Antiquarianism, the History of Objects, and the History of Art before Winckelmann

Kaufmann, Thomas

doi:10.1353/jhi.2001.0026

Cited by 26 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…The creation of the Royal Society of Arts in 1754 marked the milestone for new ways of producing and consuming art, in response to an enlarging anonymous art market emerged for the increasing middle class of a commercial society. Art history, pioneered by Winckelmann (1717-1768), was formed by connecting historical texts and ancient Greek or Roman ruins to discussing the changing styles and national characteristics of artmaking (Kaufmann 2001). This knowledge became a backbone for categorising and classifying the colossal colonial collections from/of the Other, and the level of skill or technique, aesthetic sensibility and artistic feature became the criteria of ranking -a concept and mechanism often entailing a price tag.…”

Section: White-cube To Erase Colonial Traits (Decolonisation)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Museum coloniality: displaying Asian art in the whitened context

Wang

2020

International Journal of Cultural Policy

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The transformation of Musée Guimet and the transition of museums in the 'countries of origin' of its collections elucidates how white-cube crystallises Western cultural hegemony by erasing the colonial past of the objects and by representing the physical form of modernity. It contributes as well to nullifying the demand of repatriation, which seems to merely raise new power struggles rather than to recover indigenous beliefs (or identities). Through such a muséographie, the deities of the Other are 'elevated' from ethnographic specimen into art in the West while 'diminished' from sacred icons into art or historical artefacts in Asia. Museumification as such constitutes a whitening (Westernisation) heritage process that physically and epistemologically secularises non-Western faiths. Although the temple-simulated design is applied and limited Buddhist practice allowed in certain exhibition milieu or tourism destination, the phenomenon of museum coloniality is to be further studied should cultural diversity be indispensable for better heritage futures.

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Section: White-cube To Erase Colonial Traits (Decolonisation)mentioning

confidence: 99%