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“[These essays] introduce a wide variety of complex and unsettled issues associated with the canon to the general reader at large. . . . Brzyski’s tenaciousness in revealing the mechanisms of canons is admirable. . . .” — Jennifer Ferng, Leonardo
“[These essays] introduce a wide variety of complex and unsettled issues associated with the canon to the general reader at large. . . . Brzyski’s tenaciousness in revealing the mechanisms of canons is admirable. . . .” —Jennifer Ferng, Leonardo
“Anna Brzyski’s anthology Partisan Canons fills a long-recognized need in the literature on the history of art. The essays in this volume approach the canon of works of art on which the discipline is built from a variety of perspectives: how did it come about, on what principles is it built, does it have universal validity? These thoughtful and probing texts promise to afford art historians and others insight into one of the most deeply naturalized values of this profession.” — Keith Moxey, author of, The Practice of Persuasion: Paradox and Power in Art History
“The subject of canons, a long-standing problem in literary studies, makes an impressive art historical debut in this authoritative collection of essays, which gathers together some of the most important critical voices in the contemporary study of the visual arts. Partisan Canons makes an important contribution to the discussion of values, power, and the social construction of artistic traditions.” — W. J. T. Mitchell, editor of, Critical Inquiry and author of What Do Pictures Want?
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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
Anna Brzyski is Assistant Professor of Art History at the University of Kentucky.
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