The ?pictures of collections? genre was a special type of cabinet painting, and was invented, refined and popularized within the artistic community of early seventeenth?century Antwerp. Depicting a sumptuous array of luxury goods, natural curiosities, connoisseurs and nobles in elegant interiors, the paintings that make up this genre were purposefully seductive, designed to parade the consummate skill of the Southern Netherlands? finest artists at a time when the market for works of art was growing and highly competitive. Yet there is (...) a heavy lacing of symbolism and allegory apparent in many of the images, and they were also intended to speak to the intellectual preoccupations of the age, from the cultivation of personal virtue to the honing of the critical faculties necessary for philosophy. The genre is explored by tracing stages in its evolution in the seventeenth century, and four types of collection making up the genre are distinguished. Finally, the historiography of the genre is investigated. (shrink)

In a vivid re-creation of late sixteenth-century Flemish intellectual life, Mark Morford explores the intertwined careers of one of the period's most influential thinkers and one of its most original artists: Justus Lipsius and Peter Paul Rubens. He investigates the scholarship of Lipsius (1547-1606), whose revival of Roman Stoicism guided his contemporaries during the revolt of the Netherlands from the rule of Spain and whose teaching prepared future leaders in church and state. Maintaining that Lipsius' thought reached Peter Paul (...) Rubens through his brother, Philip Rubens, Morford analyzes the artist's use of Stoic philosophical and political allegory, beginning with his painting The Four Philosophers. This book discusses the revival of Stoicism in northern Europe, focusing on Lipsius' editions of Tacitus and Seneca, his widely read handbooks on constancy and politics, and his interaction with leading scholars and public figures. As his letters reveal, Lipsius was inconsistent in his life and unsuccessful in reconciling Stoicism with Catholic doctrine; Rubens, although at first sympathetic to the doctrines of Lipsius, is shown to have later transcended their limitations. (shrink)

This essays deals with Heidegger’s concept of “Thing”, as sketched in the 1950 lecture Das Ding.In Being and Time, Heidegger had worked out a concept of “tool”, Zeug, which vanished in later works. The Heideggerian “thing” is undeniably more than a “tool”. The author argues than beings viz. phenomena are actually given to us which oppose the logic of “thinghood” while transcending the logic of “toolhood”: Flemish painting is used as an example of phenomena which overcome the affective reality (...) of being-in-the-world without respecting the mode of appearing proper to things. Another witness is summoned, sacramental experience: a phenomenological description of what is given to see and feel during the Eucharistic liturgy aims at showing that being-in-the-world and “being in the Fourfold” can be put into brackets in such an event, and that it must be the case for such an event to be understood. (shrink)

This collection brings together a selection of writings on art by the internationally acclaimed novelist, historian and critic Marina Warner. For 30 years Warner has published widely on a range of art-world subjects and objects, from contemporary installation and film works to paintings by Flemish and Italian Renaissance masters, through Victorian photography and twentieth-century political drawings and prints. Warner's extraordinary curiosity in art and culture is conveyed in writing that is at once poetic and playful, elegant and rigorous, training (...) our eyes on the smallest of details while painting a broad-brushstroke landscape of art past and present. Themes familiar to Warner's readers--myth and fantasy, psychic and sexual experience, the vast and marvelous expanse of the human imagination--are treated in the lectures and articles, stories, interviews and essays contained here, some of which are published for the first time or republished from out-of-print sources. For the first of two volumes, editor Vivian Sky Rehberg has assembled themed sections titled "Playing in the Dark," "Telling Tales" and "Phantom Technologies." Texts include interviews with Tacita Dean and Paula Rego; catalogue essays on Leonora Carrington, Henry Fuseli, Zarina Bhimji, Tony Oursler and Fischli/Weiss; articles on Tracy Emin, Marlene Dumas, Louise Bourgeois; stories for artist's books by Kiki Smith and Helen Douglas; and lectures on Francis Bacon, Hieronymous Bosch and William Kentridge. "The Symbol Gives Rise to Thought" invites us to explore new ways of seeing and engaging with the traces of our artistic heritage. Marina Warner is a writer of fiction, criticism and history. Holder of 12 honorary degrees and two honorary fellowships, Warner is a Fellow of the British Academy and of the Royal Society of Literature. She has judged the The Jerwood Drawing Prize and the Turner Prize; she is a regular broadcaster on the BBC, and has taught and given lectures worldwide, including the National Gallery and ICA, London and the Prado in Madrid; she has delivered the Presidential Lecture at Stanford University and the Carpenter Lecture at Harvard. She has been awarded a CBE, Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, France and Commendatore dell'Ordine della Stella di Solidareità, Italy. Warner is a winner of the Aby Warburg Prize and a Getty Scholar. Vivian Sky Rehberg is an art historian and critic based in Paris and Rotterdam. A founding editor of "Journal of Visual Culture," she is a contributing editor of "Frieze," and has written for numerous contemporary art publications. Previously Chair of the department of Critical Studies at Parsons Paris School of Art + Design, where she taught modern and contemporary art, Rehberg is currently Course Director for the Masters in Fine Art at Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam.. (shrink)

A work of Vietnamese art crossed a million-dollar mark in the international art market in early 2017. The event was reluctantly seen as a sign of maturity from the Vietnamese art amidst the many existing problems. Even though the Vietnamese media has discussed the issues enthusiastically, there is a lack of literature from the Vietnamese academics examining the subject, and even rarer in from the market perspective. This paper aims to contribute an insightful perspective on the Vietnamese art market, and (...) hesitantly the Vietnamese art as well, through the lens of fake, forgery and copy artworks. 35 cases of fake, forgery and copy paintings were found on the news and from the experts' wisdom. Through the examples, we argue that the Vietnamese art market is a temporary reaction to the immaturely rising of the Vietnamese art and the economy. Therefore, the art market is unable to function healthily unless the Vietnamese art and the economy developed. (shrink)

PART INTRODUCTIONS TO MERLEAU- PONTY'S PHI LOSOPH Y OF PAI NTI NG Galen A. Johnson ...

In this encounter between one of the twentieth century greatest philosophical minds and an artist fundamental to our understanding of the development of modern art, Michel Foucault explores Manet.s importance in the overthrow of traditional values in painting.

This article gives an overview of Buddhist-oriented meditation techniques that were integrated with art projects for four and five year old kindergarten children at Dong Guk Kindergarten, Gyeongju City, South Korea. The article assesses the effect of this program on the creatvitiy levels of the children.

English-language translation of a major work by French philosopher Eric Alliez, in which he offers a new perspective on critical problems in modern aesthetics.

This essay develops a critical interpretation of Gadamer’s account of Renaissance painting. My point of departure is a brief reference in Truth and Method to Leon Battista Alberti, the Italian Renaissance humanist who developed an influential mathematical theory of perspective in painting. Through an explication of Gadamer’s critique of Alberti and of perspective generally, I argue that what is ultimately at stake in Gadamer’s confrontation with Alberti is Gadamer’s opposition to relativism and subjectivism and his downgrading of the importance of (...) the artistic medium for evaluating the truth-claim of an artwork. Against the theory of perspective, Gadamer contends that artworks make substantive claims to truth to which we interpretatively respond. By emphasizing this theme, our discussion resonates with contemporary “hermeneutical realism.”. (shrink)

이 글에서는 당대(唐代) 회화론 속에 반영된 『장자』를 통해 이 시기 회화가 지향한 예술적 이상의 도가 미학적 측면을 분석해 본다. 『역대명화기(歷代名畵記)』, 『당조명화록(唐 朝名畵錄)』, ｢필법기(筆法記)｣ 등 당대 화론에서는 『장자』 수양론의 핵심을 이루는 개념들이 다양한 회화 창작의 맥락에 적용되어 그 미학적 함의를 확장하는 과정을 살펴볼 수 있다. 화론에서 『장자』가 말하는 기술의 도(道)의 핵심은 회화 창작 과정에 차용된다. 포정(庖丁)이나 윤편(輪扁)의 일화가 상징하는 기술의 도가 회화의 도와 맞닿아 있는 것으로여겨지는 것이다. 이상적 회화의 도는 인위적 노력의 개입 없이 무위한 천지조화와 같이이루어지는 것이며, 그러한 회화의 도에 다다르기 (...) 위한 도야의 과정 또한 『장자』의 기술의도의 핵심과 맞닿아 있다. 또한 당대의 화론은 회화 창작에서 주체와 대상의 관계성뿐만 아니라 감상자의 심미적감응의 기제 또한 장자 의 사상을 통해 설명한다. 회화의 도가 발휘될 수 있는 마음의 상태는 ｢각의(刻意)｣의 순일하고 고요한 마음 및 좌망(坐忘)에 빗대어 설명된다. 진인(眞人) 의 수양의 경지와 화가가 갖추어야 할 마음의 상태가 유비를 이루는 것이다. 더 나아가 당대의 문인들이 회화를 단순한 기예로만 보는 것이 아니라 정신 수양의 방법으로 여기기 시작한 경향 또한 화론에 반영된 장자 를 통해서 이해할 수 있다. 창작 주체의 삶의 태도, 정신적 경지 등이 예술 평가의 중요한 기준으로 대두되면서 도가 사상이지향하는 탈속적 가치관은 문인 예술창작의 핵심으로 자리 잡아 갔다. 기존의 화풍을 탈피해 보다 대담하고 자유로운 용묵을 구사했던 당대 화가들의 초탈적 정신성 또한 해의반박(解衣般礴)이나 심재(心齋) 등 『장자』의 사상을 통해 대변된다. 당대를 거치며 회화의 기술보다는 그것을 창작한 화가의 자질과 그 창작 과정에 초점을 맞추는 경향이 점차 두드러진다. 이 과정에서 회화예술의 다양한 맥락에 적용되어 변주되는 『장자』의 이야기들은 그림과 화가의 역할에 대한 인식 변화를 반영하고 설명하는 매개가 되었던 것이다. (shrink)