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Erwin Panofsky and Karl Mannheim: A Dialogue on InterpretationAuthor(s): Joan HartSource: Critical Inquiry, Vol. 19, No. 3 (Spring, 1993), pp. 534-566Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1343963 .

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Erwin

Panofsky

and

Karl Mannheim:

A

Dialogue

on

Interpretation

Joan

Hart

Erwin

Panofsky

is the

most influential

art

historian

of

the twentieth

century.

The basis

of

his fame is

the

theory

of

iconology

that

generated

a

reorientation in art history toward the search for meaning instead of the

categorization

of

characteristics

of

style.

Karl

Mannheim

was

instrumental

in

formulating

the new

subdiscipline

of

the

sociology

of

knowledge

that

found

its

most controversial

exposition

in

his

book

Ideology

and

Utopia

(1929).

The book has been celebrated and vilified but is

undeniably

a

crucial text

in

sociology. Panofsky

and Mannheim

may

never have

met,

but,

in

the

1920s,

at

a

crucial

period

in

the

development

of

their theories

for

interpreting

their

respective subjects,

they

read each

other's

work

and

made

significant

contributions

to

each

other's

increasingly

similar

theo-

I am

grateful

to Gerda

Panofsky

for her

generosity

in

granting

me

access to

the

Panofsky

Papers

in

the Archives of

American

Art,

Smithsonian

Institution,

where

I

exam-

ined

the

correspondence.

I

thank Richard

Murray,

then

director of

the

archives,

and

his

assistants

for

their

gracious help.

I

thank

Frau

Klaiber

at

Freiburg

Universitaits-Archiv

for

her

courtesy.

At

Hamburg University's

Art

Historical

Seminar,

Martin

Warnke,

Karen

Michels,

and

Ulrike

Wendland

gave

me unusual

access to their materials

concerning

all

aspects

of the

history

of

the

seminar.

My scholarly

debts

are

many.

I

am

grateful

for

advice

and

information

from Mirella Levi

D'Ancona,

Peter

Boerner,

Hugo

Buchthal,

Geoffrey

Giles,

E.

H.

Gombrich,

Charles

Haxthausen,

William

Heckscher,

Martin

Jay,

Robert

Nelson,

David

Pace,

Wolfgang Panofsky,

Linda

Seidel,

Joel

Snyder,

Susan

Stirling,

and students in the University of Chicago Workshop on the History and Theory of Art

History.

All

translations

from

German

are

mine unless otherwise

noted.

Critical

Inquiry

19

(Spring

1993)

?

1993

by

The

University

of

Chicago.

0093-1896/93/1903-0004$01.00.

All

rights

reserved.

534








Critical

Inquiry

Spring

1993

535

ries

of

interpretation.

In

Germany

before the Third

Reich,

it

was not

unusual

for art

historians

and

social scientists

to

read each other's

essays

and books when the theories and practices of the cultural studies, par-

ticularly

philology,

were valued over

those

of

the natural

sciences.'

Philological

practice

was the

primary

but

not the

only

connection between

Panofsky

and Mannheim. Their

lives and

work

were

shaped by

the

partic-

ular

ecology

of

the German

university system

and, later,

by

the

environ-

ment of the

academies

to which

they escaped

during

the Third

Reich.

Even more decisive for their

careers were

the

cataclysmic

events

from

which

they sought refuge.

There were

connections and

divergences

between

the theories

of

interpretation Panofsky and Mannheim developed. Art historians remem-

ber

the anecdote with which

Panofsky

introduced his

theory

of

iconology

for

the

first time

in

1939:

a

man

greets

Panofsky

in

the street

by removing

his

hat.2

From this

brief

encounter,

Panofsky divulged

the whole of

his

interpretive

strategy

that became the

art historian's

most

important

tool

for

recovering

meaning

from the

art

of

the

past.

In

dissecting

this

decep-

tively simple

event,

Panofsky

revealed

the

tripartite,

hierarchical

but

cir-

cular

structure

of

iconological interpretation.

First,

we extract

the

basic

factual

and

formal

meaning

of

the two

gentlemen

and

the action

of

hat

removing, then we discern the expressional meaning that gives nuance to

the action-the

friendliness,

hostility,

or

neutrality

of

the hat remover-

and,

finally,

we delve

more

deeply

into

the

philosophical

meaning

of

the

event

by

examining

the

context of

the

greeting

in

terms

of

the hat

remover's

class,

nationality,

intellectual

traditions,

and

so

on. The

anec-

dote is a useful and

successful

heuristic device

because it

is

disarmingly

1.

See

Jeffrey

Herf,

Reactionary

Modernism:

Technology,

Culture,

and

Politics in

Weimar

and the Third Reich

(Cambridge,

1984).

In

his

chapter

Engineers

as

Ideologues

(pp.

152-

88), Herf demonstrates how this peculiarly German phenomenon of the deprecation of the

physical

sciences and the elevation of the

humanities was

prevalent

even

among

the

promi-

nent

engineers. They

thought

technology

should

be

in

the service of

the

Kulturnation,

the

cultural

sphere,

not the

capitalist

state.

The

classic discussion of

the

German

academic

system

in

the nineteenth

and

early

twentieth centuries

is

Fritz

Ringer,

The

Decline

of

the German

Mandarins: The

German Aca-

demic

Community,

1890-1933

(Cambridge,

Mass.,

1969).

In

chapter

1,

The

Social and

Institutional

Background,

Ringer

describes

the entrenchment

of the

classical

education

in

the

German

system

and its

entanglement

with

political

conservatism

and the social

struc-

ture. See

also

E. M.

Butler,

The

Tyranny

of

Greece

over

Germany

Cambridge,

Mass.,

1935).

2.

See

Erwin

Panofsky,

Studies

in

Iconology:

Humanistic

Themes n

the

Art

of

the

Renais-

sance (1939; New York, 1967), p. 3.

Joan

Hart

has a

Ph. D.

from

the

University

of

California,

Berkeley,

n

the

history

of

art. She is

currentlyworking

on

a

Ph. D. in

history

at

Indi-

ana

University

and

on

a book on

Erwin

Panofsky.

Her

book,

Heinrich

Wilfflin:

Antinomies

f

Experience

n

Art,

is

forthcoming.








536

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

simple

and

becomes

increasingly complex

as

Panofsky

traces

the

history

of

the

gesture

and

considers the

personality

of the

greeter.

In 1923, sixteen years earlier, Karl Mannheim created a similar inci-

dent

to

explicate

his

three-tiered method

of

interpretation:

I

am

walking

down

the street with a

friend;

a

beggar

stands at

a

corner;

my

friend

gives

him

an alms. 3

Mannheim

created the distinctions between

factual,

expressional,

and

philosophical

(or

personal) meanings

that

Panofsky

bor-

rowed.

While

Panofsky's

theory

of

iconology,

as

derived

from

this anec-

dote,

became the dominant

paradigm

of

postwar

American

art

history,

Mannheim's

theory

has

languished

in

relative

obscurity.4

The differences between the two anecdotes reveal two

scholars

possessed of an identical interpretive strategy with divergent goals.

Mannheim's

example

survived the test

of

time better than

Panofsky's:

we

often see

beggars today,

but

we

rarely

see

men

tipping

their hats. The

sub-

jects

of the stories and the

interpretations

of

them illuminate the different

purposes

and obsessions of the

two

scholars.

Mannheim's

story

is about

injustice.

His

interpretation emphasized

the differences

in

social class

and

power

between the

beggar,

himself as

observer,

and

his

friend,

and

turned,

at

the third

level

of

interpretation,

on

the motivations and

person-

ality

of

his friend who

gave

alms. His friend's

motive

was

impure

and

hyp-

ocritical. His essential character was immoral, which he communicated in

his

body language

when

he

gave charity. Panofsky's example

involved men

of

a

higher

social status

with

no

grievance

or difference

between them.

Mannheim's

interpretation

focussed

on

social

differences

and

personality,

while

Panofsky's

revolved

around the

historical

meaning

of a

gesture

that

was

dependent

on culture and

period-the

hat

raising.

It was aresidue

of

mediaeval

chivalry:

armed men used

to remove their helmets to make

clear

their

peaceful

intentions and their

confidence

in

the

peaceful

inten-

tions

of

others.

Panofsky

stressed the

change

in

the

meaning

of

the

ges-

ture

over time and the fact that it was

meaningful only

in

a

particular

cultural

setting

with distinctive traditions that would be unfamiliar

to

an

Australian

bushman and an ancient Greek.5 Determination of the rela-

tive

meaning

of

gestures

and

objects,

and

changes

in

meaning

over

time,

resulting

from

cultural

developments,

were

the aims of

Panofsky's

inter-

pretive

art

history.

Mannheim's

theory

of

interpretation

arose

partly

from

3.

Karl

Mannheim,

On the

Interpretation

of

Weltanschauung,

From

Karl

Mannheim,

trans.

Paul

Kecskemeti,

ed.

Kurt

H.

Wolff

(New

York,

1971),

p.

20;

hereafter abbrevi-

ated

IW.

The German

original

is

Beitr~ige

zur

Theorie der

Weltanschauungs-

Interpretation,

Jahrbuch fir

Kunstgeschichte

1

(1921-22):

236-74;

actual

publication

in

1923.

4. See A. P.

Simonds,

Karl

Mannheim's

Sociology

of

Knowledge

Oxford, 1978).

Simonds

focussed on

the

German

period

of Mannheim's career and

the

specific

qualities

of his

early

theory

of

interpretation.

In

general,

however,

other

recent scholars

writing

on Mannheim

have

ignored

this

aspect

of his work.

5.

Panofsky,

Studies

in

Iconology,

p.

4.








Critical

Inquiry

Spring

1993 537

his

interest

in

theories

of

art,

but

his

objective

was to

create

a

sociology

of

meaning

or

knowledge.

His

anecdote revealed

his

concern that

world-

views (discerned through personalities and social situations) served as a

summary

of

social

knowledge

and

his

awareness

of

the

practical

social

value

of

interpreting

human

interrelationships.

He focussed

on

the

human and

social

rather than the aesthetic treatment of

weltanschauung.

As

we shall

see,

Panofsky's

theory

of

interpretation

arose from a

rather

rarefied consideration of

Alois

Riegl's theory

of

art,

and his desire to

pur-

ify

it,

remove its

psychological aspects,

and

eliminate the

genetic fallacy

implicit

in

historical

interpretations

that are based on the

scientific

method. Mannheim's and

Panofsky's

theories

of

interpretation

were

very

similar, but their objectives were very different.

My goal

in

this

paper

is

twofold.

I

want

to

explore

the

interrela-

tionship

of

Panofsky's

and Mannheim's

theories

of

interpretation

prior

to

their

migration

from

Germany

in

1933. In

seeking

a

synoptic

view

of

the

context

in

which

these theories

evolved,

I

consider the

parallels

in

their

lives

that

enrich our

understanding

of

their

work.

My

second

objective

is

to consider the fate

of

their

early

theories

in

their new

environments

after

1933.

Background

In

the

1920s,

Panofsky

and

Mannheim were

unusually productive,

publishing

some of

their best

substantive and

theoretical work.

During

that decade

they

were both

interested

in

similar

approaches

to

the

study

of

cultural artifacts and

the

exchange began

that would

create

a

major

transformation

in

Panofsky's

approach,

and

probably

in

Mannheim's

also. A number of similarities in their lives united them. Both men were

non-Marxist,

Jewish,

bourgeois

intellectuals.

Panofsky

was born

in

1892

to

a

wealthy

German

family

of

bankers and

merchants.6

Mannheim was

6. This

according

to

the

Panofsky family

tree

provided

by Wolfgang

Panofsky

and

compiled

by

Adele Irene

Panofsky.

In a

letter

to

Walter

Schuchardt

(18

Apr.

1966),

Panofsky

remembers in

passing,

I

myself

come

from

a

family

which was

well

established

in

Hannover

for more than one hundred

years

when I was

born. So

I

remember

an enormous

number of

people

in

all

ways

of

life,

from the

Almighty

'Stadtdirektor' Tramm who was

a

personal

friend of

my

parents

and

my

uncle

(whose

bank,

Carl

Solling

and

Co.,

you

may

conceivably

remember)

to the

proprietor

of the

'uniibertreffliche'

Hotel Kasten in whose

beautiful

summer

place

in

Harzburg

I

spent

many

a summer when I

was a

boy. Panofsky's

mother's

name was

Solling.

The

Panofsky

family

bank was

in

Berlin. Both banks

probably

failed

in

the

post-World

War

I

period. Panofsky

listed his

father,

Arnold

Panofsky,

as

a

Rentner,

a

person

of

private

means,

in

the Matrikelbuchfor summer

semester 1914

at

Freiburg University (Freiburg

University

Archive).

He listed

his

address

as

Landhausst-

rasse

6

(in

the Wilmersdorf

section

of

Berlin),

which is one

street

over from

the

Bundesallee where he attended

the

Joachimsthal Gymnasium.








538

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

born

in

1893 to

a

middle-class

Hungarian family.

Approximately

the

same

age, they

even attended some

of

the same

universities,

and

although I have found no evidence of any personal acquaintance

between

them,

there

may

have been.

Panofsky

received his Promotion

from

Freiburg University

in

1914

but

also attended Berlin

University

for five semesters and returned to Berlin

for

a

postdoctoral fellowship

after

1914.7

Mannheim was a

student

at

the

University

of

Budapest

from

1912

to 1918 but took courses

with

Georg

Simmel at Berlin

University,

and he attended

the universities

of

Heidelberg,

Freiburg,

and Paris from

1912

to 1914. Both attended courses

at

Freiburg

with the

philosopher

Heinrich Rickert.8

Mannheim spent the war years and beyond in Budapest, from 1915

to 1920.

Despite

the

war,

this was a

productive

time for

him,

especially

since he was

a

member

of

the

Sunday

Circle

of

young

intellectuals

in

Budapest,

a

pantheon

of

the

Hungarian intelligentsia.9

Many

of

them

would

scatter after World War

I or

after

the

establishment

of the

counterrevolutionary Horthy regime

in

1920,

and

again

after

1933.

Georg

Lukacs

was the most

promising philosopher

among

them,

although

Mannheim,

who

was five

years younger

than

Lukacs,

was

thought

to

be

close to

him in

intellectual

charisma. Art historians

Arnold

Hauser, Frederick Antal,

Lajos

Fiilep,

and Charles de

Tolnay

were mem-

bers

of

the

circle,

as

were

composers

Bela

BartOk

and Zoltan

Kodaly,

and

the

poet

Bela

Balazs.

With the

exception

of

the

younger

Mannheim,

most

of the

Sunday

Circle members

were at

least

thirty years

old,

well

educated,

and almost

exclusively

from the assimilated

Jewish

middle

7. These

studies,

along

with

Panofsky's

dissertation,

are

described

in

the

Freiburg

Uni-

versity

Dissertation

Catalog.

8.

See

Simonds,

Karl Mannheim's

Sociology

of

Knowledge,p.

4.

Panofsky

attended classes

at

Freiburg University only during

his first and last semesters,

according

to the

Freiburg

University

Library Catalog

filed

with

his

dissertation.

Panofsky's

Promotion

certificate

for

summer semester

1914,

dated

22

May

1914,

lists

two

of

Rickert's courses that

he

attended

in

this

last

semester:

System

der

Philosophie

and

Einfiihrung

in

die

Erkenntnistheorie

und

Metaphysik

(Universitfits-Archiv

Freiburg,

Exmatrikel

Philosophische

Fakultait,

1914).

Panofsky

also

mentions

in

a

letter

to Wilhelm

VSge

(12

Dec.

1947),

his mentor at

Freiburg,

that

he attended

Rickert's

courses.

European

students

readily

move from one

university

to another

to

study

with other

professors,

to

seek

out

interesting

courses

not

available at their

own

universities,

or

for

any

other

reason. There

are

many

other

possible

direct

means

by

which

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

might

have met.

Arnold

Hauser,

the

Hungarian

art

historian,

was

a

good

friend

of Mannheim and

may

have known

Panofsky. Panofsky

and Charles de

Tolnay,

also a Hun-

garian

art

historian,

were

good

friends at

Hamburg University

in

the

early

1930s.

Panofsky

was instrumental

in

helping Tolnay emigrate

to the United

States,

yet

they

had

a

falling

out

in the

1940s.

Tolnay

knew Mannheim. The German academic

community

was

rather

small

and the two

men could

easily

have met.

9.

See

Mary

Gluck,

Georg

Lukdcs

and His

Generation,

1900-1918

(Cambridge,

Mass.,

1985),

hereafter abbreviated

GLG,

and Lee

Congdon,

The

Young

Lukacs

(Chapel

Hill,

N.C.,

1983).








Critical

Inquiry Spring

1993 539

class

(see

GLG,

p.

20).

The

1920s

are often described

as the

period

of the

Lost

Generation,

of

increased

pessimism,

disenchantment,

and

aliena-

tion in the wake of the war; for these intellectuals, however, the war and

its

immediate aftermath

presented

the

opportunity

for

a

major

cultural

and

philosophical

reorientation.

This

change

is also

evident

in

the work

of the

members

of

the

newly

constituted

Warburg

Cultural Sciences

Library

in

Hamburg during

the

1920s.'0

Hamburg University

was founded

in

1919,

directly

after

the

war,

and

Aby

Warburg's private

library

and

research center was

closely

affiliated

with the

university

from

the

beginning. By

1926,

the

library

was housed

in

an

independent

building

next to

Aby Warburg's

home

(where

the books were

previously

located),

presided

over

by

Fritz Saxl.

Panofsky began

teaching

at the

university

in

1920,

as a

lecturer and the

only

art historian

on

the

faculty.

The

philosopher

Ernst

Cassirer,

the

phi-

losopher

and art historian

Edgar

Wind,

and

many

historians

and art his-

torians

worked

at the

library.

The

collaborations

of

Panofsky

with Saxl

and

Cassirer

were

very

successful.

Panofsky

produced

a

number

of

purely

theoretical

papers

and

a

large

group

of

iconological

essays

and

books.

The

very

constitution of

Warburg's library promoted

an

inter-

disciplinary harmony among

the

scholars

who

used

it.

The

library,

now

in

London,

still has

the

old

organization,

with books

united

loosely by

subject

matter,

not

narrowly by

author

or

nation or

period.

Scholars

were invited

to

cross

disciplinary

boundaries

by

the mere

juxtaposition

of the books.

What united the

Hungarians

of

the

Sunday

Circle and the

Germans

of

the

Warburg library

was

a

mania

for

culture-not

society,

not

politics,

not

science,

but

Culture.'2

According

to

Mannheim,

culture subsumed all

manifestations

of

the human

spirit,

including

art,

religion,

science,

and

10.

In

German it

was

the

Kulturwissenschaftliche

Bibliothek

Warburg

KBW).

I

note

that

the

library

and

Warburg's

house survived

the

war,

but the initials KBW on

the

library

facade

were

removed.

See Gertrud

Bing,

Fritz

Saxl

(1890-1948),

in

Fritz

Saxl,

1890-

1948:

A

Volume

of

Memorial

Essays from

His

Friends in

England,

ed.

Donald

J.

Gordon

(Edinburgh,

1957),

pp.

1-46,

and

E.

H.

Gombrich,

Aby

Warburg:

An Intellectual

Biography,

2d ed.

(Chicago,

1986).

11. In

a

letter

to

me

dated 9

March

1992,

William Heckscher noted

that

Warburg

coined the

idea

of

Das Gesetz des

guten

Nachbarn

[the

law of the

good neighbor].

The

book

you sought

was

invariably missing

or

out

on

loan.

Warburg

wanted users to look

at the books flanking the empty space: They were bound to be the 'good neighbors' which

were

likely

to be

more

important

to

your

research than the book

you

were

originally

look-

ing

for.

12.

See Norbert

Elias,

The

History

of

Manners,

vol.

1

of The

Civilizing

Process,

trans.

Edmund

Jephcott

(New

York,

1978).

Elias

describes

the evolution of this

old German fixa-

tion

on

Kultur,

originally opposed

to French ideas of

civilization.

What

began

as

concepts

of

national

opposition

between France and

Germany

became

concepts

for

internal class

divi-

sions

between

the

merely

civilized

aristocracy

and the

cultured,

educated middle class

within

Germany.








540

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

the state.

In

1918,

Mannheim

described the transformation

among

his

group

in a

lecture called

Soul

and

Culture :

'[we]

had

left behind the

positivism of the nineteenth century and had once again turned toward

metaphysical

idealism'

(quoted

in

GLG,

p.

12).

Culture was

an

objecti-

fication of that

idealism,

mediating

between

subjective

self-realization

and

the

cultural inheritance of the human race

in

all areas.

In

the

process

of

appropriating

this

culture,

the human

spirit,

history,

and

the self

produce

meaning.

The new

generation

believed it was involved

in

the

production

of a new

culture;

Mannheim

stated

in

Soul and Culture that the new

European

intellectual substitutes 'the

problem

of

transcendence

for

out-

worn

materialism,

the

universal

validity

of

principles

for

relativistic

impressionism, the pathos of normative ethics for an anarchic world

view '

(quoted

in

GLG,

p.

182).

Both Mannheim and

Panofsky

sought

transcendence,

universal

principles,

and normative ethics

in

the

1920s.

While

artists

and intellectuals

in

the

Weimar

years

experienced

an

efflorescence

of

culture,

it

is

important

to

recall at what

cost.'13

The cre-

ative

productivity

of

Panofsky

and Mannheim

in

the

1920s

must be seen

against

the

hardships they

had

already

suffered and those that

they

were

soon

to

experience.

Mannheim fled

Budapest

for

Germany

after the

short-lived

Hungarian

revolution

of 1919. He

spent

the

1920s

at

Heidelberg University

and the

early

1930s at Frankfurt

University.

The

high

inflation

in

Germany

caused

Panofsky

to lose his inheritance

throughout

the

1920s,

leaving Germany

in

1934

with

no

money.'14

Both

men must

have

watched the

growing

nationalist,

xenophobic,

conserva-

tive,

and anti-Semitic movements

in

Hungary

and

Germany

with

anxi-

ety. They

were

marginalized

as

intellectuals

and

Jews,

and

yet

their

ambiguous

position

seems to have mobilized their creative

energies.'5

But their

cultural

values were rooted

in

the

past,

and these

roots

were

the

most fruitful.

13.

The visual arts and music took

interesting

new

forms

during

the

Weimar

Republic,

while literature

was less

adventurous

in

Germany.

Dada, surrealism, Bauhaus,

and Neue

Sachlichkeit

all

developed

in

this

time.

14. In

a letter to

me dated 13 March

1992,

Wolfgang Panofsky reports

that

his

father

sold whatever

he

could

during

the

inflationary period, beginning

in

1923.

When

the

family

left

Germany, they

did

not have

even

the

small

amount

of cash

they

were

permitted

to

take.

See

H.

W.

Janson,

Erwin

Panofsky

(1892-1968),

in the American

Philosophical Society

Year-

book

1969,

pp.

151-60,

and a

series

of

essays

after

Panofsky's

death entitled

Erwin

Panofsky

in

Memoriam,

in Record

of

the Art Museum

of

Princeton

University

28

(1969),

esp.

William

Heckscher,

Erwin

Panofsky:

A

Curriculum

Vitae,

pp.

5-21.

15. See

George

L.

Mosse,

German

Jews

beyond

Judaism

(Bloomington,

Ind.,

1985).

Mosse

argues

that

in

the nineteenth

century

German

Jews

adopted

the

Enlightenment

ideal

of

Bildung

or

cultivation,

which allowed

them to

pursue

a

path independent

from

Judaism

that

transcended ethnic divisions.

Unfortunately,

this

path

led them

largely

to

ignore

the nationalistic

and

anti-Semitic

fervor at

the

end of the nineteenth

century.








Critical

Inquiry Spring

1993 541

The

Dialogue

One of Mannheim's earliest publications, On the Interpretation of

Weltanschauung

appeared

in an art

historical

journal

in

1923.

In

it

he

cited

two

essays by

Panofsky,

The Problem of

Style

in

the

Fine

Arts

(1915)

and

The

Concept

of Artistic

Volition

(1920).

In

two

essays

of

1925

and

1932,

Panofsky

cited Mannheim's

essay

on

weltanschauung.16

He also recommended

that students

in his

courses read

it.17

In

Panofsky's

formulation of his

theory

of

art

in 1939

(the

introduction to Studies in

Iconology)

there

is an

unmistakable

similarity

to Mannheim's

essay,

begin-

ning

with the anecdote

of

the

meeting

of

gentlemen

in

the street that

leads

to the

interpretation

of the

meaning

of the

story using

a

tripartite,

hierar-

chical

schema.

Panofsky

elaborated

on

this

theory

of

iconology

in

his

final

theoretical

statement,

Art

History

as a

Humanistic

Discipline

(1940).

The

dialogue

consisted

in

Mannheim's

reflections

on

Panofsky's

two

early

essays

and

Panofsky's

gradual absorption

of Mannheim's

interpretive

the-

ory.

Panofsky's

early

theoretical

writings

are

interdependent

and each

essay

builds on the

previous

one,

as

if

he were

engaging

in a

monologue

with

himself,

as

well as

in

a

dialogue

primarily

with

Mannheim.

The

first

article Mannheim

cited,

The

Problem of

Style

in

the

Fine

Arts,

was the one with which

Panofsky began

his

publishing

career;

it was

a

belligerent

article

directed

against

Heinrich

W61fflin's

history

of

vision,

which

Panofsky

felt

was

opposed

to the

study

of

content.

It

was

also

his

first theoretical

essay. Panofsky

was

already

staking

out

his

territory,

although

it

took

him

some

time to

figure

out

what

theory

and

method

would

be most

fruitful

for the

history

of art.

In

1965,

he recalled

his

early

article

on

W1olfflin

and

said,

What

gives

me

some

satisfaction is

only

the

fact

that

even as

a mere

beginner,

in

1915, I

clearly

saw

the flaws in an

essential

separation

between 'form' and

'content.'' 18

He was

kinder to

16. All

four

of

these

essays

by

Panofsky

are

reprinted

in

Panofsky,

Aufsdtze

zu

Grundfragen

der

Kunstwissenschaft,

ed. Hariolf

Oberer

and

Egon

Verheyen

(Berlin, 1985).

The

original

German titles

are Das Problem des Stils

in der

bildenden

Kunst

(1915),

pp.

19-28;

Der

Begriff

des

Kunstwollens

(1920),

pp.

29-44;

Uber

das

Verhiltnis

der

Kunstgeschichte

zur Kunsttheorie:

Ein

Beitrag

zu der

Er6rterung

fiber

die

Miglichkeit

'kunstwissenschaftlicher

Grundbegriffe '

(1925),

pp.

49-76;

and

Zum

Problem

der

Beschreibung

und

Inhaltsdeutung

von

Werken

der

bildenden Kunst

(1932),

pp.

85-98.

17.

This

according

to

lecture

notes

by

Willi

Meyne

from

summer

semester

1928,

for

Panofsky

and Noack's

course

Ubungen fiber Methodenfragen

der

Kunstwissenschaft

in

the

Archiv

zur

Wissenschaftsemigration

in der

Kunstgeschichte,

Hamburg.

Of

the

assigned

or

recommended

books and articles for

this

course,

Mannheim's

was one of the

few

recent ones.

18.

Panofsky,

letter

to E.

H.

Gombrich,

15

Nov. 1965.

Panofsky

probably

read

or

heard

Heinrich

W6lfflin's

brief lecture to the

Royal

Prussian

Academy

of

Science of

1912

Das

Problem

des Stils

in der bildenden

Kunst,

Sitzungsberichte

der

K3niglich

preussischen

Akademie

der

Wissenschaften

31

[Jan.-June

1912]: 572-78),

which

was

published

prior

to

W6lfflin's

full

treatment

of his ideas on

art and vision

in

Kunstgeschichtliche

Grundbegriffe








542

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and Mannheim

Wolfflin

in

later

reflections

on

his contribution

to the

history

of

art,

realiz-

ing

that

Wolfflin's

concentration on the formal

aspects

of a work of art

was

useful and necessary although inadequate unless supplemented by other

perspectives.

However,

among

art historians

Alois

Riegl

exercised

an

incredible

influence on

Panofsky

until

1924

when he

published

Die deutschePlastik

des

elften

bis

dreizehntenJahrhunderts

German

Sculpture rom

theEleventh to

the

Thirteenth

Centuries]

in which he

practiced

a

Rieglian

formalism

not

actually

visible

in

most

of

the earlier

essays.

The

Concept

of

Artistic Voli-

tion

was devoted

entirely

to

Riegl's

concept

of Kunstwollen

[artistic

voli-

tion].

Panofsky's

intent

in

this article was to establish the

independence

of

the visual arts from all other objects in the world. To accomplish this goal,

he defined

Riegl's

artistic volition as the

unity

of all creative forces of an

immanent nature

in

art. His

overarching

interest

was

to create

an imma-

nent,

autonomous,

and transcendental

philosophy

of

art,

based

on

deduc-

tive

a

priori

categories.

His

primary

aim was to eliminate

psychological

factors

from Kunstwollen

in

three

areas:

the

artist's

intent,

collective

his-

tory,

and

the

spectator.

In

each of

these

domains,

Panofsky

found

a

vicious

circle at

work,

since

the

psychology

of

the

work of

art

was often

derived

from

the

psychology

of the artist

and vice

versa,

and this

circular

explanation was repeated with the collectivity and the spectator.'19To

avoid the

vicious

circle

in

explaining

artistic

phenomena, Panofsky

believed that documents relevant

to the artist's intention or the

psychol-

ogy

of

the

period

had to be examined

independent

of the work

of

art,

an

idea

he

later

termed the

correctives

to

interpretation-the

autonomous

checks to achieve

a valid

meaning.

The

idea was

to view the work of art

as

given

and then

interpret

it

from

historical,

grammatical, logical,

and

transcendental-philosophical

points

of

view.20

Panofsky

thought Riegl's categories

for

understanding

Kunstwollen

revealed a meaning immanent in artistic phenomena. Descriptive terms

became

transcendent,

ideal

concepts

of a Platonic

nature.21

Thus,

(1915);

trans.

M. D.

Hottinger,

under

the title

Principles

of

Art

History:

The Problem

of

the

Development of Style

in Later Art

(New

York,

1932).

19. It is

possible

that

Panofsky

recognized

this vicious

circle

in

W6lfflin's

theory

and

wanted to

discredit it

on

that

basis.

Most formalist

theories are

subject

to this

criticism,

because

they

define

their

subject narrowly.

W6lfflin

tried

to

compensate

for

the vicious

cir-

cle

by including

external

factors in his schema. This issue

is

discussed

in

my forthcoming

book,

Heinrich

Wdlfflin:

Antinomies

of Experience

in Art.

20.

These

categories

are

similar

to

those found

in

many

hermeneutic

models of

philological interpretation.

See

August

Bockh,

Encyclopddie

und

Methodologie

der

philologischen

Wissenschaften,

d. Ernst Bratuschek

(Leipzig,

1877),

intro.

and

chap.

1;

trans.

John

Paul

Pritchard,

under the title On

Interpretation

and

Criticism,

ed. Pritchard

(Norman,

Okla.,

1968).

21.

See

Silvia

Ferretti, Cassirer,

Panofsky,

and

Warburg:

Symbol,

Art,

and

History,

trans.

Richard Pierce

(New

Haven, Conn.,

1989).

Ferretti

usefully

describes

a

relationship








Critical

Inquiry Spring

1993 543

Panofsky

believed that

Riegl's

contrasting

terms

for

Egyptian

and Hellen-

istic works

of

art,

such as

haptic

or tactile versus

optic,

and

objective

versus subjective, removed them from historical-genetic consideration

into

an

ideal,

a

priori sphere.22

The

sum

of all

descriptive

categories

of this

nature

could be

epitomized by

an axis

or scale of

polar concepts

that

could

completely

characterize

all

art,

since

every

work

would fall

somewhere

on

the

axis.

Ultimately, Panofsky's

goal

was to establish a

transcendental,

aes-

thetic

mode

of

looking

at art that

would not

supplant

but would

comple-

ment

previous

writings

in

art

history.

Assuming

the

concept

of

artistic

volition

to be

methodologically

justified,

the

'necessity'

which

it,

too,

determines

in

a

particular

historical

process

consists

not

in

determining

a

causally

dependent relationship

between individual

phenomena

which

succeed each other

in

time

but

in

discovering

in

them

(just

as

in

an

artistic

phenomenon)

a unified

sense.

He believed that

the

history

of

meaning

would

complement

Riegl's

theory

and

replace psychologizing

history

that confused

art

and

artist,

subject

and

object,

reality

and

idea

in

a

vicious

circle.23

In

creating

this transcendental

philosophy

of

art,

Panofsky ignored

Riegl's

own convictions about

his

theory

of art. While

Riegl

was

convinced

that art

should be

examined

independent

of

other cultural

enterprises

and

worldviews,

he was also a

strong supporter

of Adolf von Hildebrand's

perceptual psychological interpretation

of

art,

presented

in The

Problem

of

Form

in

the Fine Arts

(1893)-so

strong

a

supporter,

in

fact,

that he

believed

only

Hildebrand had come close to his

intent

of

constructing

a

pure positivist theory

of

Kunstwollen. 24

The

descriptive

terms of

Riegl's

and

Hildebrand's formal

oppositions-such

as

tactile,

optical,

and dis-

tant

and

near

views-were

closely

linked to the sensationist

psychology

popular

at the

end

of

the nineteenth

century.25

between

Platonism

and the three

Warburgians,

though

somewhat

convolutedly.

22.

See Alois

Riegl,

Spdtromische

Kunstindustrie

(Vienna, 1901).

This

is

the

principal

text

in which

Riegl

introduced the

concept

of

Kunstwollen

and

the

development

of art

in

the

ancient

world,

from tactile to

a

balance

of

tactile

and

optical

to

purely optical

art-

following

the

progression

from

Egyptian

to classical Greek to Hellenistic art.

23.

Panofsky,

The

Concept

of Artistic

Volition,

trans.

KennethJ.

Northcott

andJoel

Snyder,

Critical

Inquiry

8

(Autumn

1981):

30-31.

24.

Riegl,

Naturwerk

und Kunstwerk

II,

Gesammelte

Aufsiitze

(Augsburg-Wien,

1929), p.

64.

See Adolf von

Hildebrand,

Das Problem der Form in der

bildenden Kunst

(Strassburg,

1893).

For a

lengthier

description

of

the

interrelationship

of

Riegl

and

the

sculptor

Hildebrand,

see

Joan

Hart,

Some

Reflections on

W61lfflin

and the

Vienna

School,

in

Wien

und

die

Entwicklung

der

kunsthistorischen Methode,

Akten

des XXV.

Internationalen

Kongresses

ffir

Kunstgeschichte

(Vienna, 1984),

pp.

53-64.

25

Hermann

Helmholtz

was

widely

read

by

artists

and

art

historians

at the

end of

the

nineteenth

century;

see

Hermann

Helmholtz,

On

the Relation

of

Optics

to

Painting

(1876),

Popular

Lectureson

ScientificSubjects,

rans.

E.

Atkinson

(New

York,

1881),

chap.

3.

I

hesitate

to call Helmholtz's

theory

of

perception by any

name,

since

I

have seen so

many








544

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and Mannheim

Panofsky's primary

intent was to

depsychologize Riegl's

theory,

just

as Edmund

Husserl

and

Heinrich

Rickert

had

argued

against

those who

claimed that psychology was the foundation for philosophical inquiry.

Rickert

was one of

Panofsky's

(and Mannheim's)

philosophy

professors

at

Freiburg,

but it was

clearly

Husserl's

phenomenology

that had

the

great-

est

impact

on

Panofsky's thought.26

Husserl's

great

contribution

to

philos-

ophy

was to

refocus

attention

on

the content

of

consciousness,

what he

called

its

intentionality

(and

later

transcendental

subjectivity ).

Rather

than

reflecting

on

psychological

processes

or

acts,

we

actually

reflect on

the

content of those

processes.

When we

consider

Husserl's

philosophy,

we

think about the

content

of his

ideas;

we do not

attempt

to

replicate

a

set

of psychological acts or events that went on in his head. Earlier psycholo-

gizing philosophy

had been concerned with

understanding

the mental

acts

of consciousness.

When

Panofsky

referred to the

given

nature of

the

work of

art,

he

meant its

content,

just

as Husserl redirected attention

to

the

objects

of consciousness.

Husserl

thought

psychological

and historical

accounts were often

guilty

of the

genetic fallacy,

against

which

Panofsky

also

argued

in

his arti-

cle

on

Kunstwollen

and his later defense of that

article,

Uber

das

Verhiltnis

der

Kunstgeschichte

zur

Kunsttheorie

[ Concerning

the Rela-

tionship of Art History to Art Theory ]. Husserl meant by genetic allacy

the false

belief

that

the

empirical

circumstances

in

which a

judgment

occurs decide its truth or

falsity.27

He

argued against

psychological

and

historical methods and for

logical

and

transcendental ones.

For

Husserl,

as

for

Panofsky

at this

time,

the realm of

empirical

facts could never

lead

to

the realm

of

truth and essences.

However,

Panofsky

regarded

traditional historical documents to be

essential heuristic aids

in

the

interpretation

of

meaning.

The immanent

meaning

of

art revealed

in

Riegl's

artistic

volition

through

the

axes

of

a

priori

categories

such as

haptic

and

optic required

outside validation. He

believed that documents can

alter

our immanent

interpretation

of

a

work

offered. Sensationist seems

appropriate,

since his

theory

is

not

completely

nativist but

insistent on sensation as

a

basis. See Kurt

Danziger, Constructing

the

Subject:

Historical Ori-

gins of Psychological

Research

(Cambridge,

1990),

p.

29.

In

the first three

chapters,

Danziger

provides

an excellent

overview of

German

psychological

practice

in

the nineteenth

century.

26. Both Mannheim

and

Panofsky

referred

to

Husserl as a

primary

source

for

their

work. See Edmund

Husserl,

Logical

Investigations,

trans.

J.

N.

Findlay,

2

vols.

(1900;

Lon-

don,

1970).

This book

was

most influential

in

debunking

psychologism.

See

also Heinrich

Rickert,

Science

and

History:

A

Critique of

Positivist

Epistemology,

trans.

George

Reisman

(1921;

Princeton,

N.J.,

1962),

and Die

Philosophie

des

Lebens:

Darstellung

und

Kritik der

philosophischenModestromungen

unserer Zeit

(Tiibingen,

1920).

Georg

G.

Iggers,

The German

Conception

of

History:

The National Tradition

of

Historical

Thought

rom

Herder to the Present

(Middletown,

Conn.,

1968)

contains a valuable introduction

to Rickert's

thought.

27.

See

Husserl,

Philosophie

als

strenge

Wissenschaft,

Logos

1

(1910-11):

289-341.








Critical

Inquiry Spring

1993

545

of art

by

providing

a

reconstruction

of a

lost

work or

part

of a

work,

or

an

exegetic

correction

demonstrating

alterations

in formal

aspects

of

the

work, or, more generally, any error in interpretation of a work. Panofsky's

essay

on artistic

volition was an

attempt

to balance the

historical

project

of

the art historian with the abstract and

absolute

meaning

of

a

work

of

art,

attained

by

considering

a

work's immanent

meaning.

The

seeds of his

later

theory

of

iconology

were

clearly

in

the

harmonizing

of

levels of

inter-

pretation,

although

his

main

objective

was to validate a

pure

aesthetic

meaning

in

art,

devoid

of

psychological

or

historical

genetic

errors.

Mannheim's

essay

On

the

Interpretation

of

Weltanschauung

1923)

must have

changed

Panofsky's

view

of his

theory

almost

immediately.

For

Mannheim, by misinterpreting Panofsky's interpretation of Kunstwollen

and

putting

it into

a

larger interpretive

theory, suggested

a

method for

deriving meaning

from

any

cultural

object,

which could be

used

by

the art

historian and

sociologist

as well as

the

literary

historian,

philosopher,

and

others. Mannheim

directed his

attention to the visual

arts.

The

question

he wished

to

answer

was,

Can I

give

a

methodological analysis

of

the

concept

of

Weltanschauung

and

determine its

logical

place

within

the

conceptual

framework

of the

historical cultural

disciplines?

( IW,

p.

8).

Weltanschauung

was

not

exactly

equivalent

to

Kunstwollen

but

a

global

outlook, nonrational, germinal, unformed, deeper, and prior to but

inherent

in

cultural

objectifications.

It should be

stated at the

outset that

Mannheim's

objective

in

this

essay

was a

totalizing

hermeneutic

interpre-

tation of the social world

and

art.

He

regarded

the

eclipse

of a

Hegelian

universal

history

as a

necessary

phase

in which

to

regain

scholarly

stan-

dards and

investigate

the

details,

but this

analytic period

led back

to

an

understanding

of the

global

historical

process,

a new

synoptical approach.

Furthermore,

this

global

outlook was

atheoretical and

nonrational.

Wilhelm

Dilthey

was

Mannheim's

forerunner

in

recognizing

that

theo-

retical philosophy is neither the creator nor the principle vehicle of the

Weltanschauung

of an

epoch;

in

reality,

it is

merely only

one of

the

chan-

nels

through

which

a

global

factor-to be

conceived

as

transcending

the

various cultural

fields,

its

emanations-manifests

itself

( IW,

p.

13).

Phi-

losophy

was

merely

one

among

many objectifications

of

weltanschauung.

Crucial for Mannheim

was

his

intuition that the

craving

for

theoretical

knowledge

is

inconsistent

with

the

direct

experience

already

wholly

pos-

sessed

of

weltanschauung.

However,

theorizing opens

up

new

possibilities.

Authentic

experience

demands

repatterning,

demands

theorizing;

the

very

basisof knowledge is the reciprocity of experience and rational operations.

Mannheim

provided

a

framework for

graduating

the

atheoretical

into the

theoretical,

for

manipulating

that unmediated and

authentic

experience

to achieve a

new

understanding:

Every

cultural

product

in

its

entirety

will

...

display

three

distinct

'strata

of

meaning':

(a)

its

objective

meaning,

(b)

its

expressive

meaning,

(c)

its

documentary

or

evidential

meaning

( IW,

p.

19).

To

illustrate his

theory,

Mannheim

described the








546

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

street

encounter

and its

interpretation

that was the

exemplar

for

Panofsky's

interpretive

strategy

in

the introduction to Studies in

Iconology

(see IW, p. 20). The lower level objective meaning was the visual data

alone. At this level of

interpretation,

one

grasped

the

structural character-

istics

of

the visual

field,

without further

knowledge.

To

attain

the

expres-

sive

meaning

one must have understood the

gestures

of

the individuals

in

space

and

time;

in

art,

an

understanding

of the

artist's stream of

psychic

experience

and an

empathy

with it

led

to

expressive meaning.

Factual

his-

torical

research could also

illuminate

expressive meaning.

The

final,

doc-

umentary

meaning

was like Kunstwollen

in

its result:

this

search ... for

an

identical,

homologous pattern

underlying

a

vast

variety

of

totally

differ-

ent realizations of

meaning

( IW, p. 32). Mannheim associated the

synoptic,

documentary

meaning

with

Riegl's interpretation

of Roman

decorative arts

in

which

Riegl

found

a

pervasive

cultural characteristic

immanent

in

all

of

them.28

After

a

comprehensive

examination of the three levels

of

interpreta-

tion,

Mannheim declared

that

the

divisions

between

them

were

false

because

each

unit

of

meaning

is

already

encased

in

a

universe

of

interpre-

tation

(Auffassungsganzheit)

IW,

p.

44).

A

face is not

patched together

from a mosaic

of

features

but is whole

and

unique

on first

glance,

and

so

the

weltanschauung

is like a

gestalt.

The

theory

created to understand the

global

outlook is distinct

from the

unitary

nature

of it.

In

other

words,

the

objective, expressive,

and

documentary

meanings

are

given

simultane-

ously,

and it

requires

a

scientific

analysis

to

separate

them,

to

stabilize

them,

to

give

them

a

firm

outline.

The

simultaneity

and

circularity

of

the

part

and the

whole

in

the

cul-

tural sciences

is

the

paradox

implicit

in

giving

a theoretical

and

scientific

account

of

weltanschauung

or cultural

meaning.

Mannheim

selected

biog-

raphy

as

a model for

this

paradox,

as

Dilthey

had

before

him.

We derive

the

'spirit

of

the

epoch'

from its individual

documentary

manifestations-

and we

interpret

the individual

documentary

manifestations

on

the basis

of what we

know about

the

spirit

of the

epoch

( IW,

p.

49).29

This sounds

like the vicious

circle.

However,

Mannheim

suggested

that

we can use

scientific terms

to control

and

verify

the

unity

of cultural endeavors

in

a

given

period

by

creating

a

coordinate

system

of

concepts.

In

his

next arti-

cle of

1925,

Panofsky presented

Riegl's categories

as such a coordinate

system

while

expanding

his

theory.

Mannheim

surveyed

the failure of various authors to create

a thor-

28.

The

Riegl

text

is

Stilfragen:

Grundlegungen

zu

einer

Geschichte der Ornamentik

(Berlin,

1893).

29.

See Wilhelm

Dilthey,

Das

Erlebnis

und

die

Dichtung:

Lessing,

Goethe,

Novalis,

H'lderin

(Stuttgart,

1957).

This

collection

of

essays

has sometimes

been

interpreted

as

Dilthey's

proposal

to

replace

his

earlier

descriptive

psychological

foundation

by

an

individ-

ual

psychology

expressed through

individual creative artists

or

biographies

of

them.








Critical

Inquiry

Spring

1993

547

ough synthesis

of

cultural

meaning-Dilthey

with

his three

types

of

weltanschauung,

Hermann

Nohl

who found a weak

correspondence

between Dilthey's three types and visual forms, and Riegl's project.

Mannheim criticized

Riegl

for

the

rigidity

of his

approach

because it

led to a strict

rationalizing

of

art forms at their lowest common denomi-

nator or

germinal

patterns.

Mannheim

believed

it was

impossible

to

achieve

a

synoptic

interpretation

incorporating

the wealth of

meaning

available

in

any given

culture

by

using

Riegl's

reductionist

and

unimagi-

native

theory.

He

did,

however,

offer two

hopeful

models

in

the work of

synthesiz-

ing

historians

Max

Dvoiak

and Max

Weber,

an

art historian and a

social

scientist. These two took a historical approach and analyzed individual

cultural

phenomena

in

detail to re-create the

essence

of

a

past

epoch

in

all

its

multiform

variety

( IW,

p.

55).

However,

this

hermeneutic method

for

finding meaning

of a

global

nature had the

problem

of

how to

express

the interrelatedness

of

different cultural fields.

Should the

unity

be

expressed by

means

of

causality,

correspondence,

function,

reci-

procity ?

According

to

Mannheim,

Dvoiak

favored

correspondence

and

parallelism,

while

Weber

proposed

a mutual

causal

dependence

with

one

cultural domain sometimes

explaining

another.

Partial determination of

historical

processes

was the result. For Mannheim, this

methodological

problem

was critical for

distinguishing

the cultural

sciences

from

the

natural

sciences.

When a

cultural

phenomenon

was

traced back to a

weltanschauung

instead

of

another

phenomenon,

the

result was an inter-

pretation

that

did not

posit

a

causal

relationship.s0

Meaning

could not

be

explained

causally

or

genetically,

it could

only

be

understood

or

inter-

preted.

Science

was

explanatory.

Thus,

Mannheim avoided the

genetic

fallacy against

which

Panofsky

argued,

and

distinguished

the

cultural

sphere

from the scientific one.

In

his article on

artistic

volition,

Panofsky

had

already suggested eschewing

causal

progression

in favor of a unified

sense.

Perhaps Panofsky

was

encouraged

by

Mannheim's

suggestion

of

a

coordinate

system

of

concepts

to understand and

verify

the

unity

of a

period,

for

he had

already suggested

such a

system using Riegl's

dichoto-

mies.

But,

gradually,

in later

essays,

he followed the

interpretive paths

of

Mannheim and

Weber.

Their

totalizing

interpretive

frameworks

derived

from the

nineteenth-century philological

method

of

hermeneutics.31

A

30. New Historicists should take note of this

prefiguring

of

their current concerns.

Shying away

from causal models in

philological methodology goes

back to the

eighteenth

century,

at

least.

31. Mannheim

pursued

a hermeneutic

approach

early

in his

German

period,

which

became more

like Max

Weber's

approach.

Weber

proposed

an

amalgam

of

hermeneutics

and

empiricism

in

his

early

theoretical

essays,

Roscher

and Knies: The

Logical

Problems

ofHis-

torical

Economics,

trans.

Guy

Oakes

(1903-6;

New

York,

1975),

p.

8. The

essays

are a cri-

tique

of economic

theory

from

this

new

perspective.

Later his

concept

of

the

ideal

type

was








548

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

summary

of a hermeneutic

theory

of this

sort includes the

following

ideas:

The

goals

of

such

a

theory

are

meaning

and

understanding,

not

explana-

tion, and are attained through interpretation, which is usually a multi-

level

process;

the

theory

utilizes

a

circular method

of

explication;

it

is

empirical

in

that

objective

elements

are

compared

in an

attempt

to

verify

the

interpretation;

the

theory

assumes the

relativity

in

space

and time

of

the

interpreter

and

object

of

interpretation;

it

emphasizes

the

reconstruc-

tive

process

of

understanding

and, therefore,

the

subjectivity

of the inter-

preter.32

Panofsky gradually

implemented

Mannheim's

explication

of his

hermeneutic

method,

but its

full

adoption

and revision took sixteen

years.3

The

philology

of

the

past

crystallized

in

modern art

history

and

sociology.

Panofsky

footnoted Mannheim's

essay

in his

methodological

article

of

1925,

Concerning

the

Relationship

of Art

History

to Art

Theory.

He

agreed

with Mannheim that it made

sense to consider artistic

styles

as cor-

related,

not

causally

related. He

continued

to

stress the

immanent and

transcendental character

of Kunstwollen. But

pressed

by

his

critic,

Alexander

Dorner,

to

whom he

addressed the

essay,

he

responded by

taking

the

programmatic

statements of his Kunstwollen article further to

illuminate the

relationship

of

art

theory

to art

history.34

a

heuristic device that allowed

for

an overall structure of

hypotheses

that could then be

tested.

However,

the

process

of

understanding

was

hermeneutic.

Max

Dvoriak

seemed

rela-

tively

uninterested

in

methodological

considerations,

although

he

was concerned with the

social

history

of

medieval art

in

Idealismus

und

Naturalismus in der

gotischen

Skulptur

und

Malerei

(Munich, 1918).

32.

The

history

of

hermeneutics

is

cogently

presented

in

Richard

E.

Palmer,

Hermeneutics:

Interpretation

Theory

in

Schleiermacher,

Dilthey,

Heidegger,

and

Gadamer

(Evanston,

Ill.,

1969).

The best

nineteenth-century

source is

still

B6ckh,

On

Interpretation

and

Criticism.See

also David

Couzens

Hoy,

The

Critical Circle:

Literature,

History,

and Philo-

sophical

Hermeneutics

(Berkeley,

1978);

Jiirgen

Habermas,

Knowledge

and Human

Interests,

trans.

Jeremy

J. Shapiro

(Boston,

1971);

and

Hans-Georg

Gadamer,

Truth and

Method,

trans.

Joel

Weinsheimer and

Donald

G.

Marshall,

rev.

ed.

(1960;

New

York,

1989).

The lit-

erature

on

hermeneutics is

growing exponentially.

However,

it is

helpful

to

distinguish

between

philological

and

philosophical

hermeneutics.

For

the

purposes

of

this

paper,

I am

discussing philological

hermeneutics.

33. See

Simonds,

Mannheim's

Sociology

of

Knowledge

as a

Hermeneutic

Method,

Cultural

Hermeneutics

3

(May

1975):

81-104.

Simonds

correctly

identifies Mannheim's

method

as

hermeneutic but

prefers

to discuss

its

opposite-the

New

Criticism

of

I.

A.

Richards and others-rather than to

explore

Mannheim's

theory

in

detail.

34. Alexander Dorner

(1893-1957)

received

his

degree

in

art

history

at

Berlin

Uni-

versity

in

1919;

Adolph

Goldschmidt was

his

mentor,

as well

as

Panofsky's.

Dorner was a

lecturer when he wrote Die

Erkenntnis

des

Kunstwollens durch die

Kunstgeschichte,

Zeitschriftfiir

Aesthetik und

allgemeine Kunstwissenschaft

16

(1922):

216-22,

a

rebuttal to

Panofsky's essay.

In

1925,

Dorner became

director

of

the Landesmuseum

in

Hannover,

for

which he

acquired

modern

art.

Many

works of

art

in

the Entartete

Kunst

exhibition of

1937

came from

the

Hannover

collection.

Dorner

left

Germany

in 1936 for

the United

States

and became director

of

the museum at

the

Rhode Island

School

of

Design.








Critical

Inquiry

Spring

1993

549

By

1925,

he

must

have

realized,

like

Mannheim,

the limitations

of

Riegl's

project,

for

he transformed

it

substantially.

In

his article on

Kunstwollen of 1920, he had offered two pages on how to reconcile tran-

scendental artistic volition

with the

historical

understanding

of

works

of

art,

but

the

whole

object

of

this later

article was to

argue

for

the reci-

procity

of

philosophy

and

history,

in

response

to the

critics

of

the earlier

essay.35

He reiterated

the

phenomenological

argument

but

with a

new

respect

for the

knowledge imparted

by

the

history

of art. The

claim

in

this article was

that art

theory

and

art

history

fulfilled

different

but

interrelated

projects:

in

art

theory, problems

were

formulated

by

means

of a

system

of basic

concepts

that

were

deduced from

an

Urproblem.

Art

history, consciously or not, oriented its solutions around these problems;

art

history

was

empirical

and

created

style

criteria

out of the

sensuous

qualities

of

works

of

art.

Finally,

art

history

was an

interpretive

science at

the

transcendental

level of

Kunstwollen. At

this

level,

art

theory

and

art

history

joined

to

create a

principle

of

formation

or

structure,

a

Gestaltung.

In

this

manner

Panofsky

described three

levels of

interpreta-

tion,

familiar

to us from

his

later,

less

philosophical

descriptions:

the

Urproblem

of

art

theory

with

its

conceptual

framework,

empirical

art

his-

tory,

and

interpretation

[Kunstwollen] through

the union of

art

history

and art

theory.

Panofsky adopted

Mannheim's

explication

of

Kunstwollen

as the uni-

fying,

synoptic,

and

formative

interpretation,

encompassing

theory

and

history.

In

this

essay

of

1925,

he

united

theory

and

practice,

integrating

what

had been

merely suggested

in

his earlier

article. The

three-level

divi-

sion of

the

interpretation

of art

recalls

Mannheim's three

interrelated

kinds

of

meaning,

although

there

is

still no

organic

correspondence

between

the levels.

The unusual

part

of

his

1925

theory

was the

sliding

scale or

axis of

antithetical

concepts

that he illustrated to show the

continuity

and divi-

sion of

art

theory

and art

history.

He

presented

a

table with

five

vertical

divisions

(table

1):

at the

far left

is the extreme

set of

antithetical

art the-

oretical

concepts

of

an

ontological

nature-fullness

opposed

form,

and

on

the far

right

is

the

extreme

set

of

antithetical

art historical

concepts

of

a

methodological

nature-space

and time. The

antitheses are

corre-

lated,

for

fullness and form

are the

a

priori hypotheses

for

the

essence

of

the

artistic

problem,

and

space

and

time

are the a

priori

conditions

of

its

solution.

Between

these two

poles

of

contrasting concepts

are

three

pairsof

opposites

within the

phenomenal

and

visual

sphere

that are

graded

in

value from

elementary

to

figurative

to

compositional,

a

three-part

hier-

archical

progression:

from

optic

versus

haptic,

to

depth

versus

plane,

35. The

argument

for

the

complementarity

of

history

and

philosophy

was

common

among

nineteenth-century philologists.

See the

introduction

to

B*ckh,

On

Interpretation

and

Criticism.








550

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and Mannheim

and,

finally,

to fusion

versus

independence.

These

contrasting

pairs

con-

form to

Riegl's contrasting

characterizations

of

Egyptian

versus Hellen-

istic art, or Wdlfflin's schema of Renaissance versus Baroque

art.36

These were the

basic

concepts

for the

science

or

philosophy

of

art and

art

history,

according

to

Panofsky.

He

united the

conceptual

and

experi-

ential

aspects

of artistic

interpretation.

These

concepts

seemed to

oper-

ate

as a heuristic

device

for

Panofsky,

to be

used

to

compare

the

abstract

with the

real,

or to

set

up

a dialectic

between

a

priori concepts

and real

works of

art.

Art

itself

possessed

these

dual

qualities:

it was conditioned

by

time

and

place

but also had an a

priori,

timeless,

lawful,

metahistorical

character.

There was a

reciprocal,

not

a

causal,

relationship

between art

history and art theory, which were united in interpretation.37 Following

Mannheim,

Panofsky

suggested

that

by

correlating

different

areas of

cul-

ture

one could attain a

synthetic

view of

a

single

or several cultures-

that

is,

theoretical

concepts

could

be

compared

with real

objects

to arrive

at

immanent

meaning.

In

this

essay

of

1925,

Panofsky

reached a

crossroad.

Kunstwollen was

no

longer purely

a

priori

and

transcendent,

although

he

continued

to

claim it was.

Rather,

Kunstwollen was

now

synonymous

with

interpreta-

tion,

which

united the theoretical and historical studies

of art. The Pan-

dora's box of

interpretation

was

open.

Why

did

Panofsky

move from a transcendental

philosophical

defense

of Kunstwollen

to a

half-hearted rebuttal

of

arguments against

it and an

increasing

integration

of

those

nasty empirical

facts of art

history?

His

own art historical

work

tells the

story.

Panofsky's

dissertation

was entitled

Diirer's

Theory

of

Art,

Particu-

larly

in Relation to the Art

Theory

of

the

Italians. 38

t was

published

in

1915,

after

it

was awarded the Grimm Prize

at

Berlin

University.

The

topic

was

not

conceived

by Panofsky

but

by

the

Grimm

Committee,

most

likely byHeinrich

Wolfflin.39

At the same

time,

Panofsky

published

the 1915 article

on

W61fflin,

an

article on Leon

Baptista

Alberti's

perspective

that was the

first to

interpret perspective

construction,

and an assortment of articles on

36. See

Riegl,

Spdtriimische

Kunstindustrie,

and

W6lfflin, Principles

of

Art

History

and

Renaissance and

Baroque,

trans. Katherine

Simon

(1888;

Ithaca,

N.Y.,

1966).

37.

This became a central

argument

in

Panofsky's

1940

essay

The

History

of Art as

a

Humanistic

Discipline,

in

Meaning

in the

Visual

Arts

(1955;

Chicago,

1982);

see

esp.

pp.

21-22.

38.

See

Panofsky, Diirers

Kunsttheorie,

vornehmlich n ihrem

Verhdltnis

zur

Kunsttheorie

der Italiener

(Berlin, 1915).

39.

In

a letter to

Jan

Bialostocki,

8

Nov.

1970,

Gerda

Panofsky

explained

the circum-

stances

of the award

of

the

Grimm Prize

(as

in

the brothers

Grimm)

to

Panofsky.

It came

from

the

Grimm

Stiftung

at Berlin

University,

in

honor

of

the best dissertation.

It

com-

memorated the

seven

professors

at

G6ttingen University

who

protested

the dissolution

of

the constitution

in

1837

by

the

new

King

of

Hannover.

The

topic

of 1911

was

probably

for-

mulated

by

W61lfflin,

who

left Berlin

University

in

1912.

W6lfflin

reviewed

Panofsky's

dis-

sertation

in

Monatsheftefiir

Kunstwissenschaft

8

(1915):

254-55.








Critical

Inquiry

Spring

1993

551

medieval,

Renaissance,

and

Baroque

themes.40

The

newly

founded Ham-

burg University

recruited

Panofsky

in

1920,

through

Gustav Pauli who

was

director of Hamburg's Kunsthalle.4' In 1920, the year of his arrival in

Hamburg, Panofsky

began

a series of

studies

all

very

similar

in

method on

the

subjects

of

proportion,

perspective,

devoted

images,

and

the

concept

of

idea,

among

others.42

The

pattern

in

all these studies

was

to

isolate

one

motif

out of the

manifold

possibilities-motifs

like

proportional

schemas,

spatial

depictions,

classical

themes,

or a

concept

like idea-and

attempt

to

understand its

particular meaning

(as

opposed

to

focussing

solely

on

appearance)

in

a

given

time frame that would

provide

an idea of

the artistic

intention

realized

in

all artistic

creations

in

a

given

period.

By

comparing

these meanings across periods, one could chart historical developments.

Each

new

generation

of

artists utilized these motifs

in a new

way,

transform-

ing

the

meaning

to suit

a new worldview.

Panofsky

took

particular delight

in

finding

these often bizarre transformations.

In

most

of

these

studies,

he

used texts

contemporary

with the

images

to elucidate the

artistic

problem.

None of these

studies were based

purely

on

Riegl's

theory

of art

nor on

Panofsky's

1925

exposition

that

juxtaposed

theory

and

practice

with

only

a

tentative

union between them. There was

clearly

a

disjunction

between

Panofsky's

theory

and his

actual

method.

In 1931,

Panofsky

wrote his mentor, Wilhelm

Vige,

At the corner

where we attain the

meeting

of the tradition

of

words and the tradition of

images,

and with the simultaneous use

of a

method

of

historical

types

and

philological

methods a definite form of

iconological

knowledge

can be

40. See

Panofsky,

Das

perspektivische

Verfahren Leone

Battista

Albertis,

Kunstchronik,

6

Aug.

1915,

pp.

504-16. See the

bibliography

in

Panofsky's

Aufsdtze

zu

Grundfragen

der

Kunstwissenschaft

for a

listing

of

these

essays.

41. In a letter to

Magdalene

Pauli, wife of Gustav Pauli, 8 Mar. 1955,

Panofsky

stated

that he

and Dora intended to dedicate their book Pandora's Box to

Gustav Pauli: Denn

wir

haben nie

vergessen,

dass

er es

war,

dar einen damals

ganz

unbekanntenjungen

Mann nach

Hamburg

einlud,

ihn von

Anfang

bis

zu

Ende

in

Treue

und

Freundschaft

f6rderte. Pauli

tried

to convince

Panofsky

to

stay

in

Hamburg

after the

1933 law that excluded

Jews

from

the universities

was

enacted.

42.

These

are the

Panofsky

works,

cited

in

full: Die

Entwicklung

der

Propor-

tionslehre als Abbild der

Stilentwicklung, Monatshefte

ir

Kunstwissenschaft

14

(1921):

188-219;

Diirers

Stellung

zur

Antike

(Vienna,

1922)

(Panofsky

translated the first two

essays,

and

they

were

published

as The

History

of the

Theory

of

Human

Proportions

as a Reflec-

tion

of

the

History

of

Styles

and Albrecht Diirer and

Classical

Antiquity, Meaning

in

the

Visual

Arts,

pp.

55-107,

236-94);

with Fritz

Saxl,

Diirers

MelencoliaI : eine

quellen-

und

typengeschichtlicheUntersuchung (Leipzig,

1923);

Die

Perspektive

als

'symbolische Form,'

Vortrdge

der

Bibliothek

Warburg (Leipzig,

1924-25),

pp.

258-330;

'Imago

Pietatis':

ein

Beitrag

zur

Typengeschichte

des 'Schmerzensmannes' und

der 'Maria

Mediatrix, '

Festschriftfiir

Max

J.

Friedlinder

zum

60.

Geburtstage

(Leipzig,

1927),

pp.

261-308;

with

Saxl,

A

Late

Antique Religious

Symbol

in

Works

by

Holbein and

Titian,

Burlington Maga-

zine 49

(Oct. 1926):

177-81;

and Hercules am

Scheidewege

nd

andere

antike

Bildstoffe

n

der

neueren

Kunst

(Leipzig,

1930).








552

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

won. 43

He

gave

equal

status to

images

and

words,

always

seeking meaning

in

the

transformations

of a motif over time

and

relating

it to a

synoptic

whole. Without doubt, Panofsky practiced iconology long before he

preached

it.

In

1932,

Panofsky

published

an article

in

Logos

entitled

Concerning

the Problem

of

Description

and

Interpretation

of

Meaning

in

Works

of

the Fine Arts.

The

basic

content

of

it,

more

lucidly

organized, appeared

in

1939

in

English

as

his introduction to Studies in

Iconology,

and

was

reprinted

with

minor

changes

in

1955 as

Iconography

and

Iconology:

An

Introduction to the

Study

of

Renaissance

Art. 44

The last

formulation

of

iconography

and

iconology

appeared

in 1940 in

The

History

of

Art

as a

Humanistic Discipline. In these three essays, the subject of inquiry was

the

interpretation

of works of

art.

Panofsky

described

three

interrelated

levels

of

interpretation:

a

description

of

forms derived

from

the

interpreter's

practical

experience

that was

to be corrected

against

the his-

tory

of

style;

a

secondary analysis

of

subject

matter that

required

knowl-

edge

of

literary

sources and was

corrected

by

a

history

of

types;

and an

iconological

synthesis

of the

content,

requiring synthetic

intuition or

knowledge

of

worldviews

and

corrected

by

a

history

of

cultural

symptoms

or

symbols.45

He

stressed that the

three levels

refer in

reality

to

aspects

of

one

phenomenon,

namely,

the work of art as a whole. So

that,

in actual

work,

the methods

of

approach

which

here

appear

as

three

unrelated

operations

of

research

merge

with

each

other

into

one

organic

and indi-

visible

process. 46

Mannheim

also stressed the

interlocking

unity

of

the

three

theoretical levels.

Not

only

were all

three

operations

unified,

but each

presupposed

a

knowledge

of the others.

Panofsky

used

this

example:

an art historian

finds

a

contract

for an

altarpiece,

finds records of

payment

for the

work,

and

an

altarpiece

in

situ

that

corresponds

to the

description

in the

con-

tract. The historian must

inquire

about the

authenticity

of all three

pieces

of

evidence.

In

order to validate each

one,

the

investigator

must

already

know what must be

checked,

such as the

date

of

the

script

used in the

con-

43.

Panofsky,

letter

to

Wilhelm

V6ge,

6

Jan.

1931. The letter

reads,

die

Ecke,

wo

das

Zusammentreffen

von

Worttradition

und

Bildiiberlieferung

uns

erreicht,

und durch die

gleichzeitige Anwendung

typengeschichtlicher

und

philologischer

Methoden

eine

bestimmte

Form

'ikonologischer'

Erkenntnisse

gewonnen

werden kann.

Panofsky

stated

that

V6ge

was

the

one who

invented this

approach

and

Panofsky

was a mere

follower.

I

thank Peter Boerner for his

help

with

my transcription.

44.

See

Panofsky,

Zum Problem der

Beschreibung

und

Inhaltsdeutung

von Werken

der

bildenden

Kunst,

Logos

21

(1932):

103-19;

repr.

in

Aufsiitze

zu

Grundfragen

der

Kunstwissenschaft,pp.

85-97. See

also

Panofsky, Iconography

and

Iconology:

An

Intro-

duction

to

the

Study

of

Renaissance

Art,

Meaning

in the Visual

Arts,

pp.

26-54.

45.

See

the

tables

that

Panofsky

constructed

for his

essays

of

1932 and 1939

(tables

2

and

3).

The

table

for

the

1932

essay

in

Logos

still

contains

the

philosophical verbiage

of the

earlier work: vitale

Daseinserfahrung, phainomensinn,

and Wesenssinn.

46.

Panofsky,

Studies in

Iconology,

pp.

16-17.








Critical

Inquiry

Spring

1993 553

tract,

formal or

iconographical

oddities in the

altarpiece.

Thus,

the

beginning

of our

investigation always

seems to

presuppose

the end. We

cannot analyze what we do not understand. 47Historical interpretation is

a

circular

process-a methodological

circle,

not a

vicious one.

You

may

recall that

he asserted it was a vicious

circle

in the

essay

on

Kunstwollen

because

he

had not

yet

considered

independent

correctives

to

verify

the

interpretation.

Panofsky

cited

Mannheim in

the first

of

his

iconology papers

of

1932.

He credited

Mannheim as the source for his third level

of

interpretation,

the

documentary

meaning,

which

Mannheim had

derived

partially

from

Panofsky's

own

interpretation

of

Riegl's

Kunstwollen.48

Panofsky

adopted

far more from Mannheim's theory of interpretation than he credited to

him.

However,

Panofsky

codified Mannheim's

three

levels of

interpreta-

tion

in a far

more

systematic

manner,

suggesting

the

way

one

could

vali-

date an

interpretation

using

correctives

and

without

referring

to

causal

explanations. Using

Mannheim's

model,

Panofsky

was

able to shed the

overly

philosophical

and

obscure

verbiage

of his earlier

theory,

to make it

a useful

construct

(tables

1-3 reveal the

increasing

clarity

of his

theory).

Panofsky's

most

striking adaptation

from

Mannheim's

essay

was the

little

scene

of

the

street

encounter.

At last

Panofsky

characterized a

theory

that was consonant with his

actual

practice,

and he never

theorized

again.49

The

interpretive

theory

Panofsky

delineated

was,

like

Mannheim's,

that

of

hermeneutics.

Hermeneutics

was

that

part

of

philology

concerned with the

interpreta-

tion of texts.

Panofsky

often referred

to himself as a frustrated

philolo-

gist

or

philologist

after the

fact. 50 When Leo

Spitzer,

the renowned

philologist,

received his

copy

of

Panofsky's

Meaning

in

the Visual Arts

in

which the last two

of

the

three

iconology

articles

appeared,

he

sent

47.

Panofsky,

The

History

of

Art

as

a

Humanistic

Discipline,

Meaning

in the Visual

Arts,

p.

9.

48.

Mannheim remarked in a note

that

Panofsky's analysis

of

Riegl's

concept

of

the

'art

motive'

shows

a clear

understanding

of

what

is here

defined as

documentary

meaning

( IW,

p.

33).

49.

In

his

correspondence,

Panofsky

would

respond

to

questions

about

iconology,

but

he

increasingly

refused to be

concerned with theoretical

questions.

He

asserted to

all who

inquired

that,

with

advancing

age,

he

was unable to

concentrate on

such

problems.

50. One

among

many

such references

in

Panofsky's correspondence

is

in

a letter to

Dr. Erich

Hubala,

27

Jan.

1966:

The

only thing

which

slightly

disturbed a would-be

philol-

ogist

is the

spelling

'Perystil.'

This

letter

is also

interesting

for

Panofsky's

reminiscence

about

his life in

Berlin from

1900 to 1920. Hubala

sent

him an

article about the Berlin

Imperial

Castle,

and

Panofsky

recalled that

the

family

bank

of

Eugen Panofsky

was

located

in

a

big ugly building right opposite

the

Castle.

Panofsky

wrote to Booth

Tarkington

about

President Franklin Delano

Roosevelt,

the

very style

of his

speeches

and

writings,

as it hits the ear

of

an old

philologist,

seems to reveal

a

genuinely

humanistic

attitude

(Dr.

Panofsky

and

Mr.

Tarkington:

An

Exchange

of

Letters,

1938-1946,

ed. Richard M.

Ludwig,

[Princeton,

N.J.,

1974],

p.

58).








Table 1

Panofsky's

First

Schematization

of

an

Interpretive

Strategy,

1925

Specific

oppositions

within the

phenomenal

and

particularly

the

visual

sphere

General

General

antithesis

antithesis

within

the

(1)

Opposition

(2)

Opposition

(3)

Opposition

within

the

ontological

of

elementary

of

figurative

of

composition

methodological

sphere

values values

values

sphere

Fullness

Optical

values

depth

values values of

Time

versus

(open

space)

versus

interlocking

versus

Form versus

planar

values

(fusion)

Space

haptic

values

versus

(body)

values of

juxtaposition

(separation)

Spezifische Gegensaitze

nnerhalb der

phainomenalen

und zwar

visuellen

Sphlire

Allgemeine

Allgemeine

Antithetik

Antithetik

innerhalb der

(1)

Gegensatz

(2)

Gegensatz

(3)

Gegensatz

innerhalb der

ontologischen

der

der der

methodologischen

Sph~ire

Elementarwerte

Figurationswerte

Kompositionswerte

Sphaire

Die Fulle

Die

optischen

Die Die Werte des

Die Zeit

steht

gegeniiber

Werte Tiefenwerte Ineinander

steht

gegeniiber

der

Form

(Freiraum)

stehen

(Verschmelzung)

dem Raum

stehen

gegeniiber

den

gegeniiber

den

gegeniiber

den

Flichenwerten

Werten des

haptischen

Nebeneinander

Werten

(Zerteilung)

(K6rper)

Source:

Uber

das

Verh~iltnis

der

Kunstgeschichte

zur

Kunsttheorie,

n

Aufsiitze

u

Grundfragen

der

Kunstwissenschaft,

.

51.








556

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

foundational

science,

for the

cultural

studies,

then

the traditional

method

of

studying

the

contents

of

the

mind-hermeneutics-became

salient

again. Husserl was influential in establishing the ground for this develop-

ment,

devoting

half of

his

Logical Investigations

(1900)

to

refuting

psycho-

logism, although

he was

not

a

hermeneuticist.

Dilthey

and others were

convinced

by

his

arguments

against

psychologism.

Dilthey

realized that

psychology

itself has a

history

and

cannot

provide

a foundation for

history.57

As

Mannheim

noted,

Dilthey

was

extremely

influential

in

establishing

hermeneutics as the

foundation

for

studying

the

humanities,

beginning

with his

early,

monumental

biography

of

Schleiermacher,

an

early

hermeneuticist. Even

the

most

prominent

psychologist

in

Ger-

many-Wilhelm Wundt-added the historical-psychological method of

hermeneutic

understanding

to his methods for

overcoming

the

introspec-

tionist's dilemma: How

do

I

understand

my

own

thought processes?58

Wundt

admitted that

psychology

reached its

limit

for

explanation

or

understanding just

at the

point

when

it

was

most needed. Closer to Ham-

burg,

the

participants

in

the

Warburg

circle were

engaged

in

these issues.

Edgar

Wind,

the first doctoral

student of

Panofsky

and

Cassirer

at Ham-

burg

University,

wrote

a

number of

essays,

including

his

Habilitations-

schrift,

ustifying

hermeneutics

by

arguing

that the circle

of

understanding

was not vicious but a methodological necessity.59 Panofsky often

referred to Wind's work

in

his articles on

iconology.

Fritz

Saxl,

who

avoided

discussions of

theory,

must have

intuitively

agreed

with the

57. See

Dilthey,

Der

Aufbau

der

geschichtlichen

Welt

in

den

Geisteswissenschaften

1910),

Gesammelte

Schriften,

12

vols.

(Stuttgart,

1957-60),

7:

143-44,

200.

Dilthey

did not com-

pletely

eliminate

psychology

from

his

theory,

but

hermeneutics

became

the

means of under-

standing

and,

because

it is

a

theory

that has

no

unquestionable

ground,

it became the basis

for

rethinking

the nature of

cultural studies. Michael

Ermarth,

Wilhelm

Dilthey:

The

Critique

of

Historical Reason

(Chicago,

1978),

pp.

232-45,

is an

excellent source

for

understanding

this

change in

Dilthey's

construct.

Dilthey

was not alone in

being

influenced

by

Husserl. Max

Weber's

early

theoretical

writings

were also

influenced

by

Husserl. Even

in

Roscherand

Knies,

Weber offered

a

synthesis

of

hermeneutics and

empiricism,

while

rejecting psychologism

(the

view

that

all

critical

problems

in

philosophy

could be

resolved

by

psychology).

Mannheim

followed Weber's

approach,

and

sociology

has

probably

been more

affected

by

this solution than

any

of

the other social

sciences.

Panofsky's path

was not

unique.

58. Wilhelm

Wundt,

Logik,

3 vols.

(Stuttgart,

1906-8),

3:

8,

164-69.

See

Ermarth,

Wilhelm

Dilthey,

p.

212;

Ermarth

recognized

the

similarity

of

Wundt's late

theorizing

to

Dilthey's

hermeneutics.

59. See

Edgar

Wind,

Aesthetischer und

kunstwissenschaftlicher

Gegenstand:

ein

Beitrag

zur

Methodologie

der

Kunstgeschichte

(Ph.

D.

diss.,

Hamburg

University,

1924).

Part of the dissertation

appeared

as Zur

Systematik

der kiinstlerischen

Probleme,

Zeitschriftfiir

Aesthetikund

allgemeineKunstwissenschaft

18

(1925):

438-86. The dissertation

was

never

published

in

full,

due to

the inflation

in

Germany

at the

time,

but

a full version

can be found

in

the

Hamburg University Library.

Wind's

Habilitationsschrift

was Das

Experi-

ment und die

Metaphysik:

zur

Aufli'sung

der

kosmologischen

Antinomien

(Tiibingen,

1934).

According

to a

letter

from Wind

to

William

Heckscher,

3 Nov.

1968,

Wind

studied

with

Husserl and

Heidegger

in

Freiburg

before

1920.

(Access

to this

letter

was

granted by

the

kind

permission

of

Margaret

Wind.)








Table

2

Panofsky's

Second Schematization of an

Interpretive Strategy,

1932

Object

of

Subjective

Sources

Objective

Correctives

Interpretation

of

Interpretation

of

Interpretation

1.

Phenomenon

sense

Vital experience

of History of formal configu-

(divide

into factual

existence rations (sum of

repre-

and

expressive

senses)

sentational possibilities)

2.

Meaning

sense

Literary knowledge

History

of

types (including

imaginative possibilities)

3.

Documentary

sense

Original

condition of

General

history

of

ideas

worldview

(including

ideological

possibilities)

Gegenstand

der

Subjektive Quelle

der

Objectives

Korrective der

Interpretation Interpretation

Interpretation

1.

Phainomensinn

(zu

Vitale Daseinserfahrung

Gestaltungsgeschichte

teilen

in

Sach-

und

(Inbegriff

des Darstel-

Ausdrucksinn)

lungsmiglichen)

2. Bedeutungssinn Literarisches Wissen Typengeschichte (Inbegriff

des

Vorstellungs-

m6glichen)

3. Dokumentsinn

Weltanschauliches

Allgemeine

Geistes-

(Wesenssinn)

Urverhalten

geschichte

(Inbegriff

des

weltanschaulich

Miglichen)

Source: Zum

Problem der

Beschreibung

und

Inhaltsdeutung

von

Werken der

bildenden

Kunst, in Aufsdtze zu Grundfragen der Kunstwissenschaft,p. 95.








Table 3

Panofsky's

Final Schematization

of an

Interpretive

Strate

OBJECT

OF

ACT

OF

EQUIPMENT

FO

INTERPRETATION

INTERPRETATION

INTERPRETATION

I-Primary

or natural

subject

Pre-iconographical

description

(and Practical

experience

(familia

matter-(A)

factual,

pseudo-formal

analysis).

with

objects

and events).

(B) expressional-,

constituting

the world of

artistic motifs.

II-Secondary

or

conventional

sub-

Iconographical

analysis

in the

nar-

Knowledge

of

literary

source

ject

matter,

constituting

the

rower sense of

the word.

(familiarity

with

specific

world of images, stories and and concepts).

allegories.

III-Intrinsic

meaning

or

content,

Iconographical

interpretation

in a

Synthetic

intuition

(familia

constituting

the

world of

deeper

sense

(Iconographical

with the

essential

tenden

'symbolical'

values.

synthesis).

the

human

mind),

conditi

by personal

psychology

'Weltenschauung.'

Source:

Panofsky,

Studies in

Iconology:

Humanistic Themes

in the Art

of

the

Renaissance

(1939;

New

Y








Critical

Inquiry

Spring

1993

559

method,

for

his collaborative

work

with

Panofsky

produced

iconological

interpretations.

Cassirer has often been viewed as a source

of

Panofsky's

thought, and he, too, perhaps after the others, pointed out that the rules

of

semantics,

not the laws

of

nature,

are the

general principles

of

historical

thought.

History

is included

in

the field of

hermeneutics,

not

in

that of

natural

science. 60

What

were Mannheim's and

Panofsky's

reasons for

adopting

this

phi-

lological

method? Consider the

ecology

of

the German

university system

in

the

1920s,

which

predisposed

them to this method. Both

sociology

and

art

history

were still

consolidating

their

professional

statuses and inde-

pendence.

Weber had

given

his

imprimatur

to a

quasi-hermeneutic

method. Panofsky could build on several theories in art history, each of

which had

potential,

but none

was a

totalizing interpretive

schema.

Thus,

at

this

stage

of

professionalization,

Mannheim and

Panofsky

could

still

make

their mark

by

creating

innovative theories.

Philology

was

the

most

valued and

privileged

discipline

in

Germany.

Unlike the

situation

in

America

or

England,

in

Germany

the

humanities

were

more

highly

esteemed than

the natural sciences.

Jeffrey

Herf has shown

in

Reactionary

Modernism that German academic

engineers throughout

the

Weimar

Republic

and until the end of the

Third

Reich

attempted

to

acquire

the

high

status of the

humanities,

not the natural

sciences,

by

using

its lan-

guage

and

ideas.6'

Thus,

by

developing

and

refining

the

philological

method

for use

in

their

disciplines,

Mannheim and

Panofsky

could

appro-

priate

its aura and

prestige.

This

adoption

would make these newer disci-

plines

more credible to

the

established

groups

in

academia.

The

cash value

for

selecting

this

strategy

was

very

high.

Mannheim

began

teaching

at

Heidelberg,

one of the most

prestigious

universities

in

Germany,

and

received

the

only

full

professorship

in

sociology

in Ger-

many

when he went

to Frankfurt

University

in

1930.62 He

was one of the

very

few Social Democrats

teaching

at a

university

in

Germany.

At Ham-

burg

University,

Panofsky

became a

full

professor

very rapidly

and

attracted

the most brilliant students

in

art

history.63

60. Ernst

Cassirer,

An

Essay

on

Man:

An

Introduction to a

Philosophy

of

Human Culture

(New

Haven, Conn.,

1944),

p.

195.

The

influence

may actually

be reversed.

Panofsky may

have influenced

Cassirer.

Freud's

psychoanalytic

method also

presumes

an

ongoing

and

open-ended dialogue

between the

analyst

and the

analysand,

a

method that Habermas celebrated

as

hermeneutic,

although

neither

Mannheim

nor

Panofsky recognized

it as such. See

Habermas,

Knowledge

and Human

Interests,

chap.

10.

61. See

Herf,

Reactionary

Modernism,

chap.

7.

62.

See

Simonds,

Karl Mannheim's

Sociology

of

Knowledge, pp.

4-5.

63. See

Panofsky,

Three

Decades of

Art

History

in the

United

States,

p.

336n.

Panofsky

joined

the

faculty

of

Hamburg University

in

1920

as

a

Privatdozent

(non-civil

ser-

vant,

unsalaried

position,

paid

through

student

fees)

and

became

a

professor

in

1926.

Soon

after

his

arrival at

Hamburg,

Panofsky

was in the

unusual

position

of

being

director of the

art historical seminar

(a

position

usually

held

by

a

professor),

by

which

means he

paid

him-








560

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

The

seeming

unconsciousness of their

appropriation

of

hermeneutics

is

a

puzzle. Why

did neither

Mannheim nor

Panofsky simply

state

the

nature of their

theory

instead of

reinventing

the wheel? Weber had

been

very

self-conscious

in

creating

a

method that balanced the scientific

method

with

hermeneutics.

Despite

the

great prestige

of

philology

and

the cultural

studies,

there

was

a

lingering

doubt that

they

should

acquire

the

methods

of the natural

sciences. Both

Mannheim

and

Panofsky

wanted to avoid

using

the scientific

method.64

They

hoped

to eliminate

any

doubts about their

interpretive

strategy by

using

correctives

outside

the

object

of

interpretation

to validate it.

They

rejected

the scientific

grounding

that

earlier

theorists had

thought

was essential.

Perhaps

the

prestige

of

philology

was so

great

that

stating

that their method was

hermeneutics

would

have

been

unnecessary.

However,

neither Mannheim

nor

Panofsky

ever stated that their

theory

was

equivalent

to hermeneutics.

Panofsky

did not

synthesize

all

the elements of his

theory

until the

1930s,

and

the conflict between

maintaining

some

vestige

of

his earlier

Rieglian

project

and the new

theory

of Mannheim was

present

until

1932,

and

probably

longer,

when he was

no

longer

in

the

same

cultural matrix

or

tra-

dition,

but

in

Princeton.65

The

goal

of the theories

concerning

Kunstwollen and

weltanschauung

was

a

totalizing, harmonizing,

and

comprehensive

whole,

unified

in

mean-

ing.

These aims resembled God.

In

discussing

their

theories,

Mannheim

and

Panofsky

produced images

of an

organic,

self-contained universe

laden with

meaning.

That

both

men

adopted

hermeneutics to attain this

godlike

totalizing

whole is

not

surprising,

since hermeneutics

was

devel-

self,

as

lecturer,

a

salary.

From

1921

on,

he was

courted

by

other

universities,

and Gustav

Pauli and other friends

continually urged

the

Hamburg University

administration to

make

him

a

professor

before

they

lost him

(Hochschulwesen

Dozenten

und Personalakten IV

1204,

Staatsarchiv

Hamburg).

64.

I

am

referring only

to

Mannheim's

1923

On the

Interpretation

of

Weltan-

schauung

essay.

Later,

in

Ideology

and

Utopia,

Mannheim

attempted

to harmonize science

and the circle

of

understanding.

65.

Robert

Klein,

Thoughts

on

Iconography

(1963),

Form and

Meaning:

Essays

on the

Renaissance

and Modern

Art,

trans. Madeline

Jay

and Leon

Wieseltier

(Princeton,

N.J.,

1979),

pp.

143-60.

Klein's

essay

is

very interesting

and

very

critical

of the hierarchical

structure

of

Panofsky's iconology.

Klein

constantly

refers

to the hermeneutic nature

of

iconology.

He

concludes

his

essay

with three

central

paradoxes

in

iconology:

understand-

ing [Verstehen]results in objectification, objectification annuls understanding, and the

understanding

of

history

is itself historical.

(One

might

ask what kind

of

objectification?)

Panofsky

and Klein were

friends,

and

Panofsky

read

the

article

(in

1963

when it was first

published)

and commented

favorably

in

a

letter to

Klein.

However,

even in

this

response

he

never used

the

word

hermeneutics,

nd I

have

not

found the word

in

any

of his

letters

or writ-

ings

to date.

Panofsky

wrote

to

Klein,

I

feel

both

honored and

slightly

embarrassed

by

the

fact that

I seem

to

have reached

the

stage

of

being

commented

upon

instead

of

comment-

ing,

and have learned to

understand

myself

better

in

the

light

of

your

brilliant

and,

on

the

whole,

affirmative

exegesis

(17

Feb.

1964).








562

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

The

Fate

of

Their

Theories

in Exile

The theory Panofsky elaborated became the mainstay of the growing

discipline

in

America

in

the

postwar period,

when Americans were

eager

to learn from their

prestigious European counterparts,

who had emi-

grated

to

escape persecution.

Art

history

in

the United States before the

emigration

in

the

1930s

was a small

field,

and the

prestigious

figures

in

it were often the

indepen-

dently wealthy

WASP

cliche,

with

the

notable

exception

of the

young

Meyer

Schapiro

at

Columbia.68

This is not to

say

that these were not schol-

arly

men,

only

to note how much the

demographics

of

the

discipline

has

changed.

Women,

though

often-then as now-interested students of art

history,

were

systematically

excluded

from

professorships, although

a

number

held

prestigious

museum

appointments. Foreigners

and

Jews,

on

the other

hand,

were

largely

unrepresented.

Panofsky

recorded

his aston-

ishment when the Boston Museum of Fine Arts

appointed

as head of deco-

rative arts

Georg

Swarzenski,

who had been director of

the

Frankfurt

Stfdel

Museum for

thirty years,

and his son Hanns Swarzenski to the

Department

of

Painting,

because

foreigners

in

general,

Jewish

or

not,

sim-

ply

were not considered for

museum

positions.69

In

1930,

Panofsky

was recruited for the

fledgling

department

at New

York

University

and,

in

1931,

he

began spending

half a

year

in

New York

and half a

year

at

Hamburg University

where he was a

full

professor.70

thinking

in the

argument

of

the

book,

which was evidence

of the

compromise

Mannheim

was

attempting

to

make

between his

German roots and

the

sociology

of

England,

his

adopted country.

Adorno states that the

liberal,

who

sees

no

way

out,

makes himself the

spokesman

of

a dictatorial

arrangement

of

society

even

while he

imagines

he is

opposing

it

(p.

48).

Martin

Jay provides

an

interesting

critique

of Adorno's

analysis

in The Frankfurt

School's

Critique

of Karl Mannheim

and

the

Sociology

of

Knowledge,

Permanent Exiles:

Essays

on the Intellectual

Migration

rom Germany

o

America

(New

York,

1985),

pp.

62-78.

Jay

turns Adorno's

criticism

around and notes that Adorno failed to understand

Mannheim's

challenge:

what is the Archimedean

point

in

which a true

consciousness can be said to be

grounded? (p.

72).

This takes

us

back to

Dilthey's

and Husserl's dilemma in the

first

dec-

ade

of

the

twentieth

century.

68.

Panofsky

described

American

art

history

in rosier

hues

in Three Decades

of Art

History

in the

United

States,

but

in

his

personal correspondence

he was

far

more critical.

69.

Panofsky,

letter to Hanns

Swarzenski,

4

Apr.

1949: it is

a

tremendous distinction

for an

emigrant

scholar to be offered a

permanent position

at an American

museum of

the

rank

of

the

M.F.A.

at

Boston.

There are several other statements to

this effect in

Panofsky's

correspondence.

70. Richard

Offner,

letter to

Panofsky,

13

Dec.

1930,

wherein

Offner

invited

Panofsky

to teach

in

the

graduate

division of

the

College

of Fine Arts at NYU.

Panofsky

told

the

Hamburg

Hochschulbeh6rde that

he needed a leave since

he

had

just

turned

down an offer

at

Heidelberg

University,

and

he

wanted to take the U.S.

position.

Senator

Chapeaurouge

of

the

Hamburg

Assembly

asked the

Hochschulbeh6rde to

deny Panofsky's

leave

for

fear








Critical

Inquiry

Spring

1993

563

When he was

dismissed

from the

university

at

Hamburg

in

1933

by

the

Nazis,

he

decided

to

emigrate

and his

family

moved

in

1934.71

In

1935,

the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton invited Panofsky to become

one of

its

original

members. Thus

Panofsky,

by

virtue

of his

incredible

scholarship

and

extreme

good

fortune,

was

placed

in

a

position

to

ensure

the

future

of his

own

work and that of his

colleagues

and

students.

He

helped

(among

others)

his

professor

from

Freiburg

University,

Walter

Friedlaender,

come

to teach

at the Institute of Fine

Arts

at

NYU,

as well

as

Karl

Lehmann,

the

classical

archaeologist.

His

German

and American

students

read like

a who's who in

the

discipline:

Peter

Janson,

Adolf

Katzenellenbogen,

Walter

Horn,

Hugo

Buchthal,

Ludwig

Heydenreich,

Marilyn and Irving Lavin, George Kubler, Edgar Wind, Frederick

Hartt,

William

Heckscher,

Colin

Eisler,

and Lotte

Brand-Philip, among

many

others.

Karl

Mannheim,

like

Panofsky,

was

fortunate

again

in his

second

jour-

ney

into

exile,

which took

him

to

England

in

1933

to lecture

on

sociology

at the

London School

of

Economics.72

Mannheim's

strategy

of

adaptation

to

this new cultural

matrix was

more

startling

than

Panofsky's.

His

pub-

lished work

changed

dramatically

after 1933. His

earlier

epistemological

concerns in the

sociology

of

knowledge

receded,

and

pragmatic problems

of social

planning

and reform in the liberal state took

precedence.

One

can

ascribe this

shift

in his

research

to a sense of

urgency

in

the need

to

that

they

would

lose

their

best

professor

(Hochschulwesen

Dozenten

und Personalakten

IV

1204,

Staatsarchiv

Hamburg).

71. See

Panofsky,

Three Decades

of

Art

History

in

the United

States,

pp.

321-22.

Shortly

after

taking power

in

1933,

the Nazis

instituted a law for

the

purification

of the

civil

service,

the

Wiederherstellung

des

Berufsbeamtentums.

They

sent

a

questionnaire

to

all

civil servants, which included all

professors

at German universities, to discover their

racial

origins.

On the basis

of the

7

April

1933

questionnaire,

mostJews

and

political

and

cultural dissidents

were

immediately

fired.

Even in liberal

Hamburg,

the law

took

immedi-

ate effect. Most

astonishing

is the fact

that two

museum directors in

Hamburg

with

pure

Aryan

roots-Gustav Pauli of the

Kunsthalle

and Max

Sauerlandt

of

the Museum

of Arts

and

Crafts-were

also

immediately

fired.

Their

impurity

resulted from

collecting

mod-

ern

art.

There

are

some remarkable

letters in the

Panofsky

Papers

between

Panofsky

and

Pauli,

Udo

von

Alvensleben

(an

aristocratic friend

and

student

of

Panofsky),

and

Peter

von

Blanckenhagen

(a

student and later classical

archaeologist),

during

the

period

of

1933-34

when

Panofsky

was in the

process

of

leaving Germany.

Von

Blanckenhagen

was

one of the

few

students

who

wrote

to

Panofsky

when

he

read the

newspaper

in

April

1933 and

learned

of

Panofsky's

dismissal

from the

university.

It

is a

moving

document,

for he

explained

to

Panofsky

that

not

all

Germans

support

Hitler

and that

resistance is bound

to

result.

Von

Alvensleben saw

the immediate

danger

and

offered

sanctuary

to Dora

Panofsky

and

their

sons

(Panofsky

was

already

in

the United

States).

Pauli tried to

convince

Panofsky

to

stay,

and in

these letters

Panofsky

explained

his reasons for

leaving.

72.

See

Simonds,

Karl

Mannheim's

Sociology

of

Knowledge, pp.

5-6,

and

Gunter W.

Remmling,

The

Sociology

of

Karl

Mannheim

(London,

1975),

pp.

83-103.








564

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and

Mannheim

reform

society,

resulting

from his direct

experience

of the

German disas-

ter.73

The

Anglo-American

tradition of social science was

positivist,

and

Mannheim courted acceptance in his new environment. He succeeded. In

1946 he

accepted

a

position

in

the Institute

of

Education at the

University

of

London,

where he could

pursue

his

interest

in

the

development

of

pub-

lic education.

He

took the

position

of

director of

European

UNESCO

prior

to his death

in

1947.

Panofsky

had to make a

different kind of

adjustment

in

America.

The

natural

sciences,

particularly

physics,

were the status

disciplines

in

America,

not

the humanities.

(Panofsky's

two sons became

scientists.)

The humanities

were

largely

nontheoretical,

even antitheoretical.

Panofsky's work, even when he did not discuss theory, was initially diffi-

cult for American art historians to understand.74 There

was no

tradition

in

the United States

comparable

to

that

which had existed

in

Europe.

Panofsky

set about

recreating

the

European

tradition in the U.S. insofar

as he

could,

but he

proceeded

cautiously,

with

charm,

and

by

demon-

strating

the

usefulness

of

iconology,

not

through theorizing

about

it.

He

left

his

legacy

through

his students and

his

publications.

His

later

pub-

lished works

were devoid

of the

philosophical

jargon

and difficult con-

struction

of his earlier work. He

believed that it was

in

learning

English

73.

Remmling

believed that Mannheim's

direction

changed

in

England

as

a result

of

the need

to

adapt

to

the new academic

philosophy

and

his own

desire

to

transform

society.

This is a kinder

interpretation

than

Simonds

gave.

Paul

Kecskemeti,

in

his

introduction to

Mannheim's

Essays

on

Sociology

and

Social

Psychology,

ed. Kecskemeti

(London,

1953),

assigned

great

importance

to

the idea

of

structure in Mannheim's

early

work:

underly-

ing

this

concept

of

structure

was, then,

a

metaphysical,

quasi-religious

belief in

the

creative

function

of

history

(p.

1).

According

to

Kecskemeti,

totalitarianism broke the

spell

of his-

tory

for Mannheim.

Harmonizing

structure could no

longer

be

explained.

Kecskemeti

ascribed the

change

in

Mannheim's

work in

England

to the Nazi

experience

and the atmo-

sphere

of academic life in

Britain,

which he described as far less

Olympian

and inbred

and

in

which

sociology

was a new

and

less

important

field. Mannheim drew

on

Freudian

theory

to

develop

ideas on social

planning

in his

last works.

74.

Panofsky

admitted

in

a

letter

to Monsieur

le

Chevalier

Guy

de Schoutheete de

Tervarent,

a

diplomat

and

iconographer

(17

Feb.

1966),

that

Studies

in

Iconology

could

safely

be

entitled Studies

in

Iconography :

When it was

published

the

very

term

iconology,

as

yet

unknown in

America,

proved

to

be

puzzling

to

certain

colleagues

and one of them

(the

late-lamented

Henry

Francis

Taylor,

the Director of the

Metropolitan

Museum)

became so

angry

that

he

made me

personally

responsible

for

the rise

of

Hitler,

saying

that

it

was

small

wonder

that

stu-

dents confronted

with this kind of

incomprehensible

and

useless

investigation,

turned

to National

Socialism

in

despair.

He,

of

course,

had never heard

of

Ripa

and his

fol-

lowing;

nor

had

he ever

thought

of

the difference between

iconology

and

iconography

as it was

understood

before what

may

be

called the

iconological

revolution. He

repented,

however,

in

the

end;

and

now,

I am

afraid,

things

have come to the

point

where

iconology

has entered a kind

of

Mannerist

phase

which evidences both the suc-

cesses and the

dangers

of

what we all have been

trying

to

do

during

the

last

few

decades.

Taylor's

letter

of

repentance

is

preserved,

undated,

in

the

Panofsky

Papers.








Critical

Inquiry Spring

1993 565

that

this transformation occurred. More

likely

it was his

adaptation

to

the

prevailing

academic

culture,

which

was

permeated

with

scientism,

that led to this change in his style.75

Art

history

in

America,

until the

arrival of

the

refugee

scholars,

was a

weak

discipline,

although

there

was a

strong

tradition

in

the

archaeology

and

analysis

of

medieval and

classical

art.

Connoisseurship

and

apprecia-

tionism

were

probably

the

strongest

currents

in

the

discipline.

Panofsky

and other

refugee

scholars were forced to come to terms with the

indige-

nous tradition that

they

had

previously

scorned. Even as late as

the late

1950s,

one of

Panofsky's

students wrote to

him in

despair

that she was

being

forced to

teach art

history

as

though

it

were timeless because her

colleagues believed historical methods are wrong and old-fashioned.

Her

superiors

insisted

that

by

discussing

an

artist

as

an

integral part

of

his

time,

I

deny

his

'free-will.'

76

Before

she

resigned,

she asked

Panofsky

what she should do.

His

answer

was

ajustification

of historical

methods:

It seems to

me that

just

historical

methods

are

the

only

ones that rec-

ognize

the

artist's

free will whereas all

nonhistorical methods-

whether

psychological

or,

God

forbid,

aesthetic-always preestablish

absolute standards

(mostly

unbeknownst to the writers or

speakers)

which tend to measure artistic achievements

by

the

prejudices

of the

speaker.

In

your

further discussions

you may

remind

your

interlocu-

tors

that

with

a

very

few

exceptions

no

artist,

however intense his

human

expression,

was ever

judged according

to his merits. We all

know that the whole

seventeenth

century

violently

disapproved

of

ce

fanfaron de

Michelange,

that

Shakespeare

and Rembrandt were

long

considered to be

barbarians,

and

that,

conversely,

such

German

writers

as

Scheffler looked

down

upon Raphael

as

a

producer

of

picture postcards

and

accepted only

what

they

thought

was

Gothic.

Thus,

who

are

we

to

pass judgment on,

or

even

to

understand,

the

works of art

produced

in

an

environment different from our own

if

not

by

the

application

of historical

methods?77

Although

Panofsky's

tone was

even,

he

had,

in

fact,

been

more

involved

in

the

fight against

appreciationism

than

he

admitted

here,

or in

Three

Decades of Art

History,

where he

painted

a

rosy

picture

of Amer-

ican

art

history.

Later he

told

his

student that it

was,

in

fact,

merely

because these

diabolical tendencies

began

to

get

hold

of the

College

Art

Association that I resigned from its board of directors. You and I (and, I

hope,

a few

others)

will have to

resign

ourselves to the role of reactionaries

75. He admitted this

link

with

the

pervading atmosphere

of

positivism

in

Three

Decades

of Art

History,

p.

329:

it was

a

blessing

for him

[the

emigrant]

to come into

contact-and

occasionally

into conflict-with an

Anglo-Saxon positivism.

76. Mirella Levi

D'Ancona,

letter to

Panofsky,

10 Dec.

1959.

77.

Panofsky,

letter to

D'Ancona,

15 Dec. 1959.








566

Joan

Hart

Panofsky

and Mannheim

who,

in

the

end,

may yet prove

to be ahead of the

general

swim. ' 78

t

would be

interesting

to know more

about

the

history

of

this

appreciation-

ism that sounds like I. A. Richards's New Criticism applied to the visual

arts,

that

is,

taking

a

text

or work of art

completely

out of context to dis-

cuss its

intrinsic

meaning.79

While art

appreciation

courses are still

taught,

the

historical method

of the

emigrants

dominates

in

art

history

programs

today.

The

United

States

became

deprovincialized;

students came

from

abroad to

study

here,

and

European professors

often came

to teach

here. This

process

has con-

tinued,

although

new theories from

abroad

have

recently challenged

the

older,

entrenched

theory

of

iconography.

Panofsky radically changed the discipline of art history in America.

From his

central

position

at

the

Institute for Advanced

Study,

which

he

made into

his

fiefdom,

he

exerted the

greatest

authority

in the

discipline

during

his

lifetime;

he was

cherished

in

this role.

In

Germany,

Panofsky

and Mannheim

could

proceed

along

similar

theoretical

paths

that

privi-

leged

the

cultural sciences over the natural sciences.

For

Panofsky

in

the

United

States,

their common route culminated

in

the formulation of

iconology,

an almost

theological harmonizing

of

meaning

in

the visual

arts.

With

the

emigration,

Mannheim and

Panofsky

had to

adjust

to

dif-

ferent ecological matrixes: Mannheim to the Anglo-American positivist

strain

in

the social sciences and

Panofsky

to the

atheoretical,

incipient

art

history

in

America.

Despite

their later

changes,

it

was

their

early

theoreti-

cal

work,

in

which

they

had

cooperated,

that

ultimately

had the

greatest

impact

in

their

new

environments.80

78.

Panofsky,

letter to

D'Ancona,

7 Oct. 1960.

79.

Panofsky

characterized

appreciationism

in

Three Decades

of

Art

History,

but it

would be

worthwhile

to consider its

origins

and

protagonists.

There are some

suggestive

letters

from

Panofsky

to

Sumner

Crosby,

the

Yale

medievalist,

during

Panofsky's

tenure as

a member of the

College

Art Association's board of

directors

(see,

for

example,

the

letter

of

2

June 1941). Wolfgang Panofsky

informed me

in a

recent letter that

his

father

was

very

critical

of

art

appreciation

in

Germany. Accordingly,

Panofsky

refused

requests

by

art deal-

ers and collectors

for

statements

of

attribution,

authenticity,

or

quality

of

artworks,

although

sometimes

he

gave

detailed

information

about

the item

if he

found it

interesting.

80.

Mannheim's

Ideology

and

Utopia:

An

Introduction

to the

Sociology

of

Knowledge

(1929;

New

York,

1936)

was

the

culmination

of

his

early

theoretical

essays

and

his

most

complete

exposition

of his

hermeneutic method.

Sociologists

in

the United

States,

notably

C.

Wright

Mills and Daniel

Bell,

found it

compelling,

for

different

reasons,

in

the

1960s. See

C.

Wright

Mills,

The

Sociological Imagination

(London, 1959),

p.

168.

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