Art history: contemporary perspectives on method

Аннотация

The historiography of art history has been a potent theme in the discourses o f the discipune of the last thirty years. And the approaches and methods in the study o f the visual are probably more varied, and more vigorously debated, than in any other area of historical enquiry. This is so much so that the interest in the practice and history of the history o f art history has at times appeared to be equal to object-based study and it is arguable that this now forms part o f the archive o f the disciphne. There is o f course no doubt that since the inception o f art history as a field of academic study, works o f art have been ‘read’ in a variety o f ways. These different modes o f description and interpretation inscribe meaning in to art and it is here that art and its history are perhaps most intricately linked.