Shelley E.Garrigan, Collecting Mexico: Museums, Monuments, and the Creation of National Identity. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2012, 216pp. $22.50 (pbk), $67.50 (hbk).

Abstract

In this work of historical sociology and art history, Smith seeks to demonstrate how art played an important role in the development of national identity. The book is divided into six numbered chapters with an introduction and a conclusion. In the introduction, Smith gives an overview of his definitions of the nation and nationalism and outlines how he will categorise the chosen works of art. In short, there are three types that he looks at: didactic (heroic imagery); evocative (landscapes and atmosphere); and commemorative (glorifying the dead). These three types then combine with four dimensions of the nation: community, territory, history and destiny.Chapters 1 and 2 serve almost as a prologue to the main work. Smith discusses the notion of national art in antiquity, concluding that while some of the tropes were there, it was not national art, and proceeds to focus on the Netherlands during the 1500s and the early 1600s where he argues the linkage between art and nation first emerged. Artists, such as Rembrandt, drew on imagery, both biblical and Batavian, to craft a sense of the Dutch being a 'chosen peoples', who had existed through time. During this period, many of the artistic motifs that would become popular were first developed. It is an ambitious opening that lays out the structure of the work ahead. Smith is impressive and engaging as he skilfully conveys the sense and atmosphere of the paintings he describes and analyses.Chapters 3 and 4 focus on two types, didactic and evocative, and examine them closely. France is used as the focus for didactic art, with the works of Jacques-Louis David and Eugene Delacroix being the main artists used. Their works would often show images of ancient heroism, and the scenes of oath swearing were recurrent during the period around the French Revolution. These paintings were crucial in shifting the sense of allegiance away from the king and towards the nation, representing the citizens. Delacroix, in particular, is shown to have used imagery and symbols that help ground the notions of liberty, virtue and honour and make them allegorical to the characteristics of the people of the nation. Smith argues that this helped to ground abstract values, in memorable images, and makes them communicable to the people. Britain, with the works of Turner and John Constable, stands as an example of evocation, with Smith looking at the portrayals of the landscapes to craft the atmosphere that would represent a distinct Englishness and help define the homeland of the people. He argues, persuasively, that the beginnings of the nation, during this period, made artists aware of their own background and identity and gave them a desire to convey that sense of identity to others.Chapters 5 and 6 then focus on the two national dimensions of history and destiny, with the art type of commemoration getting an extended examination in the final chapter. Here, Smith makes that case that historical artists like Benjamin West, John Singleton Copley and Jacques-Louis David crafted scenes from history an...