When Little Girls Become Junior Connoisseurs: A Cautionary Tale of Art Museum Education

in the Hyperreal
Author(s): Melinda M. Mayer
Source: Journal of Aesthetic Education, Vol. 40, No. 3 (Autumn, 2006), pp. 48-58
Published by: University of Illinois Press
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When
Little Girls Become
Junior
Connoisseurs:
A
Cautionary
Tale of Art Museum Education in
the
Hyperreal
MELINDA M. MAYER
Introducing
the Tale
A
young girl
about eleven
years
old
appeared
on the TV screen. She stood
in an art museum
expounding upon
the
painting hanging
behind her. She
talked about the artist and what the
image portrayed.
With an air of elitist
prissiness
that suited the museum
environment,
the
girl
delivered her
pre-
sentation to a
group
of schoolmates. As I and the other art museum educa-
tors assembled in the conference room where the video was shown
learned,
the
girl
had
participated
in a
program
at a
prominent
art museum in which
students from her school came to the museum
many
times
during
the school
year.
This
repeat-visit program
culminated with these
youngsters
demon-
strating
what
they
learned about art
by giving
a talk on a
single
artwork to
friends,
family,
or other classmates. The
girl's
recitation of art
historically
correct information was
impressive.
She sounded
just
like a
junior
art histo-
rian.
Yet,
something
was
missing.
The little
girl appeared
to
copy
the
style
of
art historical talk more than its content. I turned to the
colleague sitting
next
to me and
wondered,
"Did that
girl
learn how to make
meaning
or how to
talk like a curator?"
Despite
the several
years
that have
passed
since the
conference,
the im-
age
of that little
girl lingers
in
my
mind. A
repeat-visit
school
program
is
what an art museum educator
working
with school tours desires.' All an art
museum educator can
hope
to
impart
on a one-shot tour is a
simple expo-
sure to art and the museum.
Hopefully,
that one encounter will result in a
lifelong appreciation
of art and art
museums,
but that is a tall order for one
field
trip. Repeat-visit programs, by
contrast,
allow
knowledge
and skills
related to art to be
presented
in the school and museum and reinforced in
subsequent
sessions. Students can learn to
meaningfully interpret
the content
Melinda M.
Mayer
is on the
faculty
of the Art
Education/Visual
Art Studies Division
at the
University
of Texas at Austin. Her recent
publications
include
"Bridging
the
Theory-Practice
Divide in
Contemporary
Art Museum Education" in Art Education
(March 2005),
and "A Postmodern Puzzle:
Rewriting
the Place of the Visitor in Art
Museum Education" in Studies in Art Education
(Spring
2005).
Journal of
Aesthetic
Education,
Vol.
40,
No.
3,
Fall 2006
02006
Board of Trustees of the
University
of Illinois
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When Little Girls Become
Junior
Connoisseurs 49
of works of art as well as make
personal
connections with them. The
girl
in
the
video, however,
did not
appear
to be
engaged
in
meaning-making.
No
hint that the
painting
had
metaphorically
come off of the museum wall and
moved into her life
experience appeared
in the
girl's presentation.
Instead,
she
successfully
imitated the manner of an art historian.
In the
essay
"The Precession of
Simulacra,"
the French
sociologist
Jean
Baudrillard theorizes that
reality
or
meaning
no
longer
exist.2 Like the
Moebus
strip,
which when
split generates
a
duplicate
of
itself,
what we ex-
perience
as
reality
in this
increasingly
mediated
age
in which we live is no
more than the
repeated
circulation of models or simulacra. Rather than
models
emerging
out of real
phenomena
or
originals, they beget
them-
selves-models
precede
models.
Any
notion of
reality implodes
in the cir-
culation of these simulations.
Reality
becomes what Baudrillard calls the
hyperreal-simulation generating
simulation. What does this
imply
for vi-
sual art?
Interpretation
of
meaning
in artworks would not reveal some
rep-
resented truth of human
experience;
instead it would be the
repetition
of
interpretive
forms
masking
that there is no
reality
to
represent.
The talk
by
the little
girl
in the video indicated that art museum
education,
at least in
that
program,
had become the
perpetuation
of a model of
inquiry.
Rather
than
making meaning,
the
girl reproduced
the aesthetics of art
history
in-
terpretation.
Even under the ideal circumstances of a
repeat-visit
school
program,
the
girl
became the
perfect
model of a
petite
connoisseur.
Although
the video
depicts
one little
girl
in one art museum
program,
is
there not a
cautionary
tale here for the field of art museum
education?3
When visitors to art
museums,
including
children on school field
trips, par-
ticipate
in educational
programs,
are
they engaging
in
meaning-making
or
an
experience
in the
hyperreal?
In
theory
art museum educators
espouse
facilitating meaning-making
as their
mission; however,
in
practice
are
they
falling
into a vortex of
recycling
the models of art historical
interpretation
they
assimilated
during
their own education? Do
they replicate
the form of
the model rather than the substance of
interpretation?
Whether or not these
educators
agree
with Baudrillard's
premise
that
meaning
no
longer
exists,
when the
programs they design
cause visitors
merely
to imitate art
history
inquiry,
the effect is the
precession
of simulacra. The
model,
not
meaning,
precedes
the educational endeavor.
To delve into the lessons of this tale I will look at three models of art
history inquiry taught
in
university programs during
the twentieth
century
and,
as the
story
of the
girl
indicates,
that recirculate
today
in museum edu-
cation
practice.
I will address the
question,
How
might
these models
oper-
ate to inhibit art museum visitors in
making meaning
in relation to works of
art? To answer the
question
I will use Baudrillard's
theory
of simulacra to
examine Ernst Gombrich's
perceptualism,
Erwin
Panofsky's iconology,
and
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50
Mayer
connoisseurship.
First, however,
what is
meaning-making
in the context of
art museum education?
Art Museum Education and
Meaning-Making
Whether we are
discussing subject
matter, content,
or what the artist meant
to
convey,
we are
interpreting meaning
from works of art. Since its
incep-
tion,
the
discipline
of art
history
involved
developing
and
applying
models
of
interpretation
to derive
meaning
from works of art.4 It
is,
in
fact,
hard to
conceive of
meaning-making
without some model of
interpretation
to
guide
inquiry.
In
presenting
works of art
chronologically, stylistically, geographi-
cally,
or
thematically,
art museums
represent
institutionalized models of in-
terpretation.
Exhibition
practices
and
publications
such as
catalogs repre-
sent
ways
of
seeing, interpreting,
and
understanding meaning
in works of
art. Art museum educators also work within the context of models. In de-
signing programs
for the
public,
museum educators use and teach
inquiry
models "to enhance the visitor's
ability
to understand and
appreciate origi-
nal works of
art."5
The little
girl
in the video had
certainly
learned a model
of
interpretation during
the museum
program
she
experienced.
How could
she not be
engaged
in
meaning-making?
Baudrillard's
theory
does not contest the existence of models but rather
the connection of models to an
original,
a
reality.
Art museums house
origi-
nal works of art.
Yet,
the work of art itself is a
representation
of an
object,
idea,
or
phenomena. Any reality
involved in works of
art, therefore,
would
have to exist in the broader world of culture. In order for art
history inquiry
models to
produce interpretations
that remain connected to some notion of
a
reality, they
must relate to life. As far back as the
1980s,
art museum edu-
cators defined as
part
of their mission
enabling
visitors to take what
they
learned from works of art and "to transfer these
experiences
into other as-
pects
of the visitors' lives."6
Contemporary
museum
teaching
theories and
strategies
assert that visitors make
meaning by integrating
new information
into their preexisting ways of knowing.7 Interpretation is an interactive pro-
cess
through
which visitors
gain insight
into life.
Perhaps they
will use their
new
knowledge
in their lives
beyond
the museum walls.
When education
programs
focus
inquiry
on
disseminating
some notion
of content from within the work of
art,
meaning-making
is one-sided and
art
inquiry
models are
simply reproduced.
The
reality
to which models of
interpretation
should be anchored in art museum education is the visitors'
own lives. When
inquiry
models do not allow visitors to
forge
that link
with their lived
experience, meaning-making collapses
into the
hyperreal.
Little
girls interpreting paintings
mimic art historians.
Examining
the
fea-
tures of art
history inquiry
models
commonly
used in art museums could
reveal features within the models that
permit
them to
spin
into simulations
of themselves.
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When Little Girls Become
Junior
Connoisseurs 51
Art Historical
Mapmaking
Baudrillard
opens
"The Precession of Simulacra"
by relaying
the
Borges
tale as the "finest
allegory
of
simulation."8
In this fable the
mapmakers
of
the
Empire produce
a
map
of such exactitude that it
perfectly
covers the
land. The abstraction of the
map replaces
the
reality
of the land. As the Em-
pire
deteriorates so too does the
map.
The
Empire
and the
map appear
to be
and become one in their deterioration-the true and the false
disintegrate
into each other. Baudrillard identifies this
collapse
of difference between
the real and the
imaginary
as a second-order simulacra. The arena of simu-
lation is the
hyperreal,
wherein models
produce
themselves rather than
representing
realities.
The
Borges
fable is an
especially apt metaphor
for modernist art
history
methods of
interpretation.
When the
postmodern critique
of modernist art
history erupted
in the 1980s and 1990s
many
art historians drew
upon
car-
tographic metaphors
in their
writing.9
Preziosi,
Holly,
and Bal used verbs
such as
"map," "survey,"
"chart,"
and
"plot"
to describe the nature of the
modernist art historical
enterprise.10 Interpretation
of works of art was a
process through
which the
unified,
inherent truth of the work of art was re-
vealed, identified,
and situated. With all the detail and
fidelity
a
Borges
car-
tographer
could
muster,
the art historian
mapped
the truth or
reality repre-
sented
through
the work of art.
Throughout
the twentieth
century
various
inquiry
models
developed
that relied
upon
this
mapping process.
Ernst
Gombrich
developed
a
perceptual
model based
upon
the
perceptions
of the
mind."1
The
iconology
of Erwin
Panofsky posited
a humanistic
approach
to
art historical
inquiry.12 Connoisseurship
was an
applied approach
to mod-
ernist art
history
that became
widely pursued by
curators in art museums
during
the twentieth
century.13
As will be seen
below,
through
these mod-
els
mapmaking
can
easily supercede meaning-making.
When
interpretation
becomes confined to
mapping
the work of
art,
it becomes an aesthetic
project
without connection to a
reality.
Ernst Gombrich's
Perceptualism
One of the most
broadly
influential art historians of the twentieth
century
was Austrian-born Ernst Gombrich
(1909-2001).
Until
recently
Gombrich's
The
Story of
Art was a common text used in
college
art
appreciation
courses,
thus
forming
students' notions of
interpretation.14
Gombrich's model is still
heard when students in the
academy
or visitors to museums focus their in-
quiry
on
discerning
what the artist meant to
convey
in
creating
a
particular
art
object. Bryson
calls Gombrich's method the
"perceptualist"
account of
analyzing images.15 Accordingly, interpretation
is anchored in the
process
of artistic
perception.
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52
Mayer
Gombrich's
theory
of art
making
is foundational to
understanding
the
model of art
history inquiry
that arose from it. He theorized art
making
as a
cultural
practice
more than the direct
recording
of nature. The
artist,
condi-
tioned
by
the
history
of
representation preceding
him or
her,
encounters na-
ture with a set of
stereotypes
or schema in mind. These schema are the col-
lected and modified
perceptions
of the artistic tradition that
produced
the
artist. What the artist's
eye
beholds is less determined
by
the reflection of
light
off an
object
and onto the retina and more
by
the artistic conventions
of the culture. Art
emerges
from
pictorial language,
not from nature. As
Gombrich
states,
"All art
originates
in the human
mind,
in our reactions to
the world rather than in the visible world itself."16 In a similar fashion to
Baudrillard,
Gombrich framed the artistic
process
as the
generation
of mod-
els. He would
part
with
Baudrillard, however,
by identifying
schema as re-
alities.
The science of
psychology, specifically
the
psychology
of artistic
percep-
tion,
informed Gombrich's
understanding
of art and artists. He had studied
the research and
writings
of
perceptual psychologists
Rudolf Arnheim and
Gustof
Britsch.17
Although psychology
articulated for Gombrich the act of
perception
as constructed in the human mind rather than the
eye,
it was the
importance
of the individual in the science of
psychology
that Gombrich
employed
to
distinguish
his art historical
practice
from that of his
peers.
The
Hegelian project
in which cultural
practices,
such as
art,
could be
traced to factors existent in the
spirit, zeitgeist,
of the times anchored art
historical
methodology among
Gombrich's fellow art
historians.18
His
peers
were identified as cultural art historians.
They sought
to
map
the
meaning
of a work of art
through
connective lines of influence discernible in the cul-
ture and
reflecting
a national
spirit.
A
unified,
true
meaning
of a work of
art,
thereby,
could be attained.
Despite
his own identification as a cultural
historian,
Gombrich believed
accounting
for the
meaning
of a work of art in the
zeitgeist
of the times was
too facile. This
approach
denied the artist's
ability
to choose to
differ,
and
thereby consciously
and
intentionally develop
one's own
style.
To
Hegel,
artists were members of a collective
society,
which was unified
through
the
spirit
inherent in the times. That
zeitgeist virtually predetermined
the
style
or manner used
by
the artist. To
Gombrich, however,
artists were indi-
vidual,
free
agents developing
their own
style regardless
of the
zeitgeist.
Gombrich's notion of individual
agency
as central in the
development
of
an artist's
style
and work informed his
philosophy
of the role of the art his-
torian in
discerning meaning
in art. He believed the art historian needed to
trace the
ways
in which individual artists differed from the
prevailing
artis-
tic mode of the
time,
rather than
attempt
to lock the artist into the
totality
of
a movement.19
Working
from the concentration on the individual, which
Gombrich derived from
psychology,
he infused
Hegelian
art historical
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When Little Girls Become
Junior
Connoisseurs 53
theory
with the notion of
meaning
derived from individual artistic inten-
tion.
A more
fitting description
of Gombrich's art historical
project,
in
fact,
might
be the
identification
of artistic intent rather than the
interpretation
of
meaning.
This intention was traceable
through
a scientific
empiricism
that
was indeed a
mapping project.20
Gombrich
adopted
the scientific method to
map
artistic intention. For
example,
in Art and Illusion Gombrich
hypothesized
his
theory
of
represen-
tation based on schema.
Step-by-step
he
systematically
confirmed his
hy-
pothesis.
The
truth,
the
reality,
of individual artists'
perceptions
(intentions)
are discovered and
mapped
in works Gombrich takes from the
history
of
art.21
Although
Gombrich
believed his
mapping
of the
stereotypes
held in
the minds of artists revealed the
reality
of artistic and human
experience,
a
hyperreal easily
results.
Stereotypes
and schema
precede
the
production
of
the artwork. Art
history inquiry collapses
the real and the model when us-
ing
Gombrich's method. When used in art museum education
programs,
what effects could Gombrich's model have on visitors?
Bryson
contends that the
perceptualist
account
places
the viewer in the
passive position
of
re-perceiving
the
image
created
by
the artist.22 As the
viewer
gazes upon
the
image,
his or her own
culturally
conditioned store of
schema are set in motion. A check for
correspondence
is made between the
viewer's schema and the
image. Adjustments
ensue,
and the viewer's
gaze
is modified. This act occurs
through
the communication of a
message,
the
artist's intent,
from the artist
through
the work of art to the viewer. The
opening
sections of The
Story of
Art illustrate the
point.
Gombrich establishes his mission in the
preface
of The
Story of
Art. He
wants the reader to understand the "master's artistic aims."23 Gombrich
cautions the reader not to fall into the
trap
of
judging
a work to be correct or
successful based on its
fidelity
to the visible world. Before
evaluating
a
work of art the
reader/viewer
must ascertain whether "the artist
may
have
had his reasons for
changing
the
appearance
of what he saw."24
Through
his text Gombrich instructs the reader as to how to
go
about this task.
Gombrich's
reader/viewer is a
passive
receiver of artistic intent. The
job
of
the
reader/viewer
is to alter his or her
perceptions
to accommodate the in-
tention of the artist. In
faithfully following
and
assimilating
the
map
of ar-
tistic
intention,
the
reader/viewer
enters the
hyperreal,
wherein the model
reproduces
itself. Museum visitors do not make
personally
relevant connec-
tions between works of art and their own lives
through
this
model; instead,
reality collapses
into the
map.
Erwin
Panofsky's Iconology
Erwin
Panofsky (1892-1968)
contrasted with Gombrich both in influence
and method.
Panofsky developed
the
theory
and
practice
of
iconology,
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54
Mayer
which
powerfully
influenced the field of art
history.25
The
interpretation
of
works of art
through
the
study
of
iconology
continues to thrive
among
art
historians in the
academy
and the museum. His influence on the
general
public,
however,
is less
discernable
than that of Gombrich.
Panofsky
differs
from Gombrich in another
important respect
as well. The use of
iconology
appears
to be a broader humanistic
process
of
interpreting meaning
than a
scientific
mapping
of artistic intent. The
Borges
fable does not fit as
readily
here. If
applied
in art museum education
programs,
therefore,
might
iconology
be less
likely
to result in a
hyperreal
of
interpretation
than with
Gombrich's
perceptualism? Might Panofsky's
method enable visitors to make
meanings
that connect works of art to their own lives?
Erwin
Panofsky
articulated the subtleties and
complexities
of his
theory
with
clarity
in "The
History
of Art as a Humanistic
Discipline"
and Studies
in
Iconology. Panofsky
believed
interpretation
to be an
organic
exercise,
re-
sulting
in a
meaningful
whole that "makes sense."26 In "The
History
of Art
as a Humanistic
Discipline," Panofsky
describes the art historian's
proce-
dure as
starting
in a scientific manner with
observation,
but
immediately
an
empathetic
re-creative
process
takes
place
in the researcher's mind. The im-
age
is to be
interpreted
in the context of culture.
Through
the
analysis
of
"man's"
records,
the humanist art historian
engages
in an
investigation
of
the
documents,
of the archive.
Investigating
the
meaning
of the document
rather than how it can be
used,
Panofsky
contends,
is what
distinguishes
the humanist from the scientist.27
Although Panofsky's approach
is more humanistic than
scientific,
it in-
volves three distinct
stages
to
interpretation.
First,
the literal
recognition
of
subject
matter and its
expressive qualities
is made.
Next,
the conventional
symbols (iconography) practiced
and understood at the time
period
are rec-
ognized. Finally, interpretation
moves into
iconology
or the
deciphering
of
the
deep
codes of
meaning
embedded in social
systems
and the
very
iden-
tity
of the artist.28 Rather than
tracing
direct lines of causation to artistic in-
tent as did
Gombrich,
Panofsky
creates a model with a hierarchical series of
steps laying
out a
path
to
meaning-a mapping project.
Since art museums serve the
general public, especially pertinent
to inter-
pretive
encounters with works of art in the museum
setting
is
Panofsky's
discussion of the difference between the naive beholder and the art historian.
The naive beholder is the individual who
enjoys looking
at and
interpreting
works of art but is
largely
unaware how one's own cultural context
shapes
the assessment of art
objects.
Furthermore,
the naive beholder does not re-
ally
care whether the
meaning
he or she derives is correct or not. The art
historian,
on the other
hand,
is aware of his or her "cultural
equipment."29
Panofsky points
out that the
expert
tries
diligently
to shed all
vestiges
of
this
culturally
constructed
subjectivity through
immersion in the records
surrounding
the work of art and its context of
production.
This is the re-
creative nature of
interpreting
works of art. As
Panofsky puts it, the art
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56
Mayer
Of the three art historical models examined
here,
connoisseurship
is
most
explicitly
a
mapmaking
model. The connoisseur is
virtually charting
the surface of the
object
and the land in which it exists
(its
style,
school,
pe-
riod,
lineage). Interpretation
of
meaning
is not the
goal.
This
rupture
illus-
trates Baudrillard's
theory
of the second-order
simulacra,
which hides the
absence of a basic
reality.
With
connoisseurship, ironically,
there is no
meaning, only
the work of
art,
which
ultimately
is a
reproduction,
a model.
Clearly
the
irony
lies not with Baudrillard's
theory
but in the stated
project
of
connoisseurship
as
authenticating
real works of art. As Baudrillard
points
out,
art
objects
are
abstractions,
not
realities.38
The
connoisseur,
thinking
to
map
the
reality
of the
original,
is
producing
a second-order simulacra.
Yet,
what is the
relationship
between
connoisseurship
and art museum education?
With the
emergence
of the new art histories in the late twentieth
century,
Preziosi,
Crimp,
and
Holly
each noted that what thrived in the art museum
was the connoisseur-like obsession with
arranging
art in terms of a
progres-
sive series of
styles
with traceable lines of influence and
exemplified by
master works.39 In
Rethinking
Art
History
Preziosi further observed that
even as feminist and
poststructural approaches
to art
history
arose in the
1970s,
iconography
and
connoisseurship
were the
prevailing
modes of in-
quiry
in the museum.40 The
galleries
of museums were
virtually
three-di-
mensional
maps charting
the course of the
history
of art.
Interpretation
was
not about
meaning-making
but rather about
properly hanging
the
object
in
its
precise
location
among
the succession of works. Museum visitors liter-
ally
move within the
map
that is the museum as
they
stroll from
gallery
to
gallery.
The museum is a
hyperreality.
As the viewer walks
through
the
clean,
well-lighted galleries,
his or her
eye
is
being
trained to
recognize
the
accurate
placement
of works. The connoisseur model is reflected in the la-
conic viewer. No
interpretation
takes
place.
No
connecting
of
meaning
in
works of art to life occurs. The
job
of the museum visitor is to
faithfully
follow the
map
from the Renaissance to the
Baroque
to Neoclassicism to
Romanticism to Realism and on and on. The
map
and the
empire
are one.
The Moral of the Tale
What is to be learned from the
mapping projects
of art
history?
And what is
the moral of the tale of the little
girl?
Art museum educators need to interro-
gate
the
inquiry
models
they
learned and
accepted through
their education
and
practice
and that
they
now
perpetuate. They
need to reflect on how
those models
operate.
Do
they
indoctrinate museum visitors into the
prin-
ciples
of
reading maps
of art historical
interpretation?
When the
inquiry
methods that educators use are confined or reduced to exercises in
map-
ping
artistic
intention,
reducing subjectivity,
or
examining
the surface
prop-
erties of works of art, meaning-making collapses.
Art museum education
enters the
hyperreal.
Little
girls
become
junior
connoisseurs.
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When Little Girls Become
Junior
Connoisseurs 57
On the other
hand,
do our models
produce
vibrant
interchanges
of ideas
and
insights regarding
what it means to be alive in
contemporary
culture?
Do
they
illuminate culture? When museum educators create
programs
that
ignite
visitors' own
insights regarding
art and
life,
and when those visitors
are then able to become
independent producers
of
interpretations,
art mu-
seum education remains
firmly
connected to cultural realities. Art museum
educators cannot
help
but use and teach models of
interpretation
in their
programs. They
must take care in the models
they
choose and how
they
re-
produce
them.
Although
the model will
precede
the educational
endeavor,
it will not
merely reproduce
itself if the connection to the visitor's life
expe-
rience remains vital. Museum educators not
only
fulfill their
mission,
but
they
also avoid the
trap
of the
Borges
tale when
they
so
empower
visitors.
Little
girls
and little
boys
make
meaning,
not
maps.
NOTES
1.
Although
the one-shot school visit is still the standard
practice
for
fieldtrips
to
art
museums,
school
programs featuring
two to six visits
per year
have become
more common since the 1970s. Susan
Witmer, Jessica Luke,
and Marianna
Adams,
"Exploring
the Potential of Museum
Multiple-Visit Programs,"
Art
Education
53,
no. 5
(2000):
46-52.
2.
Jean Baudrillard,
"The Precession of
Simulacra,"
in Art
after
Modernism:
Rethinking
Representation,
ed. Brian Wallis
(Boston:
David R.
Godine, 1984).
3. In this article the term museum education will refer to art museum education. Al-
though
the issue
presented
here has
bearing
on
interpretation
in other museums
such as those devoted to
history,
science,
anthropology,
etc.,
the context of this
discourse is art
history
and art museum education.
4. For an overview of art
history's methodologies
see Eric
Fernie,
Art
History
and
Its Methods: A Critical
Anthology
(London:
Phaidon Press
Limited, 1995),
and
Vernon
Hyde
Minor,
Art
History's History (Englewood
Cliffs, NJ:
Prentice
Hall,
1994).
5. Bonnie
Pittman-Gelles,
"Defining
Art Museum Education: Can We
Agree?"
Journal of
Museum Education
13,
no. 3
(1988):
21.
6.
Ibid.,
21.
7. Some
contemporary
museum education theories include
constructivism,
narra-
tive
approaches,
and the contextual model of
learning.
See
George
Hein,
Learn-
ing
in the Museum
(London
and New York:
Routledge,
1998);
Lisa
Roberts,
From
Knowledge
to Narrative: Educators and the
Changing
Museum
(Washington,
DC:
Smithsonian Institution
Press, 1997); John
H. Falk and
Lynn
D.
Dierking,
Lessons
Without Limit: How Free-Choice
Learning
Is
Transforming
Education
(Walnut Creek,
CA: AltaMira
Press, 2002).
8.
Baudrillard,
"Precession of
Simulacra,"
253.
9. For further information on
postmodernism
in art
history,
see A. L. Rees and
Frances
Borzello, eds.,
The New Art
History (Atlantic Highlands, NJ:
Humanities
Press
International, 1988);
Keith
Moxey,
The Practice
of Theory:
Poststructuralism,
Cultural
Politics,
and Art
History
(Ithaca, NY,
and London: Cornell
University
Press, 1994); Jonathan Harris,
The New Art
History:
A Critical Introduction
(Lon-
don and New York:
Routledge,
2001).
10. Donald
Preziosi,
Rethinking
Art
History:
Meditations on a
Coy
Science
(New
Ha-
ven,
CN: Yale
University
Press, 1989);
Michael Ann
Holly,
Past
Looking:
Histori-
cal
Imagination
and the Rhetoric
of
the
Image (Ithaca,
NY: Cornell
University
Press,
This content downloaded from 189.135.52.66 on Tue, 8 Jul 2014 12:39:20 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
58
Mayer
1996);
Mieke
Bal,
"Reading
the Gaze: The Construction of Gender in 'Rem-
brandt,"'
in Vision and
Textuality,
ed.
Stephen
Melville and Bill
Readings
(Durham,
NC: Duke
University
Press, 1995).
11. Norman
Bryson,
ed.,
Calligram: Essays
in New Art
History from
France
(Cambridge:
Cambridge University, 1988).
12. Erwin
Panofsky,
Studies in
Iconology:
Humanistic Themes in the Art
of
the Renais-
sance
(New
York:
Harper
and
Row, 1939);
Erwin
Panofsky, Meaning
in the Visual
Arts
(Garden City,
NY:
Doubleday,
1955).
13.
Preziosi,
Rethinking
Art
History,
191.
14. Ernst
Gombrich,
Story of
Art
(London
and New York: Phaidon
Publishers, 1950).
15.
Bryson, Calligram,
xviii.
16.
Gombrich,
Story of
Art,
87.
17. Ernst H.
Gombrich,
Art and Illusion: A
Study
in the
Psychology of
Pictorial
Repre-
sentation
(New
York: Pantheon
Books, 1960),
87.
18. Ernst H.
Gombrich,
"In Search of Cultural
History"
(1967),
in Art
History
and Its
Methods: A Critical
Anthology,
ed. Eric Fernie
(London:
Phaidon
Press, 1995),
227-28.
19.
Ibid.,
232.
20.
Gombrich,
Art and
Illusion,
29.
21.
Ibid.,
80-81.
22.
Bryson, Calligram,
xviii-xix.
23.
Gombrich,
Story of
Art,
2.
24.
Ibid.,
9.
25. Mieke Bal and Norman
Bryson,
"Semiotics and Art
History,"
Art Bulletin
73,
no.
2
(1991):
175-208.
26.
Panofsky, Meaning
in the Visual
Arts,
8.
27. Ibid.
28.
Stephan
Bann,
"Meaning/Interpretation,"
in Critical Terms
for
Art
History,
ed.
Robert S. Nelson and Richard Schiff
(Chicago: University
of
Chicago
Press,
1996).
29.
Panofsky, Meaning
in the Visual
Arts,
17.
30. Ibid.
31. Ibid.
32. Charles W.
Haxthausen, ed.,
The Two Art Histories: The Museum and the Univer-
sity (Williamstown,
MA:
Sterling
and Francine Clark Art
Institute, 2002),
ix-x.
33. Harvard's Art Museums: 100 Years
of Collecting
(New
York:
Harry
N.
Abrams,
1996),
39.
34.
Ibid.,
34.
35.
Panofsky, Meaning
in the Visual
Art,
22.
36.
Fernie,
Art
History
and Its
Methods, 330; Minor,
Art
History's History,
133-35.
37.
Panofsky, Meaning
in the Visual Arts,
19.
38.
Baudrillard,
"The Precession of
Simulacra,"
256.
39.
Preziosi,
Rethinking
Art
History,
9;
Douglas Crimp,
On the Museum's Ruins
(Cam-
bridge,
MA: MIT
Press, 1993),
263;
Michael Ann
Holly,
"Past
Looking"
in Vision
and
Textuality,
ed.
Stephen
Melville and Bill
Readings
(Durham,
NC: Duke
University
Press, 1995),
85-86.
40.
Preziosi,
Rethinking
Art
History,
71.
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