DOI Artikel:
Kultermann, Udo: Art History and the Twentieth Century: (the work of Meyer Schapiro)
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.52445#0207
As in his earlier methodical practice, also here it
is not the scheme or the rule, it is rather the individ-
ual work by which the method is determined. It is
the high respect for the achievement of the artist that
characterizes Schapiro’s art history and which at the
same time distinguishes him from many other Con-
temporary fellow art historians: “The plurality of
meaning in each of these two appearances of the head
would seem to exclude a consistent explanation based
on inherent qualities of the profile and the frontal or
full-face view. It is like the difficulty of finding in
colors a universal, culturally unconditioned ground
for their symbolic use, though we experience colors
as strongly charged with feeling.”28
In this light it is extremely important to look into
the impact Meyer Schapiro had on générations of
American art historians, as well as on a country that
was on the brink of entering a new phase of its own
awareness toward art in general and art historical re-
search in particular. Rarely before in the history of
the discipline of art history had artists and art histo-
rians alike fallen under the spell of a new insight by
a man who, as an art historian of a new kind, came
as close as possible to approaching completeness.
One of his pupils in the field of art history, Albert
Elsen, an outstanding scholar of a new génération,
said “that the experience of writing his dissertation
under Schapiro’s supervision changed him for life.”29
He continued: “YouTl never be the same after spend-
ing time with Meyer, I met him as an undergraduate
and was converted to art history by one of his cours-
es... Those of us who completed our work with him
found the experience gave us lifelong confidence...”30
Piri Halasz, another former student, recalls the
teaching experience of Meyer Schapiro: “He would
start each course by going back to the period before
the one under discussion. Sometimes he would have
so much to say that he never got to the period the
course was supposed to cover. Düring one term,
a course was listed in the catalogue as Romanesque
manuscripts. Schapiro began with the Vatican Vergil
6. George Segal: Meyer Schapiro. 1977. The Metropolitan Mu-
seum of Art New York, Gift of Paul Jenkins 1981 (1981.146).
and never arrived at Romanesque painting - but the
class was so mesmerized that the students never
missed it.”31
Meyer Schapiro died in 1996 in New York. His
spécifie importance was clearly defined by his fel-
low art historian John Pope-Hennessy: “77e possess-
es a computer bank of information and, more im-
portant, of visual images, and its essential uncomi-
tant, thepower of instantaneous recall... With Scha-
28 Ibidem, p. 14.
29 EPSTEIN 1963 (see in note 1), p. 87
30 Ibidem.
31 HALASZ, Piri: Homage to Meyer Schapiro. The ‘compleat
Art historian’. In: Art News, summer, 1973, p. 59.
197
is not the scheme or the rule, it is rather the individ-
ual work by which the method is determined. It is
the high respect for the achievement of the artist that
characterizes Schapiro’s art history and which at the
same time distinguishes him from many other Con-
temporary fellow art historians: “The plurality of
meaning in each of these two appearances of the head
would seem to exclude a consistent explanation based
on inherent qualities of the profile and the frontal or
full-face view. It is like the difficulty of finding in
colors a universal, culturally unconditioned ground
for their symbolic use, though we experience colors
as strongly charged with feeling.”28
In this light it is extremely important to look into
the impact Meyer Schapiro had on générations of
American art historians, as well as on a country that
was on the brink of entering a new phase of its own
awareness toward art in general and art historical re-
search in particular. Rarely before in the history of
the discipline of art history had artists and art histo-
rians alike fallen under the spell of a new insight by
a man who, as an art historian of a new kind, came
as close as possible to approaching completeness.
One of his pupils in the field of art history, Albert
Elsen, an outstanding scholar of a new génération,
said “that the experience of writing his dissertation
under Schapiro’s supervision changed him for life.”29
He continued: “YouTl never be the same after spend-
ing time with Meyer, I met him as an undergraduate
and was converted to art history by one of his cours-
es... Those of us who completed our work with him
found the experience gave us lifelong confidence...”30
Piri Halasz, another former student, recalls the
teaching experience of Meyer Schapiro: “He would
start each course by going back to the period before
the one under discussion. Sometimes he would have
so much to say that he never got to the period the
course was supposed to cover. Düring one term,
a course was listed in the catalogue as Romanesque
manuscripts. Schapiro began with the Vatican Vergil
6. George Segal: Meyer Schapiro. 1977. The Metropolitan Mu-
seum of Art New York, Gift of Paul Jenkins 1981 (1981.146).
and never arrived at Romanesque painting - but the
class was so mesmerized that the students never
missed it.”31
Meyer Schapiro died in 1996 in New York. His
spécifie importance was clearly defined by his fel-
low art historian John Pope-Hennessy: “77e possess-
es a computer bank of information and, more im-
portant, of visual images, and its essential uncomi-
tant, thepower of instantaneous recall... With Scha-
28 Ibidem, p. 14.
29 EPSTEIN 1963 (see in note 1), p. 87
30 Ibidem.
31 HALASZ, Piri: Homage to Meyer Schapiro. The ‘compleat
Art historian’. In: Art News, summer, 1973, p. 59.
197