Product Description

What is art history? Why, how, and where did it originate, and how have its methods changed over time? The history of art has been written and rewritten since classical antiquity. Since the foundation of the modern discipline of art history in Germany in the late eighteenth century, debates about art and its histories have intensified. Historians, philosophers, psychologists, and anthropologists among others have changed our notions of what art history has been, is, and might be. This anthology is a guide to understanding art history through critical reading of the field>'s most innovative and influential texts, focusing on the past two centuries. Each section focuses on a key issue: art as history; aesthetics; form, content, and style; anthropology; meaning and interpretation; authorship and identity; and the phenomenon of globalization. More than thirty readings from writers as diverse as Winckelmann, Kant, Mary Kelly, and Michel Foucault are brought together, with editorial introductions to each topic providing background information, bibliographies, and critical elucidations of the issues at stake. This updated and expanded edition contains sixteen newly included extracts from key thinkers in the history of art, from Giorgio Vasari to Walter Benjamin and Satya Mohanty; a new section on globalization; and also a new concluding essay from Donald Preziosi on the tasks of the art historian today.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #103773 in Books
• Published on: 2009-02-26
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 624 pages

Customer Reviews

A valiant, but only partially successful effort
The New Oxford History of Art represents the first massive effort to rethink this field in detail since Nikolaus Pevsner launched the Pelican History fifty years ago. The volumes are well printed, advantageously priced, and generally refreshing in their point of view. Preziosi's volume is sui generis in that instead of dealing with a period or theme, it is a second order study--of the study of art history. It combines an anthology with interspersed commentary. Unfortunately, the Preziosi commentary, demonstrating the author's effort to find a new approach, is marred by opaque language and a sketchy presentation of ideas. For example, he says that one of his approaches will be based on the principle of the anamorphic image. Although he reproduces one by Holbein, he does not adequately explain it. Still, for those with an interest in the subject this volume is worth struggling with.