “ecstas
“instant.” You have to be in the present moment. That is how Eliot, in this context, speaks abo
be really in the present moment, to immerse yourself in it, to allow it to do something to you,
and not protect yourself by preconceived notions—all this is the way of ignorance.
Now a final passage from the Four Quartets about that Yes of blessing. (I’ve been really strugg
something about this final phase.) I think Eliot expresses it powerfully when he speaks about w
with reality.
If you came this way,
Taking any route, starting from anywhere,
At any time or at any season,
It would always be the same: you would have to put off sense and notions.
You are not here to verify,
Instruct yourself, or inform curiosity
Or carry report. You are here to kneel…
Another clue to what this kneeling means stands at the end of a poem by W. H. Auden called “
stanza by stanza, with each of our five senses. After treating the five, Auden says in a final stan
Be happy, precious five,
So long as I’m alive
Nor try to ask me what
You should be happy for;
Think, if it helps, of love
Or alcohol or gold,
But do as you are told.
I could (which you cannot)
Find reasons fast enough
To face the sky and roar
In anger and despair
At what is going on,
Demanding that it name
Whoever is to blame:
The sky would only wait
Till all my breath was gone
And then reiterate
As if I wasn’t there
That singular command
I do not understand,
Bless what there is for being,
Which has to be obeyed, for
What else am I made for,
Agreeing or disagreeing.
Bless what there is for being with the Yes of blessing. Be happy, precious five. Be happy. But h
Again Eliot has a passage about that happiness:
The moment of happiness — not the sense of well-being,
Fruition, fulfilment, security or affection,
Or even a very good dinner, but the sudden illumination —
All we need to do is hold still, be still, be open, listen. Then even the most shattering event ma
sudden illumination. The fourth section of “Little Gidding” in the Four Quartets describes a sh
comparable toGuernica. It also deals with the bombing of London and was written during Wor
stanzas Eliot makes the dive bombers transparent to the dove, symbol of the Holy Spirit who s
Pentecost. The daring imagery is almost a tour de force.
The dove descending breaks the air
With flame of incandescent terror
Of which the tongues declare
The one discharge from sin and error.
The only hope, or else despair
Lies in the choice of pyre or pyre —
To be redeemed from fire by fire.
Who then devised the torment? Love.
Love is the unfamiliar Name
Behind the hands that wove
The intolerable shirt of flame
Which human power cannot remove.
We only live, only suspire
Consumed by either fire or fire.
This does something to our concept of God, I hope. It reminds me of what a Hassidic master s
God is an earthquake!” And that earthquake is not something that happened out there in 1937
London. It happened the last time we had some soul-shattering experience. It may happen wh
hold still. And it will not only destroy but build up, if we can rise to a Yes of blessing.
Blessing is a creative encounter, for it is that basic gesture which, in Biblical tradition, we pred
ourselves. God blesses us. We bless God.
I am grateful we chose this place for a conference on art and the sacred. Lindisfarne is right no
crisis. A time of crisis is a time to kneel, to open ourselves for blessing, and to bless. Thus, the
May Lindisfarne in every crisis (as Rilke put it), “like the tongue between the teeth, remain, ne
praise.”
Reprinted from Lindisfarne Letter, #6, 1978.
Excerpts from Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot are reprinted by permission of Harcourt Brace Jo
copyright©1943, by T.S. Eliot;
copyright©1971, by Esme Valerie Eliot.
The Baroque from the Point of View of the Art Historian
Author(s): John Rupert Martin
Source: The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol. 14, No. 2, Second Special Issue on
Baroque Style in Various Arts (Dec., 1955), pp. 164-171
Published by: Wiley on behalf of The American Society for Aesthetics
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/425854
Accessed: 11-08-2018 06:06 UTC
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range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
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The American Society for Aesthetics, Wiley are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize,
preserve and extend access to The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism
This content downloaded from 47.145.175.95 on Sat, 11 Aug 2018 06:06:21 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
164 JOHN RUPERT MARTIN
their personal guilt and responsibility. On the surface such representatively
baroque men and women appear (to use the terms of Jean Rousset33) unstable,
strutting peacocks and masked changeable Circes; they know, however, in the
depth of their hearts that, with all their ostentation, they are insecure and
threatened by death. None the less they usurp a central place and rank which
they do not deserve, that place of importance which, as Pascal said, belongs only
to Christ who wants their humility and renunciation. This produces their spiritual
inquietude.
In this sense, I think, the contemporary investigators of the literary Baroque34
have established at least three fundamental distinctions:
1. They have proved that Baroque is a genuine movement pathetically an-
chored in life, and that it is not, as Symonds and Croce believed, "bad taste based
on a Jesuitry translated into culture," a formula which implied that the most
genuine expression of the tensions in the modern soul was an arranged Kulturlenkung.
2. They have corrected the opposite error of the French critics who confused
the organized dirigisme of the Baroque in France towards the so-called Classicism, with a genuine new style entirely different from and opposed to the
Baroque.
3. They have found that for the time being a wholesale identification of conceptistic pr&ieux or metaphysical poetry with the Baroque or opposition of them
to the Baroque does not lead to the heart of the matter, while the concept of
mannerism has turned out to be very helpful in this connection by covering all
these peripheral forms and, at the same time, keeping them from the center
where they do not belong.
THE BAROQUE FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE ART HISTORIAN
JOHN RUPERT MARTIN
Let me say at the outset that by "baroque" I mean, first, that period
roughly comprehended by the seventeenth century. I take it, moreover, to
nate a set of commonly held attitudes. Thus I regard "baroque art" as b
only the product of the seventeenth century, but also as being shaped
its characteristic form by those attitudes. Hence, whatever its origin
notation may have been, I do not conceive of the term as applying onl
which is theatrical, sensational or bombastic-as calling up the idea of
racket," to quote Professor Panofsky.
It is certainly not easy to prove that there is such a thing as "baroque art,"
rather than a multitude of heterogeneous works which merely happen to have
38Jean Rousset, La litt,6rature de I'dge baroque en France. Circ6 et le Paon, Paris, 1953.
34 Andreas Angyal, "Der Werdegang der internationale-n Barockforschung," Forschungen
und Fortschritte, XXVIII (1954), 377-383.
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THE ART HISTORIAN AND THE BAROQUE 165
been executed in the baroque era-or, if even t
the seventeenth century. For we must grant that a single baroque style does not
exist: on the contrary, one is almost tempted to speak of the very diversity of
styles as one of the distinguishing features of the seventeenth century. Attempts
have been made, it is true, to define a coherent stylistic vocabulary for the period.
The most brilliant of these was W6lfflin's famous comparison of sixteenth and
seventeenth century art, from which he drew five pairs of concepts. Thus he was
able to point to the contrast between "linear and painterly" modes of vision,
between "plane and recession," "closed and open form," "multiplicity and
unity," and "clearness and unclearness," as illustrating the artistic qualities of
the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries respectively. Penetrating as these observations were (and it would be absurd to disparage W6lfflin's work), it is now
evident that his categories have certain limitations. First, as is well known,
W6lfflin was interested in form rather than in content; consequently his notion
of the baroque was founded on purely optical (one might almost say "impressionist") considerations. Secondly, his conception of a unified baroque style was
only arrived at by neglecting "classic" artists such as Poussin, although it must
be obvious that a comprehensive system which fails to take into account a major
artist (no matter how inconvenient) is on that score alone deficient. Thirdly,
W6lfflin treated the sixteenth century as an artistic whole, making no distinction
between that later phase of it which is now generally termed "mannerism" and
the earlier, classical (or "high renaissance") phase. Yet it happens that the contrast between baroque and mannerism is more striking and illuminating than
that between baroque and high renaissance. For, as we are now becoming aware,
the baroque came into being not so much through evolution as through revolution; it was deliberately launched, so to speak, in opposition to the principles of
mannerism.
What is required is a definition, not of baroque stylistic forms, nor yet of
baroque iconography, but of what these reveal to us of baroque content. We shall
have to determine the common denominators in all the artistic products of the
period-those fundamental attitudes which still persist despite differences of
nationality, of individual personality, and even of religious belief, and which are
at the same time peculiar to the baroque era. Needless to say, the few remarks
that I shall make here are in no sense intended to answer this requirement. The
problem confronting us is much too complicated to be solved in so brief and
sketchy a fashion. Furthermore, it is doubtful that it can be satisfactorily solved
until we have developed new techniques of scholarship which, by transcending
individual areas of specialization (the history of art, of literature, music, philosophy, etc.), will provide us with a more reliable and valid set of criteria than
we possess at present. My remarks, then, are of necessity both incomplete and
provisional. In order to avoid complications and repetitions, I shall limit myself
to the representational arts of painting and sculpture.
Of all the essential characteristics of baroque art I would place first its naturalism. Verisimilitude, though it takes varying forms, is a principle to which all
baroque artists subscribe. Indeed, it is a factor in the very genesis of the baroque,
conceived as it was in opposition to the stylized conventions and fantasies of
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166 JOHN RUPERT MARTIN
mannerism. It was not merely a carele
any other, may be credited with inau
competent painter was one who kne
(imitar bene le cose naturali). Rembra
should be guided only by nature and
encountered in Rubens: in his essay
practice which in general he approved
and stony lustre. These were no idle w
nude makes very clear. Even much la
introduced theoretical complications i
"natural" vision of the baroque was nev
of the age of Louis XIV who, for all t
committed to the representation of ap
must look to find the most obvious lin
artistic vision of the age that gave bir
a respect for visible, material reality.
Naturalism is of course not merely a
the naturalist aesthetic is the widened
new categories to the old, accepted the
although they were not "invented" by
elevated to a position of importance s
The Dutch masters of the seventeenth
illustration of the meaning of baroqu
background, religious and mythologic
and still less, it would seem, for their pa
part specialists in limited categories o
can be said to have dedicated themsel
of the world and of the life about the
groups, domestic interiors, church int
markets, views of rivers, harbors and
the year, still life subjects of every kind
passion for representing everyday fact
light, for crystallizing the shifting pa
and enduring form.
In stressing the importance of baroq
against oversimplification. We shall ga
the baroque if we confuse the natural
of the nineteenth. The gulf between
that which separates Galileo and Darw
superficial and erroneous for the fir
baroque art, provided he does not rest
soon comes to realize that its inherent
an equally innate tendency to allegor
standing "realists" of the baroque-mas
hailed as "forerunners of impressionis
subjects. And characteristically, such a
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THE ART HISTORIAN AND THE BAROQUE 167
a naturalistic, genre-like exterior: this is especially true of the Spaniard Velazquez
and the Hollander Vermeer, two painters whose powers of observation, command
of representation and sheer technical mastery might seem to preclude any
interest in a non-material reality. In the same way, a surprising number of still
life paintings are found, on analysis, to embody a moralizing theme such as
Vanitas, the abstract idea being made more real by being conveyed in the most
immediate and concrete terms possible. These are not isolated examples. The
importance of allegory in Rubens, Poussin and Pietro da Cortona is too obvious
to require emphasis. The equilibrium of naturalism and allegory, which is one of
the distinguishing features of baroque art, plainly echoes a comparable duality
of naturalism and metaphysics in baroque science and philosophy.
In view of the growing scientific spirit of the time, it is not to be wondered at
that baroque art evinces a deep interest in psychology. We find it exemplified in
portraiture, in the power of a Rembrandt, a Velazquez or a Bernini to evoke
through a likeness an uncanny sense of presence. But the baroque concern with
the phenomena of personality is not manifested solely in portraits. We can ob-
serve it quite as plainly in religious art. Thus there are certain subjects which,
though they are in no sense innovations of the seventeenth century, yet recur
with such frequency as to show that they have a special psychological appeal.
The gospel episode of the Supper at Emmaus, in which the identity of the risen
Christ is suddenly and dramatically revealed to two unsuspecting disciples, is
such a subject. The Catholic Caravaggio and the Protestant Rembrandt were
particularly drawn to it. Or again, in the traditional theme of David with the
head of Goliath the baroque also found new possibilities of interpretation. It is
characteristic of the period that the youthful hero is usually presented not as
the proud champion elated by his victory, but as a reflective, saddened boy who
gazes with something like remorse at his grisly handiwork. In such subjects
the baroque was able to exploit to the full its taste for the portrayal of mixed
emotions.
Here we may refer also to another recurrent theme in baroque religious art:
vision and ecstasy. One of the most typical products of seventeenth-century
Catholic art is the altarpiece representing, in intensely emotional fashion, a
saint in a state of mystical trance, helpless and swooning at the awful realization
of divinity. One thinks at once of what is perhaps the greatest work of this kind,
Bernini's splendid Ecstasy of St. Theresa. It is not enough to relate such works
merely to the religious sensibilities of the age; for the mannerist period of the
sixteenth century, when religious passions were even more deeply felt, produced
nothing comparable to them. Over and above their specifically religious purpose,
it appears that artists perceived in these subjects an opportunity to explore the
psychology of ecstasy and trance, in which the self seeks to be released from
human limitations and absorbed in God.
In the same way the favorite Catholic themes of death and martyrdom,
initially brought into existence for reasons of faith, became a vehicle for the
portrayal of extreme states of feeling. The unspeakable agony of dismemberment, the intense grief and horror of the onlookers, the feral cruelty of the
executioners, these things, we are compelled to admit, are the real subject of
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168
JOHN
RUPERT
MARTIN
many a baroque martyrdom. The paintings of the Spaniard Ribera are among
those that come to mind.
Equally symptomatic of the baroque awareness of psychological factors is the
introduction of humor into the domain of art. Witty and humorous elements
can even invade the dignified tradition of monumental fresco painting, as is
shown by Annibale Carracci's Gallery in the Farnese palace in Rome, where the
decorative figures are not content to play a properly solemn and subordinate
r6le, but become positively playful. The sixteenth century, with its ingrained
notions of the dignity of art, would have found such levity intolerable. It is
significant, too, that this same Annibale Carracci, who may be regarded, with
Caravaggio, as one of the founders of the baroque, was the inventor of caricatures
in the modern sense. For caricature, with its comic exaggerations and halfmocking, half-sympathetic intent, in itself reflects an understanding of the complexities of personality. Bernini was fond of drawing caricatures, a number of
which have survived. Trivial and hastily executed as they are, they yet derive
from the same feeling for humanity that informs his most inspired works of
portrait sculpture.
Another of the distinguishing characteristics of baroque content is what may
be called the sense of the infinite. Once again it is hardly necessary to stress the
analogy to developments in philosophy, the natural sciences and mathematics.
It is not too much to say that the consciousness of infinity pervades the whole
epoch and colors all its products. Here it will only be possible to indicate a few
of the salient manifestations of that consciousness in works of art.
Some of those subjects which I have just mentioned as illustrating the baroque
interest in psychology may serve also to exemplify the concern with infinity.
In Christ's Supper at Emmaus, for example, baroque artists were able to exploit
not only the disciples' sudden realization of their companion's identity, but
also the dramatic (because unexpected) intrusion of the infinite and eternal into
the everyday world of merely human experience. So also the representation of a
saint in mystical ecstasy conjured up the ultimate enlargement of the personality,
to the point at which it achieved union with the higher reality. And this desire
for expansion of the individual personality (which lies at the very center of the
baroque spirit) is surely to be connected with a new awareness of infinity.
In general, however, the fascination that infinity held for the baroque artist
was expressed in terms of space, light and time. To mention space in baroque art
is to think at once of the widespread interest in landscape, an interest which,
incidentally, links together such diverse personalities as Carracci, Rembrandt,
Poussin, Rubens, and Vermeer, to name only a few of those who, without being
specialists in the subject, turned their attention to landscape at some point in
their careers. The typical seventeenth-century landscape painting, with its
compelling sweep into depth, and its subordination of humanity to the vaster
scale of nature, tells us not only of a fundamentally natural outlook, but something also of the exhilaration which was felt in contemplating the continuum of
space.
This is not to say that all baroque outdoor subjects are monotonously alike.
On the contrary, the rich stylistic variety of the period is nowhere more evident
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THE ART HISTORIAN AND THE BAROQUE 169
than in the widely different approaches to landscape, ranging from the cool
serenity of Carracci's idealized nature to the dynamic turbulence of Ruysdael's
forest scenes, in which nature seems to be at war with itself; from the generalized, rationally ordered scenery of Poussin, which seems to have been constructed
with a kind of Cartesian logic, to the exact and patient portraiture of place which
is found in van der Heyden's views of Dutch towns; from the rural countrysides
of Rubens, with their emphasis on physical vitality and material abundance, to
the classical landscapes of Claude, which breathe an air of poetic evanescence
and nostalgia. But varied and multiform as these interpretations may be, they
all stem initially from the same sense of wonder at the continuous expanse of
the material universe.
We can observe another expression of the baroque preoccupation with the
infinity of space in the great illusionistic ceiling paintings of which the period
was so fond. The breath-taking quality and apocalyptic splendor of such ceilings
as that of II GesA in Rome result largely from the illusion of an unbroken spatial
unity, beginning at an infinite celestial distance, penetrating and dissolving the
very substance of the roof, and finally seeming to fuse with the actual space of
the church interior. And, conversely, the observer experiences something of the
thrill of release from the narrow confines of the material world, by subconsciously identifying himself with the figures who are represented as being swept
upward into the celestial glory.
But it is not solely through such overtly "spacious" subjects as landscape and
heavenly glory that the seventeenth century betrays its feeling for the infinite
prolongation of space. One thinks of the various illusionistic devices employed
by baroque artists to dissolve the barrier imposed by the picture plane between
the physical space of the observer and the perspective space of the painting:
the out-thrust hands which seem to protrude beyond the surface of the canvas
(as in Rembrandt's Night Watch), the mirrors in which are reflected persons or
objects not contained in the picture and therefore to be understood as being in
front of it (as in works by Velazquez and Vermeer), these and similar contrivances are aimed not merely at creating a startling, theatrical effect, but at
suggesting a continuous, uninterrupted flow of space. Baroque artists were also
aware that the limitless can be suggested by the indefinite, as in those Dutch
interiors in which an open window or passageway leads provocatively to an
undefined space beyond, or as in Caravaggio and Rembrandt, where the very
obscurity of the setting seems to hint at deep recessions.
The mention of Caravaggio and Rembrandt, both of whom depend for their
expressive power upon effects of luminosity, may also remind us of the extra-
ordinary emphasis that is given to light as a symbol of the infinite in baroque
art. The representation of light may, it is true, take numerous forms. It may be
the selective, polarized light of Caravaggio, descending diagonally from an unspecified external source and throwing certain significant elements into vivid
relief, while others are lost to sight in impenetrable shadow. Or it may be Ver-
meer's sunny daylight, flooding through a casement window and impartially
illuminating everything within a perfectly ordered domestic interior. In either
case we sense the operation of an external agency which is capable of dissolving
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170
JOHN
RUPERT
MARTIN
the limited confines of the immed
instead the existence of a boundles
phenomenon is the golden luminosit
of an inner light, seeming to penet
even serving, on occasion, as the veh
once more of Bernini's Ecstasy of St
perience is effectively symbolized b
concealed window above the group, f
revelation of divinity. Similarly, in
already referred, the infinity of celes
bolic fashion by a radiant burst of lig
Landscape-painters likewise made u
of light. It is surely no accident th
maximum depth coincides with the
horizon suggesting the endlessness o
owes much to the effect of shimm
across the intervening expanse, seem
to
signify
Closely
infinity
transience
allied
is
the
to
and
the
eclipse.
baroque
constant
explo
preoccupation
sary to say, is usually expressed in
vealed by Time, for example, engag
Bernini. Very early in the century
goddess of the dawn heralding the a
course through the skies. To penetr
in which the scene is clothed is to
recurring cycle of day and night-t
subject by Guercino is made more v
are seen from below, projected agai
lessness of time there is added the
notably
Salvator
Rosa
and
Jakob
reflected in the use of ruins as a sy
transience of man and his works. B
concept of time we must look, as Pr
ings of Nicolas Poussin. With this m
ize as being utterly at odds with th
raised to the stature of a cosmic fo
creative. This conception, which to
expressed not only through iconog
ured, rhythmic movement that anim
These are some of the principal qu
the distinctive content of baroque a
is not intended to be final and com
such matters as the lingering vestig
plicate our understanding of the ea
mention of the process of evolution
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THE BAROQUE: A CRITICAL SUMMARY 171
has perhaps been said to show why, for most art historians, the word "baroque"
conveys the idea of a unified outlook which is discernible in the artistic products
of the seventeenth century.
THE BAROQUE
A Critical Summary of the Essays by Bukofzer, Hatzfeld, and Mart
WOLFGANG STECHOW
In these three contributions I find the following areas of agreement: 1) The
period to which the term Baroque may be applied in music, literature and the
visual arts consists of the seventeenth century, plus-in varying degrees-parts
of the late sixteenth and the early eighteenth. (Mr. Martin did not say so expressly but would probably agree with respect to the early eighteenth, though
perhaps not the late sixteenth century.); 2) There exists a great variety of trends
within the Baroque, and one should not press the use of the term for all works
of the period but rather conceive of its validity as applying to the most outstanding and the most influential works; 3) Regardless of the original significance
-or lack of it-of the word Baroque, its use should-or must-be continued,
since by now it has acquired a certain generally accepted meaning, in a process
comparable to the formation of the term Gothic.
Outside of these points of full, or almost full, consensus between the three
speakers, there seems to reign a healthy disparity, and I shall now turn to some
of the most interesting points of disagreement.
First: Is the Baroque a style? Mr. Bukofzer says: "The baroque era is that
period which coincides with the rise and the decline of the baroque style." Mr.
Martin says: "We must grant that a single baroque style does not exist: on the
contrary, one is almost tempted to speak of the diversity of styles as one of the
distinguishing features of the seventeenth century." Is the discrepancy between
these two statements merely a matter of semantics or does it indicate a fundamental difference of opinion?
It seems clear that Mr. Bukofzer, although fully acknowledging what he calls
"modifications" within the Baroque, has greater faith in the binding power of
the formal aspects of style than has Mr. Martin. He defines style "in terms of
such observable features as a significant group of traits, or a meaningful configuration of criteria." When Mr. Bukofzer speaks of the limitations of Wo1fflin's
principles he thinks of his "outdated theories about the mechanics of historical
development," but he commends the Swiss scholar for applying the principle of
stylistic analysis "more rigorously than his predecessors" and establishing "an
essential relation between the stylistic and the historical approach." It seems
evident that Mr. Bukofzer considers Woifflin's principles as laid down in his book
of 1915 (Kunstgeschichtliche Grundbegriffe) fully valid within the art-historical
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