Panofskys tredje nivå och den kritiska historiografins syfte

Abstract

This essay argues for the necessity of a critical historiography, exemplified through a re-reading, and an analysis, of the third level in the synoptical table of art historical interpretations introduced by Erwin Panofsky in his Studies in Iconology (1939). The analysis departs from three issues implicit of the table: (1) the relationship between the work of art and its context, (2) the interpretation and location of the "intrinsic meaning" of the work, and (3) the basic subjectivity of historical interpretations. By comparing Panofsky's "Introductory" with Mieke Bal's and Norman Bryson's Semiotics and Art History(1991) it becomes evident that the first two issues imply significant differences between the tradition of Panofsky and that of contemporary poststructuralist perspectives. On the other hand, the third issue furthers a 20th Century hermeneutic discourse, in which Panofsky tried to solve the problem of historical subjectivism as it appeared in the work by Martin Heidegger. Nevertheless, Panofsky's solution, by introducing certain "objective correctives", differs from that of Bal and Bryson. But, simultaneously, the juxtaposition of their different positions in this matter creates a dialectical relation between past and present intellectual environments. The comparison also demonstrates the need for an intensified awareness and analysis of how meaning is produced in an intellectual and social field. Critical historiography, as discussed here, aims at a profound analysis of the intellectual, social, and ideological prerequisites of meaning production within art history discourses. It will thus function both as a corrective (while not "objective") to the principal openness and subjectivity of interpretation, as well as a tool to reach new possible strategies for one's own interpretative acts.