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Alexander Kanoldt
The Red Belt
1929
oil on canvas
Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich |
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Adélaïde Labille-Guiard
Portrait of a Woman
ca. 1788
oil on canvas
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Carcassonne |
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Ludwig Hohlwein
Münchner Illustrierte
(magazine)
ca. 1926
offset print (poster)
Kunstbibliothek, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin |
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Max Beckmann
Two Women
1940
oil on canvas
Museum Ludwig, Cologne |
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Anonymous French Artist
Casque à la Minerve, ou, La Dragone
ca. 1780
drawing (print study)
Museum für Angewandte Kunst, Vienna |
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Moritz Michael Daffinger
Portrait of Natalie, Baroness Vogel von Friesenhof
ca. 1835
watercolor miniature on ivory
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna |
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Jan Anthonisz van Ravesteyn
Portrait of Bartha van Montfoort
1634
oil on panel
David Collection, Copenhagen |
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attributed to Jacob Gole
Portrait of Mary II, Queen of England
ca. 1689-94
mezzotint
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge |
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Paulus Moreelse
Shepherdess
1624
oil on canvas
Alte Pinakothek, Munich |
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Wilhelm Leibl
Portrait of Lina Kirchdorffer
1871
oil on canvas
Alte Pinakothek, Munich |
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Vivant-Denon
Portrait of Madame Mosion
ca. 1780
etching
Graphische Sammlung, ETH Zürich |
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Daniel Gardner
Portrait of Mrs Anastasia Robinson
ca. 1785
pastel and gouache on paper, mounted on canvas
Milwaukee Art Museum |
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Jacques-Louis David
Posthumous Portrait of Antoinette-Gabrielle Danton
(died in childbirth, wife of politician Georges Danton)
1793
oil on canvas
Musée Saint-Loup, Troyes |
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Gwen John
The Nun
ca. 1915-20
oil on canvas
Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea |
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Anonymous Italian Artist
Portrait of a Woman
ca. 1910
oil on panel
(forgery of Piero della Francesca)
Musées d'Art et d'Histoire, Genève |
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Yva (Else Simon)
Model wearing Adornments
from the Museum of Ethnology
1933
gelatin silver print
Kunstbibliothek, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin |
Where the sphere of practical objects ends, and that of "art" begins, depends, then, on the "intention" of the creators. This "intention" cannot be absolutely determined. In the first place, "intentions" are,
per se, incapable of being defined with scientific precision. In the second place, the "intentions" of those who produce objects are conditioned by the standards of their period and environment. Classical taste demanded that private letters, legal speeches and the shields of heroes should be "artistic" (with the possible result of what might be called fake beauty), while modern taste demands that architecture and ash trays should be "functional" (with the possible result of what might be called fake efficiency).*
*"Functionalism" means, strictly speaking, not the introduction of a new aesthetic principle, but a narrower delimitation of the aesthetic sphere. When we prefer the modern steel helmet to the shield of Achilles, or feel that the "intention" of a legal speech should be definitely focused on the subject matter and should not be shifted to the form ("more matter with less art," as Queen Gertrude rightly puts it), we merely demand that arms and legal speeches should not be treated as works of art, that is, aesthetically, but as practical objects, that is, technically. However, we have come to think of "functionalism" as a postulate instead of an interdict. The Classical and Renaissance civilizations, in the belief that a merely useful thing could not be "beautiful" ("non può essere bellezza e utilità," as Leonardo da Vinci puts it), are characterized by a tendency to extend the aesthetic attitude to such creations as are "naturally" practical; we have extended the technical attitude to such creations as are "naturally" artistic. This, too, is an infringement, and, in the case of "streamlining," art has taken its revenge. "Streamlining" was, originally, a genuine functional principle based on the results of scientific research on air resistance. Its legitimate sphere was therefore the field of fast-moving vehicles and of structures exposed to wind pressure of an extraordinary intensity. But when this special and truly technical device came to be interpreted as a general and aesthetic principle expressing the twentieth-century ideal of "efficiency" ("streamline your mind!"), and was applied to arm chairs and cocktail shakers, it was felt that the original scientific streamline had to be "beautified"; and it was finally retransferred to where it rightfully belongs in a thoroughly non-functional form. As a result, we now less often have houses and furniture functionalized by engineers, than automobiles and railroad trains de-functionalized by designers.
– Erwin Panofsky, from The History of Art as a Humanistic Discipline (1940)
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