The rise and fall of abstraction in eighteenth-century art theory

Author

Morgan, David

Document type

Article (journal)

Language

English

Source

Eighteenth-century studies. 1994, Num. 3, Vol. 27, 449-478

ISSN

0013-2586

Abstract (en)

Morgan traces the development of theories of abstraction from the first half of the 18th c. to their decline by the end of the century. He describes this trajectory primarily in German art theory and focuses particularly on the conceptual foundation of abstraction and its subsequent critique. The words "abstract" and "abstraction" entered critical discourse on the visual arts during the 18th c. As the tenure of mimesis in art theory waned, the new terminology was applied to the problem of explaining how art could avoid "servile" imitation yet fulfill the mimetic task assigned to it since the Renaissance. Whether it was the academic aim of elevating painting to the status of a liberal art, the neoclassical concern to paint like the ancients, or the novel aim of defending the role of the fantastic in art, abstraction allowed many writers to maintain the view that art was a form of imitation by redefining "invention" and the relation of art to nature.

Subject (en)

• General history of art -- 1400-1800
• Art theory
• 1700-1800
• Abstraction

Subject (fr)

• Histoire générale de l'art -- 1400-1800
• Théorie de l'art
• 1700-1800
• Abstraction

Origin

DatabaseBHA (Inist-CNRS/GRI)

Identifier19951001-00321887

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