THE POLITICS OF STYLE: MEYER SCHAPIRO AND THE CRISIS OF MEANING IN ART HISTORY by Cynthia L. Persinger BA in French, Kent State University, 1992 MA in French Translation, Kent State University, 1994 MA in Art History, University of Pittsburgh, 2000 Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Arts and Sciences in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Pittsburgh 2007 UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH FACULTY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES This dissertation was presented by Cynthia L. Persinger It was defended on October 31, 2007 and approved by Kirk Savage, PhD, Associate Professor Terry Smith, PhD, Professor Jonathan Arac, PhD, Professor Barbara McCloskey, PhD, Associate Professor, Dissertation Director ii Copyright © by Cynthia Persinger 2007 iii THE POLITICS OF STYLE: MEYER SCHAPIRO AND THE CRISIS OF MEANING IN ART HISTORY Cynthia L. Persinger, PhD University of Pittsburgh, 2007 This dissertation focuses on the art historical praxis of one of the most significant Euro- American art historians of the 20th century, Meyer Schapiro (1904 – 1996). While Schapiro has most often been celebrated for his Marxist art history of the 1930s, his art historical explorations over the course of his career were part of an extended dialogue with his German-speaking colleagues regarding the crisis of meaning in art history. In chapter one, I propose that Schapiro is concerned with what I have called the politics of style, the ways in which the definition of style has been implicated in racial and national politics since the discipline’s institutionalization in the 19th century. In chapter two, I consider Schapiro’s earliest publications and establish his indebtedness to the German art historical tradition, particularly the work of Emanuel Löwy, Wilhelm Vöge and Heinrich Wölfflin. With the rise of fascism in the 1920s and 30s, racial and national characterizations of style became increasingly pernicious. In chapters three and four, I explore Schapiro’s concern with fascism as it affects his art history and arises in his publications and personal correspondence including his discussions with Erwin Panofsky regarding iconology and with Otto Pächt of the New Vienna School regarding structural analysis (Strukturanalyse) and the belief in “national constants.” In chapter five I establish how Schapiro’s theorization of style as heterogeneous in his 1953 essay “Style” corresponds with reactions to racial and national essentialism by social scientists like cultural iv anthropologist Ruth Benedict and modern artists. In chapter six, I consider Schapiro’s semiotics in relation to linguist Roman Jakobson’s poetics and Panofsky’s iconology. My reading emphasizes both the social historical situation from which Schapiro interprets art and how his personal background as a Jewish immigrant who grew up in the working-class neighborhood of Brownsville, Brooklyn affects his interpretation. I contend that Schapiro’s experimentation was motivated by his desire to maintain a definition of style that recognized the unity of form and content without resorting to racial or national determinism. I conclude that Schapiro’s art historical struggle provides an important lesson for the contemporary interpreter of images. v TABLE OF CONTENTS PREFACE...................................................................................................................................... ix 1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................... 1 1.1. REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE .................................................................................. 4 1.2. METHODOLOGY ........................................................................................................... 9 1.3. ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE............................................................................ 11 2. SCHAPIRO AND THE NATIONALISM OF THE “GERMAN” ART HISTORICAL TRADITION................................................................................................................................. 12 2.1. INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................... 12 2.2. NATIONALISM IN THE “GERMAN” ART HISTORICAL TRADITION ................ 15 2.3. SCHAPIRO’S PATH TO ART HISTORY .................................................................... 26 2.4. CONCLUSION............................................................................................................... 48 3. SCHAPIRO’S ROLE IN SHAPING “A NEW ERA” IN ART HISTORY .......................... 49 3.1. INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................... 49 3.2. FORM, CONTENT AND THE MEANING OF ART ................................................... 54 3.3. RACE, NATIONALITY AND THE SOCIAL BASES OF ART .................................. 68 3.4. THE NEW VIENNA SCHOOL ..................................................................................... 79 3.5. THE NATURE OF SOCIALIST ART........................................................................... 85 3.6. “FROM MOZARABIC TO ROMANESQUE IN SILOS” ............................................ 91 3.7. CONCLUSION: “TOWARDS A FREE AND REVOLUTIONARY ART”................. 96 4. RECOGNIZING THE COMPLEXITY OF ART HISTORICAL MEANING: SCHAPIRO AND THE PRACTICE OF ICONOLOGY................................................................................ 101 vi 4.1. INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................ 101 4.2. STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS AND “THE SCULPTURES OF SOUILLAC” ............ 105 4.3. SCHAPIRO, SAXL AND THE RUTHWELL CROSS ............................................... 119 4.4. PANOFSKY, SCHAPIRO AND ICONOLOGY ......................................................... 125 4.5. CONCLUSION............................................................................................................. 149 5. SCHAPIRO AND THE HETEROGENEITY OF ART ...................................................... 158 5.1. INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................ 158 5.2. CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY AND GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY....................... 162 5.3. THE GERMAN ART HISTORICAL TRADITION, PANOFSKY AND THE CARTESIAN GRID ............................................................................................................... 180 5.4. THE UNITY OF ART AND MANKIND .................................................................... 192 5.5. CONCLUSION............................................................................................................. 205 6. SCHAPIRO’S LINGUISTIC TURN: SEMIOTICS AND THE UNITY OF FORM AND CONTENT.................................................................................................................................. 208 6.1. INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................ 208 6.2. FORM ........................................................................................................................... 212 6.3. WORD AND IMAGE................................................................................................... 232 6.4. THE ETHNIC ARGUMENT ....................................................................................... 241 7. CONCLUSION.................................................................................................................... 247 BIBLIOGRAPHY....................................................................................................................... 251 vii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1 [From Appraisal of Anthropology Today, p. 63] ......................................................... 178 Figure 2 [From Appraisal of Anthropology Today, p. 64] ......................................................... 179 viii PREFACE My interest in Meyer Schapiro was sparked in a graduate seminar I took with John Williams during my first semester at the University of Pittsburgh. I am grateful to John for his encouragement and willingness to mentor me in the early stages of my work. Barbara McCloskey graciously agreed to chair my dissertation committee when John retired. She has provided me with unflagging support ever since. Her seminar on Erwin Panofsky was particularly helpful in spurring my interest in the relationship between the ideas of Schapiro and Panofsky. In his seminar on art historical methodology, Kirk Savage provided me with a strong foundation on which to build my detailed consideration of Schapiro’s art historical praxis. In a seminar I took with Jonathan Arac in the Department of English, I became aware of studies of national character and the ways in which scholars attempted to bypass racial and national language in the postwar years. I am greatly appreciative of Terry Smith’s efforts to push me to think more critically about both Schapiro and Panofsky. The final shape of this dissertation is thus owed in part to the invaluable support of each of my committee members. I gratefully acknowledge the financial support provided for me by the Department of the History of Art and Architecture at the University of Pittsburgh, the Andrew Mellon Pre-Doctoral Fellowship, the Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowship, the Walter Read Hovey Memorial Foundation Scholarship and the University of Pittsburgh’s Dean’s Tuition Scholarship. Financial support