Partisan Canons

Whether it is being studied or critiqued, the art canon is usually understood as an authoritative list of important works and artists. This collection breaks with the idea of a singular, transcendent canon. Through provocative case studies, it demonstrates that the content of any canon is both historically and culturally specific and dependent on who is responsible for the canon’s production and maintenance. The contributors explore how, where, why, and by whom canons are formed; how they function under particular circumstances; how they are maintained; and why they may undergo change. Focusing on various moments from the seventeenth century to the present, the contributors cover a broad geographic terrain, encompassing the United States, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, Taiwan, and South Africa. Among the essays are examinations of the working and reworking of a canon by an influential nineteenth-century French critic, the limitations placed on what was acceptable as canonical in American textbooks produced during the Cold War, the failed attempt to define a canon of Rembrandt’s works, and the difficulties of constructing an artistic canon in parts of the globe marked by colonialism and the imposition of Eurocentric ideas of artistic value. The essays highlight the diverse factors that affect the production of art canons: market forces, aesthetic and political positions, nationalism and ingrained ideas concerning the cultural superiority of particular groups, perceptions of gender and race, artists’ efforts to negotiate their status within particular professional environments, and the dynamics of art history as an academic discipline and discourse. This volume is a call to historicize canons, acknowledging both their partisanship and its implications for the writing of art history. Contributors. Jenny Anger, Marcia Brennan, Anna Brzyski, James Cutting, Paul Duro, James Elkins, Barbara Jaffee, Robert Jensen, Jane C. Ju, Monica Kjellman-Chapin, Julie L. McGee, Terry Smith, Linda Stone-Ferrier, Despina Stratigakos Introduction: Canons And Art History / Anna Brzyski -- Measuring Canons: Reflections On Innovation And The Nineteenth-century Canon Of European Art / Robert Jensen -- Canon And Globalization In Art History / James Elkins -- Mere Exposure, Reproduction, And The Impressionist Canon / James Cutting -- Imitation And Authority: The Creation Of The Academic Canon In French Art, 1648-1870 / Paul Duro -- Chinese Art, The National Palace Museum, And Cold War Politics / Jane C. Ju -- Masculine Reason Or Feminine Spirit: Gender Battles In The Werkbund's Canonization Of National Style / Despina Stratigakos -- Coubet, The Decorative, And The Canon: Rewriting And Rereading Meier-graefe's Modern Art / Jenny Anger -- The Multiple Masculinities Of Canonical Modernism: James Johnson Sweeney And Alfred H. Barr Jr. In The 1930s / Marcia Brennan -- Gardner Variety Formalism: Helen Gardner And Art Through The Ages / Barbara Jaffee -- The Rembrandt Research Project: Issues And Controversies Raised By A Canonical Overview / Linda Stone-ferrier -- Making Art In The Age Of Art History, Or How To Become A Canonical Artist / Anna Brzyski -- Kinkade And The Canon: Art History's (ir)relevance / Monica Kjellman-chapin -- Canons Apart And Apartheid Canons: Interpellations Beyond The Colonial In South African Art / Julie Mcgee -- Coda: Canons And Contemporaneity / Terry Smith. Edited By Anna Brzyski. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [327]-354) And Index. Case studies that counter the idea of a transcendent art canon by demonstrating that the content of any and every canon is historically and culturally specific.