Formalism (art history)

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The term formalism describes an art historical method for interpreting a work of art. The value of the work lies in the autonomy of the form. The formalistic view of art emphasizes qualities such as B. Composition, Color, Lines and Texture. Content-related aspects and references such as the subject, the history of the work, the historical context and the biography of the artist are secondary or not dealt with. The formalists, as the most important representatives Heinrich Wölfflin and Alois Riegl , strived for a comparative style analysis that was free of personal evaluation and was able to solve the hermeneutical problem of art history. The formalistic ideas of the 19th century served modern painting as an impulse to develop more freely and to concentrate on the aesthetic effect of form and structure. The concept of formalism can thus also be extended to the fine arts , e.g. B. on abstraction .

Beginnings of formalism

The origins of the formalism can be found in ancient times , e.g. B. in the thought that the universe is ruled by numerical relationships. In ancient times, the concept of form was understood as the quality of things that are inherent in everything. Plato, for example, explains in his theory of ideas the perception of the ' eidos ' (shape or form) of a thing as a mere image of what actually exists. Some art historians see the form of art as a view of reality. Plato's pupil Aristotle understood art as a process of design analogous to the processes of nature.

These considerations were further developed in the Renaissance . The humanistic philosopher Benedetto Varchi defined in a lecture ( Due lezzione , Florence, 1550) on a sonnet of Michelangelo the task of the sculptor as "draftsman" of the real from the potential being.

In the age of the Enlightenment the assumption arose that the experience of a work of art could neither be purely sensual nor purely rational, and that an aesthetic experience had to be clearly distinguished from other types of experience. E.g. When looking at a painting depicting the Adoration of the Magi , a well-known biblical motif, one is inclined to interpret the religious content and, according to early formalistic ideas, neglect the aesthetic experience of the painting.

The philosopher Immanuel Kant recognized the importance of formalism in his Critique of Judgment (1790). So "in all fine art the essential consists in the form" . He further admitted that beauty as a symbol of good and the aesthetic experience can produce a moral resonance.

Friedrich Schiller, driving the ideas of Kant's Enlightenment in the direction of romanticism , emphasized the spiritual therapeutic character of the aesthetic experience of form and its ability to bring the contradicting aspects of human nature into harmony. He even saw aesthetics as an instrument of social and political reform.

Before formalism was coined as an art-historical approach, it was rather, as its history shows, a subject of philosophy and especially of aesthetics. This is due to the fact that art history itself was only able to maintain its independence among the academic disciplines in the 19th century.

John Ruskin , et al. a. Art historian, led the descriptive analysis of form to its first climax with The Stones Of Venice (London 1851). Using Venetian capitals , Ruskin derived abstract basic forms, convex and concave lines. From this he deduced the social conditions of the respective time.

In 1890, the French painter Maurice Denis wrote in his article Définition du Néo-Traditionnisme that a painting was essentially a surface covered with colors in a certain order. Denis saw the painting, sculpture or drawing itself as significant, not the subject of the artistic work. The emphasis on the form of a work led Bloomsbury art critic Clive Bell , in his 1914 book Art , to distinguish between the real and the 'significant' form. The techniques of an artistic medium captured the essence of the work (the 'significant' form) and not just the mere external appearance.

Origin as an art historical method (19th century)

Heinrich Wölfflin

Wölfflin (1864–1945) sought to give art history a solid basis, a comparative analysis of form and style history. This should be free from personal judgment.

For Wölfflin, the question of what makes it possible to recognize a style lay in the visual appearance of a work of art (form) and human perception. According to the psychology of perception , which was established in Wölfflin's time, the organs' own sensory performance determines optical knowledge. Wölfflin transferred the history of seeing to the development of form and thus style. As the perception of a newborn to an adult develops in stages, according to Wölfflin the form would also develop.

Wölfflin initially distinguished between different styles in order to define his field of activity:

  • Individual style (subjective vision and temperament-related painting style of an individual artist)
  • Group style (common design language of a school, a country, cultural area)
  • Zeit-style (superordinate, 'pure' design language)

The latter was important for Wölfflin, as it was the only way to show the larger lines of development. In the change of form from one 'time style' to the next, the change in ideals of life or worldview can be seen . Therefore, in the sense of Wölfflin, it is necessary to apply his methodology comparatively to two works of art, because only in this way would the serious difference between two styles become clear.

Its five pairs of terms serve as a 'tool of the trade'. a. Linear and picturesque (for more see Heinrich Wölfflin ), which he uses as examples for works of the Renaissance and Baroque. As in visual history, the change takes place from the simple, planar and object-outlined to the spatial and complex, united in the terms assigned to simplicity (linear) or complexity (painterly). In art this development is cyclical, a simple language of form (e.g. Renaissance ) is followed by a complex wealth of forms ( Baroque ) and then evokes the desire to return to simplicity ( Classicism ).

Alois Riegl

Alois Riegl (1858–1905), representative of the Viennese School of Art History , is the second great formalist of the 19th century. His greatest merits, however, are in his preoccupation with the preservation of monuments, the so-called 'decay periods', the applied arts and its comparative empirical art history seen that culminated in new discoveries in the history of style (see Alois Riegl ).

At the center of his theory is the elusive concept of artistic will . Hans Sedlmayr, who gave the introduction to Alois Riegl. Wrote collected essays , defines him as a real force that not only explains the style changes, but is their origin.

His theory is supported by similar formalistic assumptions and goals as the Wölfflins:

  • Development of the form out of itself (independence from artist genius)
  • Linking the development of forms (style history) with the history of perception
  • The ambition to establish art history as an academic discipline
  • Rejection of a metaphysics z. B. after Hegel

It also subdivides into pairs of terms or categories such as Wölfflin. They always also describe the mental attitude (preference) of the bearers of the artistic will, as well as its basic forms and goals. A development of styles, perception and forms takes place from the simple to the complex from an “inner natural necessity” (or “inner fate”). Here are just a few examples of his terms:

  • optical (lack of spatial perception) - haptic ('tangible' spatial, physical)
  • near-sighted - far-sighted
  • objective - subjective
  • organic - crystalline, etc.

In contrast to Wölfflin, Riegl finds an explanation for works that stand out from his style history. Styles do not only develop side by side, but also permeate each other and this leads to "random moments" ( anachronism and anticipation ). His “body of ideas” is contained in all of his works, but it was only summarized in a theory posthumously in Historical Grammar of the Fine Arts (Böhlau 1966).

Modern formalism

Clement Greenberg

Clement Greenberg (1909–1994), one of the most influential American art critics of the 20th century, always strived for an assessment of art that should only be based on what is immediately perceptible. He thus shares the basic formalistic assumption. He mainly focused on the materials and techniques used in creating a work of art.

His interest in form gave rise to his particular appreciation of modernist painting , which he justified in the 1960 essay of the same name. In the process of self-criticism , the characteristic of modernist painting, painting confronts the problems that arise from its own medium and thus asserts its independence and self-determination among the arts. The peculiarity of the medium of painting lies in the inevitable two-dimensionality. Above all, abstract painting, according to Greenberg, does not indulge in spatial illusions and only shows reality, the distribution of colors on the picture surface ("Art for Art").

Disappointed by the artistic consequences of his program, the radical removal of everything unnecessary, he turned away from self-criticism and demanded that art be judged according to its quality. This quality, in turn, can only be assessed on the basis of the visual, i.e. the formal properties of a work of art.

Criticism of formalism

One of the similarities between Riegl and Wölfflin, the thesis of the development of perception and form, was clearly refuted. In Riegl's case, this assumption weighed heavily on his theory through rejection and misunderstandings, although it was only a small part of his teaching. This is one reason why they have been partially forgotten and only a few of his terms still exist in art history today. But for the art history of the 19th / 20th In the 17th century, his and Wölfflin's terms meant the first understanding or explanation of the essential connections, instead of just stating the styles. Further criticism was made of the lack of social context, which in both cases is expressed indirectly in the representation of the 'world view' through the form. An art-historical objection relates to the inaccuracy and incompleteness of the terms, which need to be expanded or redefined.

Wölfflin's method is also subject to a circular argument , as the terms are derived from empirical studies of the works of the Renaissance and Baroque . In contrast to Riegl, Wölfflin also left less room for art that did not fit into his scheme. The question of whether Wölfflin's terms actually hit the “essentials” of the style developments remains to be seen, because they continue to serve as points of reference for art historians such as Wilhelm Worringer , Hans Sedlmayr and Otto Pächt .

Ultimately, in the further course of art history from around 1918 there was no longer any special interest in formalism or other great methods, e.g. B. the iconography of Erwin Panofsky . The assumption was strengthened that the representation of the entire history of style by a diachronic method is impossible and leads to a more or less false simplification. The goal of showing "world views" in art also shifted to other disciplines:

"To prove this connection between the visual arts and worldview in detail would not be the task of the art historian, but that - and indeed the actual future task - of the comparative cultural historian."

Further approaches followed, which had to be content with synchronous viewing and detailed studies. The term art-historical formalism therefore essentially only applies to the models by Wölfflin and Riegl, but after their end it is also used as a term for a formalistic basic attitude, as with Greenberg.

Greenberg's demand to judge works strictly according to their form would ultimately lead to the exclusion of spirituality, intellectual content and art. Viewing art through a “pure eye,” as Greenberg puts it, is impossible. His direction of formalism is therefore seen by many art historians as dogmatic and, like Wölfflin's and Riegl's methods, did not meet with existing approval.

Nevertheless, their thoughts provoke and interest up to the present day. B. in the publication by Caroline A. Jones, Eyesight Alone. Clement Greenberg's Modernism and the Bureaucratization of the Senses becomes clear.

Remarks

  1. ↑ cit. n. http://www.beyars.com/kunstlexikon/lexikon_3048.html
  2. ↑ for the following illustration cf. in particular Robert Williams: Formalism. Article from the online edition of the "Dictionary of Art" (Oxford University Press Ed. 1996), http://www.groveart.com/ and en: Formalism (art)
  3. ↑ for the following illustration cf. Heinrich Wölfflin: Basic concepts of art history. The problem of style development in modern art . 19th edition, Schwabe 2004. As well as Michael Hatt, Charlotte Klonk: Art history: A critical introduction to its methods . Manchester University Press 2006.
  4. ↑ cf. "One anchors with it [meaning the artistic will] the change of the style principles in fundamental changes of the mental structure of a group of people in changes of the 'ideals', in the reevaluation of the 'values' and thus the possible goals of will in all areas." Artur Rosenauer (Ed .): Alois Riegl. Collected essays , Vienna University Press 1996, p. XX.
  5. ↑ on the following illustration cf. Artur Rosenauer (Ed.): Alois Riegl. Collected Essays , pp. XIV-XXVIII.
  6. ↑ for the following illustration cf. Karlheinz Lüdeking: Clement Greenberg. The essence of modernity. Selected essays and reviews . 2nd ed., Philo & Philo Fine Arts, 1997, pp. 9-27.
  7. ↑ For a critical presentation cf. Artur Rosenauer (Ed.): Alois Riegl - Collected essays. Pp. XXI-XXIV. Quote: Ibid. S. XXV.
  8. ^ Caroline A. Jones: Eyesight Alone. Clement Greenberg's Modernism and the Bureaucratization of the Senses. University Of Chicago Press, 2006, ISBN 978-0-226-40951-1 .

literature

For the introduction:

  • Michael Hatt, Charlotte Klonk: Art history: A critical introduction to its methods . Manchester University Press 2006, ISBN 978-0-7190-6959-8 .
  • Vernon Hyde Minor: Art History's History . 2nd edition, Prentice-Hall 2000, ISBN 978-0-13-085133-8 .
  • Hans Belting, Heinrich Dilly, Wolfgang Kemp (Hrsg.): Art history. An introduction. 6th edition, Reimer Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-496-01261-7 .

To the formalists:

  • Heinrich Wölfflin: Basic concepts of art history. The problem of style development in modern art . 19th edition, Schwabe 2004, ISBN 978-3-7965-0288-0 .
  • Artur Rosenauer (Ed.): Alois Riegl. Collected articles , Vienna University Press 1996
  • Karlheinz Lüdeking : Clement Greenberg. The essence of modernity. Selected essays and reviews . 2nd ed., Philo & Philo Fine Arts, 1997, ISBN 978-3-364-00355-9 .