Ainsworth: From Connoisseurship to Technical Art History.
·
Connoisseur: Having a great deal of knowledge in
the fine arts.
o
Expert judge in matters of taste.
o
Identification and attribution to individual
artists of works where documentary evidence of provenance is lacking.
·
Provenance: Chronology of ownership.
o
Used to provide contextual to original
production or discovery.
·
Object based Art-History
·
Technical Art History: Interdisciplinary fields
of art-history, conservation, and conservation science.
o
Used to be called Technical Studies.
·
Conflicts arise between curators, acquisitions,
sellers and conservators.
·
Straus Center for Conservation and Technical
Studies:
o
Calls attention to investigations of the
materials and techniques of art, as well as issues of origin and manufacture.
·
Current emphasize is on fostering communication
among conservators, conservation scientists and curators.
o
Need better education as to what each function
does.
o
Need more opportunities for collaborative study
in our museums.
o
Institutions should take more aggressive leads
in publishing the results of joint projects.
·
These endeavors provide the foundation for our
apperception and understanding of human artistic endeavor.
Rudiments of Connoisseurship
·
The Works of Art
o
Connoisseurship will be discussed in the works
as:
§
Information
§
Evidence
§
As a Material in the study of art.
o
The art
is the event itself and the only adequate source of information.
§
Art that doesn’t convey its masterpiece is dead.
o
Look upon art a living thing.
·
Text only helps us prepare for the materials of
the works of art.
·
Connoisseurship is based on the assumption that
perfect identity of characteristics indicates identity of origin.
o
It is an assumption.
o
It assumes the definition of the characteristics
will distinguish one artist from another.
·
An example:
o
Starts with the characteristics that most
represent a school.
§
Closer inspection will reveal affinities closer
to one school.
o
Further the identification by identifying
artist’s works that resemble the image.
o
Can also rule out artists by characteristics
that do not resemble the work.
o
Connoisseurship works by isolating the
characteristics.
·
Elements inspected for style and nuances:
o
General Tone
o
Composition
o
Technique
·
Three classes for inspection:
o
Most applicable: The ears, the hands, the folds,
the landscape.
o
Less applicable: The hair, they eyes, the nose,
the mouth.
o
Least applicable: The cranium, the chin, the
color and movement in the human figure and architecture.
·
Forms and
characteristics are reflective of habits in visualization and execution.
o
The forms will change as the habits change.
o
Habits do not remain stationary.
·
When do we have enough information to ascertain authorship?
o
Look for characteristics over a life time for a
master.
o
Second or third rate we only need a few.
§
They aren’t good enough to be emulated or
copied.
o
The greater the artist, the more weight falls on
the question of quality in the consideration of a work attributed to him.
John Pope-Hennessy – Connoisseurship
·
Sculptures are harder to evaluate as they have a
third dimension.
o
Actual versus notional tactility.
·
2-Dimensional analysis of 3-d images are almost
always poor, if not outright wrong.
o
Knowledge of their physical properties are
essential.
o
It is also vital to understand the creative act
through which they were produced.
o
Sculptures are particularly deceiving.
§
Very difficult to date compared to paintings.
§
The must be understood from the originals.
§
The approach must be slow.
·
Connoisseurship provides the only means by which
our limited stock of documented knowledge can be broadened and brought into
conformity with what actually occurred.
·
He suggests Art-History is a more speculative
science.
·
A strict adherence to historicity, in the form
of documented works, is in fact unhistorical.
The Integration of the Image: Problems in the Restoration of
Monuments
Giovanni Carbonara
·
Restoration between Theory and Empiricism.
o
Difficulty in determining the links between
restoration and aesthetics.
§
How each time period conceptualizes art.
§
Distinguishing between our notions of art and
notions from another period.
§
What artistic and historical qualities tone
wishes to keep or recover.
o
There is a common interest in conservation.
§
But the hows and the whys can be very different.
§
Differences in opinion between “the original
state,” which is viewed as somewhat mythical, to the current state that reflects
the original over time, the “present state of the material.”
o
Restoration can become bureaucratic and strictly
cultural.
·
Scientific Restoration: Observations
o
Interest in the monument as a document “of art
and history” is the main characteristic of restoration.
o
Scientific principles become somewhat limited in
determing the artistic and documentary reality of monuments and are generally
viewed as insufficient for guiding intervention methods.
o
Science tends to be positivistic (knowledge
through observation, the senses and validation of observation) and is unable to
reach a historical understanding.
§
Historical understanding requires “further work”
in over all critical reevaluation and in aesthetic appreciation.
§
Science tended to rest on the historical
monument moreso than the aesthetic qualities.
o
Renato Bonelli
§
Restoration as a critical act
§
Restoration as a creative act.
o
One cannot go back to the monument, the original
one.
§
Restoration using ancient fragments.
·
It would be a different image and not a
substitute for the lost original.
·
It would be a new figure.
§
We would not have the old monument, but a
monument brought forth, with new meaning.
o
The question:
§
To meet historical and aesthetic requirements of
ancient monuments;
·
Is absolutely necessary to restore the monument
according to procedures are formally indifferent or neutral, but scientifically
reliable.
o
Or can the monument be introduced in a new
visual equilibrium.
§
Should the restoration only provide the physical
context, or
·
Include the figurative context, no longer the
original.
·
The new context is derived from placing the
old-context into new elements, much like a museum.
·
Planned views change the nature of the subject.
Knowing How to “Question” the object before restoring it.
Albert France-Lanord.
·
There is a difference between:
o
The scientific method for analyzing works as
objects.
o
Historical and critical measures used for
meaning.
o
Note Does how something relate to us have
meaning
·
Consideration of the lab:
o
The object should be returned, as much as it
can, to its signifigance.
o
Slow the process of destruction and ensure the
survival of the object.
o
These aspects tend to be limit the object to
just its matter
·
How to Question:
o
First question: Why and how should it be
conserved.
§
Usually guided by form and composition, rarity
or integration into a particular archaeological context.
§
Restoration needs to address the object as a
product of human activity.
o
Matter is modified over time and is
irreversible.
§
We can’t bring back the object to original
state, therefore
§
It needs to be restored with all of its meaning
as an embodiment of the imagination.
§
Art-objects contain meaning, very diverse
meaning.
·
It can be documentary
·
Purely aesthetic
·
Purely historical,
·
It may portray many aspects at once.
o
Removing artifacts can expose them to new
environment conditions that increases their deterioration.
o
The restorer is guided by the notions of
removing everything exterior to the object, while maintaining everything below
it.
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