Max Friedlander - "A connoisseur of art" Automatic translate

The little book lying in front of us portends an important and decisive turn in the science of art, and perhaps even in all modern culture. Her theme - about a connoisseur of art - seems random and too private. But the spirit of struggle that inspires every word, the clarity and simplicity of the goal, are the key to a big, real turning point.

Max Friedlander, director of the Berlin museums, we still knew as a narrow and somewhat dry specialist. His studies in German and Dutch art served as a model of restraint, caution and almost pedantic accuracy of methods. He was considered a typical museum figure, immersed in the details of secondary schools, dubious remarks and nameless masters. Now he immediately grew up in our eyes, not only as a brilliant stylist, but also as an inspired leader.

What is the meaning of his book? What does she teach where she leads? Others, perhaps, will be confused by Friedlander’s neglect of science, his doubt of the possibility of a scientific approach to art. Vain fears. Friedlander is not at all against science, but he is for art. He is not an enemy of the study of art, he only questions the mechanics of established techniques. To study art - who argues - of course, this is necessary, necessary, but only in the name of art, in the name of knowledge of artistic values, in the name of creative inspiration, and not for the sake of complex and skillful theories that do not reach art or leave it far behind.

Friedlander’s first emphasis is on a living art monument. This painting by Memling is more important than the finest judgment about the Dutch style. Therefore, Friedlander insists on the moment of attribution. Attribunia is, of course, not an end in itself. She is only a means of communicating with art. But it makes you see, not look. Searching for the author, the connoisseur comes into contact with the creative process of the monument’s emergence, experiences all the stages of its creation, not being locked up on the bare peaks of a formal analysis, like an art critic building a “history of art without artists”.

The second emphasis of Friedlander on visual contemplation. Therefore, Friedlander so appreciates the power of the first impression. Only at the first moment we can watch, not think. Only in the first minute of a meeting with a work of art do we deal with it ourselves, and not with our considerations about it. A connoisseur of art must be active in his perception. He must possess the gift of internal recreation, allowing him to find a single image of an individual author in an infinite variety of individual monuments. The expert does not deal with the signs of form, as Morelli once taught, but with its quality. He himself is an artist, as he again creates a work of art with a forgotten or unrecognized master. He himself is the creator, inspiring silent values.

With a confident hand, the Friedlander leads us into the alluring world of creative appreciation with art. We look back and, it seems, the desert of passive theory and barren methodology has passed. Ahead of us are events, swift chapters of the novel, the vague aspiration of discoveries and inventions.

B. Wipper.

An amateur, a gatherer, a historian, an esthetician and an expert have a different approach to a work of art. But these types differ only theoretically, in practice the collector can be at the same time a connoisseur and, of course, an amateur, a historian can be a connoisseur - and so on. They claim to be scientific: a historian, an aesthetic and an expert. However, one can argue about the scientific nature of the connoisseur.

The historian considers a single work as a document; from a comparison of these documents, he establishes the course of historical development.

Aesthetics sees in a separate work of art a model on which he learns himself and teaches others the laws of artistic creation.

A connoisseur explores a work of art in order to establish its author. Someone owns a dark canvas, which in his eyes has no value: he is ready to give it to the first comer. A connoisseur casts a glance at the canvas and recognizes in it the work of Rembrandt. As a result of such a definition, the art dealer pays a fortune for the canvas.

A connoisseur of art creates - and destroys - values, and thanks to this he has considerable power.

The first premise of this influence is not that the connoisseur is right, that is, that the picture really belongs to Rembrandt, but that they believe him. A merchant pays money based on a connoisseur’s loan, confident that his customers will be trusting. The matter is thus decided by trust and authority.

Should and should his judgment be justified? Is he able to show what motivates him to see Rembrandt’s work in the picture, with such convincingness that the correct determination becomes apparent to the merchant and his customers? From the very beginning, we answer this sensitive question: no.

The situation in this case is not the case as with other scientific judgments. The wrong diagnosis of a doctor is for the most part quickly detected, due to the fact that the patient, against expectation, dies or remains to live. Incorrectly calculated bridge - collapses. An incorrectly defined picture does not die and does not collapse.

In view of the fact that nobility cannot be verified, they look at it with suspicion as some sort of dubious occult science. In addition, academic art historians neglect it, since in their eyes the question of the author is of limited and secondary importance. The amateur art lover says: I do not care who painted this picture, if only I liked it. One collector gravitates to a connoisseur - and it’s easy to see why. The power of the latter is significant, but rests on a shaky foundation. Trust is easy to lose. His character, both good and bad, is determined by his dependence on someone else’s trust.

Even if a conscientious critic becomes more cautious, the deeper he feels that his judgments are rooted and born in the darkness of the unknowable, that he is carrying out his business without any control, yet universal human weakness, vanity, grows in this area to the extent of an occupational disease of quackery.

Not entirely honest means imperceptibly appear on the scene. First of all, the tone with which he speaks. He himself is convinced and would like to convince others, but he painfully feels that what he draws his confidence from, he cannot pass on to others, in any case, he cannot do this by way of generally understood argumentation. Therefore, clutching at a dangerous means of suggestion. As soon as the chest notes of conviction exceeding his inner confidence sounded - and this can happen simply by force of habit and without any malicious intent - so he already became a bit of a charlatan. He feels that he needs to create authority for himself and constantly raise it. He wants to impress. Afraid to say: I do not know this; the author is not known to me.

He takes every opportunity to show that he himself judges too often, and, in the end, even when he does not know. A true knower is certainly a specialist. There are no universal professionals in this field. But the public mistakenly believes that if a critic was powerless in one case, then he probably will not be able to say anything sensible in another. Often the connoisseur is not strong enough to, contrary to this prejudice, remain within the boundaries of his knowledge and abuse his authority in order to further increase it.

No matter how psychologically distrusting him is, psychological experience teaches that the entire orderly building of our knowledge of art rests on the activities of these very wise men. Despite all the vacillations and controversial issues, a significant amount of universally recognized truths has been achieved. If we now better understand and perceive Rembrandt better than before, then we owe these art experts who collected, sifted and put in order the material.

Nowhere is so much talked about the method and nowhere is it trashed with such fierceness by diltentantism as in the science of art. But this is precisely because there is no method, no methods of work that can be transmitted and taught that would lead to the goal, and also because art criticism is connected with diltentantism with flesh and blood.

The attempt to turn the study of art into a kind of scholarship is painful and unworthy, the statements that we have heard for decades that this science is young, that it has not yet left childhood, seem ridiculous.

There is good and bad dilentantism. Otherwise: an enthusiastic love of art, which always leads to thinking about art, reveals weaknesses as soon as it begins to strive for knowledge. If you reject dilentantism because of these weaknesses, then you risk, together with a love of art, losing, in the end, art itself. What remains after that is zero. the dilentants did the most essential, once they did everything, it’s enough to call Goncourt, Fromanten or Rumor. The profession of a connoisseur that has emerged in recent decades should be able to preserve at least some features of free dilettantism, it should not turn into a frozen workshop.

So, the Vienna school of art, out of fear that philologists and historians would not consider them to be real scientists, operating the heavy apparatus of science, are struggling in the most serious and diligent way to develop a method and free themselves from the precariousness of subjective judgment of taste. Hans Tietze’s voluminous, scholarly and clever book on the “Method of the History of Art” provides an opportunity to get acquainted with these efforts and review the results achieved. This volume mentions a thousand things that somehow come into contact with the study of art, the knowledge of which is useful and important for the connoisseur, but there is no question of art. All this knowledge will not make a person a connoisseur of art, and not being a connoisseur, you cannot be an art critic.

The late Heidelberg professor Karl Neumann successfully exposed the weaknesses of the Vienna school. I quote some excellently formulated provisions: “Titz’s statement that the issue of quality is a museum issue, not a scientific one, reveals, along with some natural-scientific pharisaism and an inadmissible narrowing of the concept of science, something worse: hostility to art. For the salvation from the danger of subjectivity, as a mortal enemy of an allegedly accurate method, a sacrifice is required here that the history of art cannot bring without giving up itself… Without a sense of quality, there is no artistic criticism… "Further:" This follows add that the methods of any science arise from the possibility of rationalizing its tasks, and that the method is powerless where it encounters an irrational, for example, a person. Genius defies any method… "And finally:" Art is more important than the method of art history… "

To these excellent positions, some more could be added. Studying art, which by all means wants to become a science, threatens to become a science against art. Not only genius is irrational, as a rare exceptional case, all artistic creativity is irrational. No distinction should be made between personal and impersonal artistic creation. The question of personality is always and at all levels the most fruitful, even if we with our limited knowledge could not, or could not yet, answer it. In the end, after all, the medieval capital or ivory relief is the essence of creating one person, the only properties belonging to him alone. And the task is to feel this individuality, so that it is possible only through sensory experience. After reading the book, Tietze feels as if in a long walk from all sides he walked around the problem of art.

In response to the expert’s brief and decisive judgment: this is Dürer’s work, or: it cannot be Dürer’s work, it sounds unsatisfied and incredulous: anyone can say so, bring evidence. Then the expert, in writing or verbally, makes an attempt to discover and show in the work of art the originality of the creative individuality. But what he can say is not what served as the basis for his judgment, and in no case can - like a mathematician - result in the form of a continuous chain of evidence. An exhaustive justification quite rightly arouses in this case distrust. The judgment of the expert is based on motives that are partly inexpressible, and partly even remain beyond the threshold of consciousness. Artistic-critical material, with the help of which the definition is justified, as it is conventionally expressed, never contains the fullness of motivation, does not contain what is most significant in the process of finding the author. The quality of the so-called substantiation cannot be judged on the quality of the judgment. Of course, the logical side can always be expressed and proved, but the most intuitive one can be hinted at the most. That is why the language of art criticism is so aphoristic and so eager to use comparisons. Often he is vaguely pathetic, argumentation intertwines in him with a call to feeling.

Let’s get acquainted with the methods of our work on an example. I study the altar icon and see that it is painted on oak. So it is of Dutch or Lower Germanic origin. I find images of donors and a coat of arms on it. The history of the costume and heraldry provide an opportunity to come to a more accurate localization and dating. By rigorous inference, I establish: Bruges, circa 1480.

The depicted donor is easily recognizable by the emblem. A little-known legend, about which the picture tells, leads me to a church in Bruges dedicated to the saint of this legend. I cope with church acts and find that in 1480 a citizen of the city of Bruges, whose name I recognized by the emblem, sacrificed to the altar and ordered the image of him to Hans Memling. So, the icon is written by Memling. The conclusion is purely scientific, strictly proven!

But even in this hypothetical case, where so enviably much can be proved, not everything can be proved. In the end, it is still possible that Memling did not fulfill the order, passed it on to his students, or that someone else did the work instead. The decisive last word even here remains with the judgment of taste, just as the first word belonged to feeling. For, what attracted me precisely to this work, if not my subjective judgment on quality? I did not begin to waste the work of analytical research on other icons. Moreover, to tell the truth, at first glance I immediately thought about Memling, I was waiting for Memling, I was looking for Memling. The thought of him was like a compass in my research wanderings.

The art researcher has various tools, the thinnest tool is his sense of style, easily damaged, but necessary. “The sharper the knife, the easier it cures. But would we prefer stupid? ”

It is possible that pure criticism of the style leads only to conjectures that become reliable only when they receive confirmation from reliable sources of a different kind. These objections, however, in no way diminish the significance of stylistic criticism as a special science. After all, there is a theory of probability.

We will try to find out what happens when I involuntarily, at the first glance, without analysis, determine: this is Memling. I once asked a physicist how he would explain the mysterious phenomenon of a wireless telegraph. He answered me: Imagine that in some space there are several differently tuned tuning forks. A sound is heard. Then only the tuning fork that was tuned in the same tone will begin to hesitate and the rest will not make any sound. I think that this is a good way to explain what happens when determining the author of a picture. The ideas about Memling and Gerard David living in me should be clearly tuned and ready to sound. That is the whole point. Then the contact takes place instantly and with it, as if by itself, the definition of a picture that I saw for the first time.

The first impression is decisive. Not the frivolous haste or vanity of a charlatan compels the connoisseur to make his judgment so quickly. Aesthetic judgment always rests on comparison, although this latter is for the most part made unconsciously. The impression of Memling is different than the impression of paintings by other masters. It is in these differences given by comparison that the whole point is. But it is clear that the originality of an impression weakens when it repeats or lasts too long. The habit dulls the excitability of the perceiving nerves. Hryvnia expression: look to dullness, it speaks of the ability of the eye to adapt. The manner of Memling is no longer felt in its originality, but more and more perceived as something normal. At the end of the connections, I begin to look at nature through the eyes of Memling.

Thoroughness is a beautiful thing. And an art researcher, like any other, can achieve much by endurance and patience, but too close and stubborn contact with the subject threatens dangers in our case.A young art critic who is too exclusively and intensely engaged in one artist alone loses his ability to perceive the individual essence of his hero. In the end, he knows only the content of his art, but not his character, he lost the ability to compare.

We can recommend the following approach to works of art. The main value lies in the first impression, this unique and unforgettable experience, the first impact should be perceived as purely, naively, without prejudice and without reflection - to perceive it as a whole. Every analysis, every mental attitude already destroys part of the impact. Only after the whole has given its word can one begin scientific analysis, approach the subject closely, and examine, like a natural scientist, the primer and the formation of cracks. records, inscriptions, clothes, architecture, iconography, the relationship of figures to space, the proportion of figures, motives of movement, etc.

The smallest detail matters. Each review method can be beneficial. But all the time you need to remember: that scientific analysis destroys the overall impression and thereby the discovery of the artist’s creative personality, you need to maintain the ability to recreate in aesthetic perception the whole that scientific inquisitiveness divided into parts. You need to move a certain distance so that with the help of other impressions you regain the freshness of perception. The study can supplement and confirm the first impression, or, conversely, reject it, but in no case replace it.

We take the clock apart to study its mechanism. But after this operation, the clock stops walking. Partial decomposition is just as dangerous for watches as it is for the soul of a work of art. Not being able to express the most important thing and at the same time overwhelmed with the desire to "prove", the expert with impatience of the deaf-mute, tries to put imaginary evidence into his vague hints and lyrical influences. Thus, dishonesty penetrates fiction-critical literature. Between conscious dishonesty and mental sloppiness, of course, there are a number of transitions. We listen to the proposed rationale. The authors want to persuade us in a lawyer’s way, emphasize points that, in essence, were not decisive, because only these points have the appearance of scientific conclusions. All this, of course, applies not only to wrong judgments,but also to the right ones. A just cause is defended by bad means. Case and word are not. cover each other.

Giovanni Morelli, who appeared fifty years ago as an art connoisseur, is a typical example of a gifted dilettante. Partly a victim of self-deception, and partly a bit of a charlatan, he proclaimed a strictly scientific - contrary to logic, he even said "experimental" - method and made him a stunning impression. Morelli knew Italian artists of the 15th and 16th centuries well. at.and offered a lot of the right attributes. But that would not have made him a celebrity. The loud polemic tone with which he advertised his infallible method aroused universal attention. New - though not entirely new - was Morelli’s indication that the same artist always depicts this or that part of the human body in the same way. He noted several such signs and pretended that with the help of these strong points he made his own definitions. He argued that the shape of the ear and nails are especially characteristic and have a decisive significance. If we approach his method of criticism, we will soon notice that his intuitive ability to evaluate, often hit the mark, but sometimes misleading, was never based on signs, and that Morelli occasionally only retroactively to prove his case,with a triumphant look indicates the triumph of forms. If Morelli wanted to act methodically, in the spirit of his teaching, he would have to establish the shape of the ear on the basis of 3 or 4 reliable works of Filippo Lippi and with this form, as if with a magic wand in his hands, find in all galleries the paintings of Filippo. But he did not. That would be too stupid. Morelli did not even check his conclusions using his method, he never refused to make a determination, because only because the signs do not converge. He used his vaunted method arbitrarily and inconsistently.Find Filippo paintings in all galleries. But he did not. That would be too stupid. Morelli did not even check his conclusions using his method, he never refused to make a determination, because only because the signs do not converge. He used his vaunted method arbitrarily and inconsistently.to find Filippo’s paintings in all galleries. But he did not. That would be too stupid. Morelli did not even check his conclusions using his method, he never refused to make a determination, because only because the signs do not converge. He used his vaunted method arbitrarily and inconsistently.

Berenson, the most intelligent and dexterous follower of Morelli in the study of Italian painting and quackery, perfectly explained why it was the ear and the nail that showed a constant, especially characteristic for the artist form. Each artist adheres to a certain extent to nature, imitates the individual, infinite diversity of life, partly works according to the model, portraits, and partly repeats some forms familiar to him. In expression, he seeks diversity and strives for the characteristic. But the shape of the ear is relatively indifferent to expression and character. That is why, when portraying an ear, the artist does not have a special need to overcome the natural force of habit. Indeed, experience shows that many artists are careless about the shape of the ear, they give out their instinct for form where they do not want to say anything,where their creative will weakens or goes out.

Many, but not all. Mendel, for example, who watches his model with unrelenting tenacity, treats his ear no less carefully than his nose. It seems strange that we hope to find a manifestation of personality where it is most weakly expressed. And yet the doctrine of signs in the sense of Morelli, with all its one-sidedness and randomness, is far from meaningless. The artist’s taste, his sense of beauty, his conscious or unconscious aspiration create his genuine and effective style, as it manifests itself in the shape of a person, in proportions, composition, mouth pattern, etc. We can say: this form is typical for this master. And yet, based on it, an expert in many cases fails to make a final judgment. Already because of the fact that the form of the glorified master, accessible to the eyes of all, has become an object of imitation.Knowing Raphael’s style is of little use to the connoisseur when he searches for the original works of Raphael. Here, as often happens, the whole point is to distinguish the master from the copycat. But Raphael’s style has become the common property. Here, perhaps, the signs recovered by Morelli may be of some use, although they never resolve matters. The imitator’s attention is weakened on trifles, on imperceptible and secondary details. The copycat adheres to those sides of the original that affect the viewer. His task is to achieve the impression that the original evoked. That which does not matter for the artistic effect is ignored by the copycat and can therefore serve as a sign of the original.to distinguish a master from a copycat. But Raphael’s style has become the common property. Here, perhaps, the signs recovered by Morelli may be of some use, although they never resolve matters. The imitator’s attention is weakened on trifles, on imperceptible and secondary details. The copycat adheres to those sides of the original that affect the viewer. His task is to achieve the impression that the original evoked. That which does not matter for the artistic effect is ignored by the copycat and can therefore serve as a sign of the original.to distinguish a master from a copycat. But Raphael’s style has become the common property. Here, perhaps, the signs recovered by Morelli may be of some use, although they never resolve matters. The imitator’s attention is weakened on trifles, on imperceptible and secondary details. The copycat adheres to those sides of the original that affect the viewer. His task is to achieve the impression that the original evoked. That which does not matter for the artistic effect is ignored by the copycat and can therefore serve as a sign of the original.The copycat adheres to those sides of the original that affect the viewer. His task is to achieve the impression that the original evoked. That which does not matter for the artistic effect is ignored by the copycat and can therefore serve as a sign of the original.The copycat adheres to those sides of the original that affect the viewer. His task is to achieve the impression that the original evoked. That which does not matter for the artistic effect is ignored by the copycat and can therefore serve as a sign of the original.

Imitation is the main problem facing the connoisseur - imitation in the broadest sense of the word. This concept embraces quite a lot: from an exact copy and forgery up to the original creation, which is somewhat dependent on other people’s art. Since the freest and most courageous master was at one time a student, perceiving other people’s art and could not completely protect himself from influence, as the favorite word of art criticism says, the problem of imitation extends to the entire field of artistic creation. Such concepts as tradition, the taste of the times, the influence of the school, the local character are partly included in the concept of imitation. Imitation should not be necessarily deliberate. The expert is faced with the problem of imitation at every step, not only when he distinguishes the student from the master or separates the individual from each other,related at first glance, when, for example, he searches for the border where Rubens ends and van Dyck begins.

Signs of Morelli Poleans. But ultimately the matter is decided by psychological tact, intuition, flexible artistic flair. Copy, imitation is qualitatively poorer than the original. Not because the copyist is a weaker artist - as it almost always happens, but because copying and imitation is an activity fundamentally different from artistic creation, so that creative power, even if it exists, cannot manifest itself when copying or imitating.

Imagine that a brilliant master, out of some motivation, copies a work of an insignificant artist. No matter how weak the original, it will have one advantage over the copy: the unity of the style that emerged organically, while the copy, even if made by the hand of a genius, will inevitably suffer from a lack of integrity, a violation of style. The original was born and raised, a copy is made, created without internal heat. The difference between these two, fundamentally different types of activities, becomes all the more noticeable the farther the imitator is in time and style from the author of the original. This is where that pitfall is hidden, about which any archiving art is broken, any imitation of a bygone style.

Next to Botticelli, some Burn Jones is weak, not only because he is a weaker painter, but also because his work is arbitrarily, falsely directed and untrue in its tendency. No one can evade with impunity the manner of seeing imperatively required by his time.

Constantly forced to distinguish originals from copies and imitations, always on the alert against possible falsification, in the broadest sense of the word, the expert acquires a flair of genuine and at the same time susceptibility to true artistic creativity. By faithful instinct, capturing the capricious variability of the creative personality, the expert will avoid the temptations of Morelli’s method and his teachings on signs that are disastrous for incapable students. Two creations of the same artist are never exactly the same. At least for the reason that the organism that creates them is constantly changing, like everything living: today it is not the same as it was yesterday. An artist never creates the same forms, like mechanical cliche prints.

Recall the handwriting. One hundred signatures of the same person resemble each other, but they are never absolutely identical. If two signatures coincide strongly in everything, then in one of them we suspect a fake.

Everyone who studies art knows that a creative organism can change, but it is not easy to realize that it must change every moment. A living organism can bloom and wither; a paper flower always remains unchanged. The copycat can once again reproduce the same, but not the artist. Here the problem of development is in touch with the problem of imitation.

There are accurate but superficial observers: their approach seems scientific, but it is powerless in front of an art monument, because it does not cover the most important thing. The look should not be riveted to one form, it should follow the flight of creative imagination, which left this form behind itself, as its mark.

Measurement and careful comparison of one form with another does not lead the connoisseur to the goal, although at times it shows him the right direction.

Surrendering to the effect of the work, we are experiencing the process of creativity and are taking part in it. Certain manifestations of the artist’s style become glare for us, by which we guess the paths of the light emitted by him. The focus from which these rays emanate is the soul of the artist - this last subject of our contemplation.

Reliable and quick memory for shape and color is usually considered, and, of course, with every right, a necessary prerequisite for the activities of the connoisseur. Indeed, when defining any picture, we compare it with the images of memory.

But one cannot imagine this process as mechanical, as if photographing, as if an archive of photographic plates in the head of an expert. Memory services are extremely large, but also extremely small! Great because it holds for a long time a large number of impressions. The picture that I now see evokes memories of another that I saw many years ago, and which I have never thought about since then. On the other hand, it is known how insignificant the ability to retain in memory the shapes of objects so as to be able to convey them in a verbal or plastic image. The well-known question offered to enlightened art lovers on which hand the Sistine Madonna holds the Baby is almost always embarrassing.

And this is very characteristic. Some excellent connoisseur of Adrian Ostade, who has examined hundreds of paintings by the master in detail, may not imagine distinctly separate paintings at all, he may not even be able to describe a single picture from memory, but he owns something else that is more valuable, and which makes him connoisseurs of Ostada, allows him to know every piece of this artist. He has a general idea, he knows the scope of the master, the possibilities of his individual talent, the look of which he penetratedly studied. Excited by the artist’s creations, the connoisseur captured in his mind not so much their formal moments as their artistic impact, but through that creative force that generated them. So the ability of a connoisseur arises, if not to write, like Ostade, then, in any case,to merge your passive imagination with the creative imagination of the master and respond favorably to all his paintings exactly as to his creations.

Giving a connoisseur can even become productive. For example: I know Rembrandt, but I never saw the marina of his brush. One art lover tells me that he has a Rembrandt marina. Of course, I immediately have an idea about this picture. If subsequently this marina is shown to me, then my first thought will be: so I imagined it myself, or not, it seemed to me different. I compare the picture I created with the one I was shown and the suek based on this comparison. The point is not how valuable this spiritual work is and what self-deception plays here; it is only important to establish that the connoisseur is not limited to one observation, but in his own way takes an active spiritual part in the creative process and, therefore, he becomes in some kind of artist.

However, it would be a mistake to conclude from this that it was the artist who should be the best expert, since the activity of the expert in a certain sense is an active artistic activity. Not to mention that experience contradicts this conclusion. More important is another: the connoisseur’s main aspiration is aimed at cognition, while the artist’s main aspiration draws him to creation. The artist’s creative gift is fundamentally different from the talent of a connoisseur, passive, giving himself entirely, but also expressing himself outside.

A connoisseur refers to a virtuoso performer, like this last one to a freely creating artist. Three degrees, three stages of artistic activity. It would be ridiculous to demand from the artist that he be an ennatian, as would expect from a dramatic writer that he would be able to better realize the images of his imagination on stage than an actor who, in turn, is unable to create an independent image. Whether we will consider the activity of a connoisseur from the side of its tendency, as a science, or from the side of its method, as art - in any case, it forms the basis of a scientific approach to art.

An art historian who wants to understand and recreate a certain personality or a certain era, must first of all take care of the purity and completeness of the material, he must be sure that the works on the basis of which he judges, really belong to one or another master, belong to that or another time.

On the other hand, nobility is the color of the scientific study of art, the result and the crowning of successful works in this field. Only from the deepest penetration into the essence of a creative personality is the ability to recognize and identify a master born. But nobility is not the last goal of the scientific study of art. Having identified the author, we have not yet answered the last question.

Only the poor and limited natures are satisfied with the role of expert. The spiritual aspiration will always go further to finding historical connections and aesthetic laws. A healthy aesthetic and a well-founded story grow out of the connoisseur’s experience.

When an academic art critic, any university teacher, on occasion proudly claims that he is not an expert, then we ask what he has in mind. If he only wants to say that he feels neither a calling, nor a inclination to give expertise for a fee or out of courtesy, then there is nothing to object to. But if he imagines that he understands or knows some work of art, not knowing how to recognize its author, then he is in error and involuntarily admits the failure of his efforts. A historian who has successfully dealt with medieval ivory reliefs becomes a will or not, a connoisseur in this area. The expert is involuntarily, perhaps the best expert, in any case, he is not a charlatan and deserves preference only to the expert.

The eternal dispute between a historian and an expert, theorist and practitioner, a university teacher and a museum figure must finally be resolved. It retains its strength only until, on one or the other side, or on both, the work is not successful enough. That is why it would be very correct and fruitful for academic and museum figures to study together. That is why it would be desirable for an exchange of forces to take place between the two sides. The desire for knowledge and artistic intuition should be combined into one without false shame in front of the subjectivity of personal assessment. Nobleness will then come by itself, anyway, whether we, together with the practitioner, see the goal in it, or together with the theorist, the means.

Translated by W. Bloch, edited by B. Wipper.
Moscow, 1923