Terms of Style in Art History

Fundamental to art history since Johann Joachim Winckelmann's Geschichte der Kunst des Alterthums, the history of styles literally haunts discipline. It periodically returns to the heart of criticism. Interdisciplinary approaches have quickly pointed out the need to think of styles not only as classificatory categories, but also as historical concepts in their own right, ready to be used as objects of analysis. This methodological approach is at the center of the present book devoted to stylistic nomenclatures, which makes available the result of an international conference organized by the Academy of France in Rome - Villa Medici, the Istituto Svizzero and the Bibliotheca Hertziana - Max Planck Institute for Art History. It introduces case studies questioning the various constructions that accompanied the emergence and semantic development of certain key terms in art history. It also includes examples from fields often forgotten in the literature on stylistic nomenclature, such as fashion or theater. In short, this book should be understood as a proposal and an encouragement to reflect on the disciplinary heritage left, for better or for worse, by the history of styles in all spheres of visual culture.