Subjectivity in Connoisseurship

Some 19th century connoisseurs by Honoré Daumier.

I’ve been fascinated by the debate that is emerging on subjectivity in connoisseurship, but have had precious little time to join in.

Last year we had Martin Kemp expressing this view in Nature, one of the world’s leading scientific journals

“The standard art-historical arguments centre around connoisseurship- the validation of the attribution by an expert’s eye. Although connoisseurship still has a role to play, and many experts depend upon it, it involves subjective criteria that should long have been superseded as the key tool of attribution.”

Unsurprisingly, Kemp was writing about the Salvator Mundi. Similar remarks were made by Bendor Grosvenor on Art History News last week, in response to Charles Hope (and others) “subjective” evaluation of the Salvator Mundi.

“This seems to be yet another case of the Salvator Mundi producing entirely subjective responses. Many of those who have declared it to be either by or not by Leonardo have gone on to describe their reasoning in subjective terms. Here it is too 'dull'. Andrew Graham-Dixon said it lacked 'the spark of inner life and feeling'. Readers will know of other similar views. And I'm sorry, but it isn't good enough. Attributions cannot be made or dismissed on a viewer's own human response to a painting. One person's 'dull' picture can be another's 'magical' one.”

I’m not going to comment on the Salvator Mundi, but I’d love to be present at the forthcoming New York colloquium on it and other works. Sure to be some emotion there.

Finally, Three Pipe Problem had an interesting post on the controversial side of connoisseurship, focussing on Giorgione attributions, and ending on a note of incredulity at Bernard Berenson’s expertizing that consisted of turning self-assured opinion into fact, which this writer still sees in today’s attribution culture:

“Even acknowledging the benefits of hindsight, and modern access to better images and technical data, we must still puzzle at the confidence with which observers make their statements, often written as fact.”

Can an expert’s eye be completely free of emotion, subjectivity, any kind of feelings when making an attribution, or even just contemplating a painting? I don’t know about others, but my eye can’t be completely dispassionate when looking at art.

Berenson again, from his diary in 1890: “First I must keenly enjoy a picture, then I can write about it.” “This, I suppose, is not scientific.”

I think all this comes under what could be called the “aesthetics of connoisseurship,” a theme l’ll return to via a review of a book about the Eastlakes, in due course.

Comments

[H Niyazi]

Cheers for the mention David - that Berenson backflip on the Allendale was fascinating to look into and write about - what a mess!

This is becoming an increasingly discussed topic - and no longer just the domain of specialists - as shows like "Fake or Fortune" have demonstrated. Even reading public comments at places like the Guardian arts blogs, people seem to be more conscious of attributions and the questions they give rise to.

We seem to be bombarded by attribution claims these days, and the individuals entrusted to do the work to verify the claims made are going to have to bring quantitative and qualitative factors into their analysis. With the prices involved and the legal ramifictaions implied - the stakes are higher than ever to develop a sound methodology.

The New York colloquium definitely sounds interesting ; attracting much less attention but equally fascinating was a very recent symposium in San Franscisco on digital techniques used in art verification. I hope its content is published at some point.

Speaking of blockbuster attributions, your readers may be interested in the details behind the *two* Michelangelo paintings from New York and Oxford, forwarded by Antonio Forcellino in 2010. A full write up, incorporating the hefty amount of sources related to it is now up at 3PP.

http://www.3pipe.net/2012/02/search-for-truth-and-clarity.html

Kind Regards
H Niyazi
3PipeProblem

[dzone]

I like your post. You make some good points.
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