Perspectives as Symbolic Form (Zone Books) - Softcover

Erwin Panofsky

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0942299531 ISBN 13: 9780942299533

Publisher: Zone Books, 1997

Synopsis

Erwin Panofsky's Perspective as Symbolic Form is one of the great works of modern intellectual history, the legendary text that has dominated all art historical and philosophical discussions on the topic of perspective in this century. Finally available in English, it is an unrivaled example of Panofsky's early method that placed him within broader developments in theories of knowledge and cultural change. Here, drawing on a massive body of learning that ranges over Antique philosophy, theology, science, and optics as well as the history of art, Panofsky produces a type of "archaeology" of Western representation that far surpasses the usual scope of art historical studies. Perspective in Panofsky's hands becomes a central component of a Western "will to form," the expression of a schema linking the social, cognitive, psychological, and especially technical practices of a given culture into harmonious and integrated wholes. Yet the perceptual schema of each historical culture or epoch is different, and each gives rise to a different but equally full vision of the world. Panofsky articulates these different spatial systems, demonstrating their particular coherence and compatibility with the modes of knowledge, belief, and exchange that characterized the cultures in which they arose. Our own modernity, Panofsky shows, is characterized by its peculiarly mathematical expression of the concept of the infinite, within a space that is necessarily both continuous and homogeneous.

About this title

Review

" Here at last is a published translation of this classic essay, available for many years in every major European language except English. It first appeared in 1927 ... and its status has since been established by the numerous commentators who have referred to it as the source of a new kind of interpretation of perspective." -- Robin Evans, AA Files

& quot; Here at last is a published translation of this classic essay, available for many years in every major European language except English. It first appeared in 1927 ... and its status has since been established by the numerous commentators who have referred to it as the source of a new kind of interpretation of perspective.& quot; -- Robin Evans, AA Files

"Here at last is a published translation of this classic essay, available for many years in every major European language except English. It first appeared in 1927 ... and its status has since been established by the numerous commentators who have referred to it as the source of a new kind of interpretation of perspective."-- Robin Evans, "AA Files"

Synopsis

Drawing on a body of learning that ranges over antique philsophy, theology, science and optics as well as the history of art, the author produces a type of "archaeology" of Western representation. He demonsrates how the perceptual schema of each historical culture or epoch is unique.

Edition details

• Publisher: Zone Books
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0942299531
• ISBN 13: 9780942299533
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 200