The Beholder: The Experience of Art in Early Modern Europe

by Robert Williams (Editor)

One of the most significant developments in the study of works of art over the past generation has been a shift in focus from the works themselves to the viewer's experience of them and the relation of that experience both to the works in question and to other aspects of cultural life. The ten essays written for this volume address the experience of art in early modern Europe and approach it from a variety of methodological concerns range from the relation between its perceptual and significative dimensions to the ways in which its discursive formation anticipates but does not exactly correspond to later notions of 'aesthetic' experience. The modes of engagement vary from careful empirical studies that explore the complex complementary relationship between works of art and textual evidence of different kinds to ambitious efforts to mobilize the powerful interpretative tools of psychoanalysis and phenomenology. This diversity testifies to the vitality of current interest in the experience of beholding and the urgency of the challenge it poses to contemporary art-historical practice.

244 pages, Hardcover

First published December 6, 2006

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Reviews

[Simone · Rating 4 out of 5]

I Love Didi- Huberman's article on Opening up Venus... how then does " art history as a humanistic discipline desexulize the figure of Venus, to close her up and petrify her, to project her into the peaceful ether of the idea?" p39

[Mariarose · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great resource for my research!