Answer:
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Literature and the Arts >
Genius: Individualism in Art and Artists
I. TERMINOLOGY
The terms “individualism” and “genius” have gone
through many changes of meaning and cannot even
now be used in an unequivocal way. Individualism will
here be understood not only as “the individual pursuing
his own ends or following his own ideas” (Murray, A
New English Dictionary [1901], V), but also as the
self-conscious, reflective conduct of single persons or
groups of persons allied by common interests, ideals,
and purposes. Genius is an infinitely more vacillating
term, and its many meanings since antiquity have been
recorded in Murray's New English Dictionary. The
concern here is primarily with the meaning the term
acquired in the course of the eighteenth century as
denoting the creative powers and outstanding original-
ity of uncommonly endowed, exalted individuals.
While the modern literature on individualism in gen-
eral is scarce and unsatisfactory and on individualism
in art and artists practically nonexistent, that on genius
is vast, diversified, and illuminating. Written mainly
by literary critics, it discusses almost exclusively poetry
and poets. Since the fifteenth century artists have be-
lieved in a close alliance between the sister arts, the
word and the picture—the Horatian Ut pictura poesis
had widest currency for over 300 years—and thus a
concentration on artistic genius without taking into
account literary criticism would tend to distort the
historical evolution.
II. INDIVIDUALISM IN ART
Individualism in art and individualism of artists are
not necessarily closely related. The first problem, that
of individualism in art cannot be divorced from visual
evidence, while the second, that of the origin, history,
and vicissitudes of the individualist artist is above all
a sociological and psychological one. In the following
pages the latter problem will be more fully discussed
than the former. The entire history of art could, and
perhaps should, be written under the heading of
“Changing Aspects of Individualism in Art.” Since this
cannot be done within the compass of this article, only
three topics of particular relevance to the history of
ideas have here been singled out for brief considera-
tion: (1) the question of individual styles, (2) that of
rapid changes of style within the work of one artist, and
(3) that of the non finito, the unfinished work of art.
Individual Styles and Rapid Changes of Style. Ever
since Johann Joachim Winckelmann and more specifi-
cally since the late nineteenth century, under the influ-
ence of such scholars as Heinrich Wölfflin and Alois
Riegl, the history of art has been equated with the
history of styles, and this approach has still a great
many advocates in the third quarter of the twentieth
century. Starting from Greece and the Italian Renais-
sance, standards of judgment, terms of reference, and
a critical language have been developed, and step by
step the history of art of all cultures and periods has
been approached and investigated with similar stylistic
criteria.
ganyan po pa pa bainliest po
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Answers & Comments
Answer:
SITEMAP
Literature and the Arts >
Genius: Individualism in Art and Artists
I. TERMINOLOGY
The terms “individualism” and “genius” have gone
through many changes of meaning and cannot even
now be used in an unequivocal way. Individualism will
here be understood not only as “the individual pursuing
his own ends or following his own ideas” (Murray, A
New English Dictionary [1901], V), but also as the
self-conscious, reflective conduct of single persons or
groups of persons allied by common interests, ideals,
and purposes. Genius is an infinitely more vacillating
term, and its many meanings since antiquity have been
recorded in Murray's New English Dictionary. The
concern here is primarily with the meaning the term
acquired in the course of the eighteenth century as
denoting the creative powers and outstanding original-
ity of uncommonly endowed, exalted individuals.
While the modern literature on individualism in gen-
eral is scarce and unsatisfactory and on individualism
in art and artists practically nonexistent, that on genius
is vast, diversified, and illuminating. Written mainly
by literary critics, it discusses almost exclusively poetry
and poets. Since the fifteenth century artists have be-
lieved in a close alliance between the sister arts, the
word and the picture—the Horatian Ut pictura poesis
had widest currency for over 300 years—and thus a
concentration on artistic genius without taking into
account literary criticism would tend to distort the
historical evolution.
II. INDIVIDUALISM IN ART
Individualism in art and individualism of artists are
not necessarily closely related. The first problem, that
of individualism in art cannot be divorced from visual
evidence, while the second, that of the origin, history,
and vicissitudes of the individualist artist is above all
a sociological and psychological one. In the following
pages the latter problem will be more fully discussed
than the former. The entire history of art could, and
perhaps should, be written under the heading of
“Changing Aspects of Individualism in Art.” Since this
cannot be done within the compass of this article, only
three topics of particular relevance to the history of
ideas have here been singled out for brief considera-
tion: (1) the question of individual styles, (2) that of
rapid changes of style within the work of one artist, and
(3) that of the non finito, the unfinished work of art.
Individual Styles and Rapid Changes of Style. Ever
since Johann Joachim Winckelmann and more specifi-
cally since the late nineteenth century, under the influ-
ence of such scholars as Heinrich Wölfflin and Alois
Riegl, the history of art has been equated with the
history of styles, and this approach has still a great
many advocates in the third quarter of the twentieth
century. Starting from Greece and the Italian Renais-
sance, standards of judgment, terms of reference, and
a critical language have been developed, and step by
step the history of art of all cultures and periods has
been approached and investigated with similar stylistic
criteria.
ganyan po pa pa bainliest po