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Delen, A. J. J.

Full Name: Delen, A. J. J.

Other Names:

  • A. J. J. Delen

Gender: male

Date Born: 10 March 1883

Date Died: 17 June 1960

Place Born: Louvain, Vlaams-Brabant, Flanders, Belgium

Place Died: Antwerp, Flanders, Belgium

Home Country/ies: Belgium

Career(s): authors, curators, and educators


Overview

Curator; professor of art history; novelist. Delen attended the Koninklijk Atheneum (high school) in Antwerp, where he befriended Alfons de Ridder (1882-1960), later known as the Flemish writer Willem Elsschot. Delen continued his education in economics at the Antwerp Hoger Handelsinstituut, and in art history at the Hoger Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis en Oudheidkunde in Brussels. He also attended the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. He was interested in the contemporary art scene and visited the studios of the painters Walter Vaes (1882-1958) and Richard Baseleer (1867-1951). Delen was in the editorial board of several local periodicals, including Alvoorder, in which he published some of his poems, and Onze Kunst. He also contributed to Dutch periodicals for art and literature that were based in The Netherlands, such as Jong Holland, Elseviers geïllustreerd Maandschrift, and De Nieuwe Gids. As a journalist he was among the founders of the Flemish socialist daily newspaper, De Volksgazet. He earned his living as an employee of the city of Antwerp. At the outbreak of the First World War, Delen fled with his wife, Justine Cooreman, and his children to The Hague. He, however, soon returned to Antwerp, leaving his family in The Netherlands. In 1915 (one other source says 1920) Delen was appointed adjunct curator at the Museum Plantin-Moretus in Antwerp. This museum is housed in the former residence and workshop of Christophe Plantin, the founder of the famous printing and publishing firm, the Officina Plantiniana (1555). In the last year of the war, in 1918, Delen was put in jail for several months by the German occupiers as an activist. In 1920 Delen obtained an additional appointment as professor of art history at the Antwerp Royal Academy of Fine Arts, a position that he held until 1948. In 1922 he published a study on the life and work of his friend, the painter and sculptor Rik Wouters (1882-1916), who had died during the war. Delen’s most important work deals with the history of engraving and woodcut in the Low Countries, Histoire de la gravure dans les anciens Pays-Bas et dans les provinces belges, des origines jusqu’à la fin du XVIIIe siècle, of which three volumes appeared, in 1924, 1934, and 1935 respectively, covering the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Despite the title, the period from 1600 up to 1800 was not dealt with. In 1936 Maurits Sabbe (1873-1938), then curator of the Museum Plantin-Moretus, established a separate municipal print room. Delen became its first curator, a position that he held until 1945. The nucleus of the collection consisted of graphic art gathered by Maximilian Rooses, former curator of the Plantin-Moretus Museum. In 1938 Delen’s catalog of ancient Dutch and Flemish drawings kept in the print room appeared, Catalogue des dessins anciens, écoles flamande et hollandaise. In 1942 he wrote a monograph on Walter Vaes. After the Second World War, Delen was appointed chief curator at the Antwerp Royal Museum of Fine Arts. His descriptive catalog of the Old Masters in this museum was first published in 1948. Other publications reveal his vivid interest in modern painting and graphic arts. Delen retired in 1948. He is better known as an art historian than as a novelist.


Selected Bibliography

De ontwikkelingsgang der schilderkunst te Antwerpen. Quinten Metsijs, Peter Bruegel, Pieter Pauwel Rubens, Hendrik de Braekeleer.Antwerp: L. Opdebeek, 1921; Rik Wouters, zijn werk – zijn leven – zijn einde. Antwerp: Opdebeek, 1922; Metsys. Brussels: Kryn, 1926; Histoire de la gravure dans les anciens Pays-Bas et dans les provinces belges, des origines jusqu’à la fin du XVIIIe siècle. 1. Des origines à 1500. Paris: G. van Oest, 1924, 2. Le XVIe siècle. Les graveurs-illustrateurs. Paris: Les Èditions d’Art et d’Histoire, 1934, Les graveurs d’estampes. Paris: Les Èditions d’Art et d’Histoire, 1935. (Reprinted as Histoire de la gravure dans les anciens Pays-Bas et dans les provinces belges, des origines jusqu’à la fin du XVIe siècle. Paris: F. De Nobele, 1969); L’illustration du livre en Belgique. Brussels: Éditions du Musée du livre, 1930; Catalogue des dessins anciens, écoles flamande et hollandaise. Antwerp: Stedelijk Prentenkabinet, 1938; Het huis van P. P. Rubens: de invloed van Rubens op de Vlaamsche barokarchitectuur. Diest: Pro Arte, 1940; Walter Vaes. Antwerp: Standaard-Boekhandel, 1942; Christophe Plantin, imprimeur de l’humanisme. Brussels: Office de publicité, 1944; Beschrijvende catalogus: Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten. 1. Oude meesters. Antwerp: Excelsior, 1948; Flemish Master Drawings of the Seventeenth Century. London: Allen and Unwin, 1950; Modern Belgian Etchers and Copper Engravers. New York: Belgian Govt. Information Center, 1951; De schilders der Schelde. Antwerp: Standaard-Boekhandel, 1956; De grafische kunsten door de eeuwen heen. Antwerp: Standaard-Boekhandel, 1956.


Sources

Bazin, Germain. Histoire de l’histoire de l’art; de Vasari à nos jours. Paris: Albin Michel, 1986 p. 505; De Seyn, Eug. Dictionnaire biographique des Sciences, des Lettres et des Arts en Belgique. 1. Brussels: Éditions L’Avenir, 1935, p. 285-286; Le Livre bleu. Recueil biographique. Brussels: Maison Ferd. Larcier S.A., 1950, pp. 144-145; Who’s who in Belgium, including the Belgian Congo. Brussels: Intercontinental Book & Pub. Co., 1957-1958, p. 170; Voet, Leon. The Golden Compasses. A History and Evaluation of the Printing and Publishing Activities of the Officina Plantiniana at Antwerp. 1, Christophe Plantin and the Moretuses: their Lives and their World. Amsterdam: Vangendt & Co, 1969, p. 410; Van den Bossche, Stefan. “De flamboyante verschijning van Ary Delen (1883-1960)” Nieuw Letterkundig Magazijn. Mededelingenblad uitgegeven door de Maatschappij der Nederlandse Letterkunde, gevestigd te Leiden 22 (July, 2004): 2-9; [obituary:] Craeybeckx, L.”In memoriam Ary Delen” Antwerpen 6 (1960): 104-105.



Contributors: Monique Daniels


Citation

Monique Daniels. "Delen, A. J. J.." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/delena/.


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Curator; professor of art history; novelist. Delen attended the Koninklijk Atheneum (high school) in Antwerp, where he befriended Alfons de Ridder (1882-1960), later known as the Flemish writer Willem Elsschot. Delen continued his education in eco

Delécluze, E. J.

Image Credit: Wikipedia

Full Name: Delécluze, E. J.

Other Names:

  • Étienne Jean Delécluze

Gender: male

Date Born: 1781

Date Died: 1863

Place Born: Paris, Île-de-France, France

Place Died: Versailles, Île-de-France, France

Home Country/ies: France

Career(s): art critics


Overview

Anti-Romanticism art critic; author a book on David and histories of art. Delécluze was born to the architect Jean-Baptiste Delécluze. He apprenticed in the studio of the painter Charles Moreau (1762-1810) in 1796 where he met Jacques-Louis David. Delécluze exhibited at the Salons between 1808 and 1814 where his works were based on the principles of the French Academy. In 1815 Delécluze started writing art criticism. His initial work was for the Lycée français newspaper, but by 1822 he was reviewing the Salon of for the Moniteur universel. He also contributed to the Journal des débats around that time (including an obituary of Antonio Canova). In 1831 articles began appearing in L’Artiste (through 1840), as well as in the Revue des deux mondes, Revue française, Revue de Paris and after 1858, the Gazette des beaux-arts. In 1855 his monograph on David appeared. He was working on a history of the middle ages, a period he had little affinity for, at the time of his death. He was the uncle of architect and Gothic revivalist Eugène Viollet-le-Duc.Delécluze’s art histories and theory reflect the neo-Platonic notions and idealism of Antoine Quatremère de Quincy, T.-B. Éméric-David and Victor Cousin (1792-1867). Like these authors, his concept of art assumed antique art as its standard. Painting’s goal was a moral elevation, and to that extent architecture and sculpture were lesser media than painting. Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres was his ideal and the works of romantic artists such as Eugène Delacroix were deprecated. He termed writing of Stendhal, who was more accepting of the Romantics, “the Koran of the so-called Romantic artists.”


Selected Bibliography

[complete bibliography:] “Bibliographie.” Baschet, Robert. E.-J. Dele´cluze: te´moin de son temps 1781-1863. Paris: Boivin et Cie, 1942, pp. 443-496; “un discorso sul genio italiano per opera.” in, Zirardini, Giuseppe. L’Italia letteraria ed artistica: galleria di cento ritratti de’ poeti, prosatori, scultori, architetti e musici piu illustri, con cenni storici. Paris: Baudry, 1851; Louis David: son école et son temps: souvenirs. Paris: Didier, 1855; L’he´micycle du Palais des beaux-arts, peinture murale par Paul Delaroche et grave´e au burin par Henriquel-Dupont. Paris: Goupil et cie., 1857; Les Beaux-arts dans les deux mondes en 1855: Architecture, sculpture, peinture, gravure. Paris: Charpentier, 1856; Pre´cis d’un traite´ de peinture, contenant les principes du dessin, du modele´ et du coloris, et leur application à l’imitation des objets et à la composition; pre´ce´de´ d’une introduction historique, et suivi d’une biographie des plus ce´lèbres peintres, d’une bibliographie et d’un vocabulaire analytique des termes techniques. Paris: Au bureau de l’Encyclope´die portative, 1828; Précis historique sur les Beaux-Arts en France, volume 28 (1836) of, Duckett, William. Dictionnaire de la conservation et de la lecture. 52 vols. Paris: Belin-Mandar, 1832-39.


Sources

Dele´cluze, E´tienne Jean. Souvenirs de soixante anne´es. Paris: M. Levy, 1862; Baschet, Robert, ed. Journal de Dele´cluze: 1824 – 1828. Paris: Grasset, 1948; Baschet, Robert. E.-J. Dele´cluze, te´moin de son temps 1781-1863. Paris: Boivin et Cie, 1942; Boime, Albert. The Academy and French Painting in the Nineteenth Century. London: Phaidon, 1971, pp. 89-91; Wakefield, David. “Stendhal and Delécluze at the Salon of 1824.” in, The Artist and the Writer in France: Essays in Honour of Jean Seznec. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974, pp. 76-85; E. S. “Delécluze, Etienne-Jean.” Allgemeine Künstler-Lexikon (Saur) 25: 420-21.




Citation

"Delécluze, E. J.." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/delecluzee/.


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Anti-Romanticism art critic; author a book on David and histories of art. Delécluze was born to the architect Jean-Baptiste Delécluze. He apprenticed in the studio of the painter Charles Moreau (1762-1810) in 1796 where he met Jacques-Louis David.

Delbrueck, Richard

Full Name: Delbrueck, Richard

Other Names:

  • Richard Delbrück

Gender: male

Date Born: 1875

Date Died: 1957

Place Born: Jena, Thuringia, Germany

Place Died: Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany

Home Country/ies: Germany

Subject Area(s): archaeology, architecture (object genre), Medieval (European), and sculpture (visual works)

Institution(s): Deutsches Archäologisches Institut


Overview

Architectural historian and archaeologist, who stood aloof from the historicization of art history into questions of styles, preferring instead to emphasize the aesthetic uniqueness and impact of classical and medieval art. As a student, he traveled to Rome studying art with Ernst Pfuhl. Professor at Giessen University, 1922-1928, and Bonn University 1928-1940.


Selected Bibliography

Die Consulardiptychen und verwandte Denkmäler. 2 vols. Berlin: 1929; Hellenistische Bauten in Lautium. 2 vols. 1907, 1912; Antike Porphyrwerke. Berlin: 1932; Spätantike Kaiserportäts von Constantinus Magus bis zum Ende des Westreichs. Berlin and Leipzig: 1933.


Sources

Kleinbauer, W. Eugene. Modern Perspectives in Western Art History: An Anthology of 20th-Century Writings on the Visual Arts. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971, p. 46 mentioned; Archäologenbildnisse: Porträts und Kurzbiographien von Klassichen Archäologen deutscher Sprache. Reinhard Lullies, ed. Mainz am Rhein: Verlag Philipp von Zabern, 1988: 188-189.



Contributors: Lee Sorensen


Citation

Lee Sorensen. "Delbrueck, Richard." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/delbrueckr/.


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Architectural historian and archaeologist, who stood aloof from the historicization of art history into questions of styles, preferring instead to emphasize the aesthetic uniqueness and impact of classical and medieval art. As a student, he travel

Delaissé, Léon M. J. Bob

Full Name: Delaissé, Léon M. J. Bob

Other Names:

  • Léon Marie Joseph Bob Delaissé

Gender: male

Date Born: 1914

Date Died: 1972

Place Born: Herzele, East Flanders, Flanders, Belgium

Place Died: Oxford, Oxfordshire, England, UK

Home Country/ies: Belgium

Subject Area(s): connoisseurship, manuscripts (documents), and Medieval (European)

Career(s): curators


Overview

Connoisseur of illuminated manuscripts; assistant curator at the Department of Manuscripts of the Royal Library in Brussels. He was born in Herseaux, Belgium. which is present day Herzele. Delaissé attended high school at Tournai, Belgium, and studied Romance Philology at the Catholic University of Louvain. During World War II, when Belgium was under German occupation, Delaissé joined the resistance and later fled to Spain, where he was arrested. He subsequently escaped to England, where he trained in the tank corps for the Belgian Army of Liberation. He was wounded at the invasion of Normandy and lost a leg. After his recuperation in England and return to Belgium he obtained an internship in 1946 at the Royal Library in Brussels. In 1947 he became librarian of the manuscripts department. His interest in the history of the medieval book, in particular of illuminated manuscripts, led to a number of important publications. In 1949, his study of the Book of Hours of Mary van Vronensteyn, preserved in the Royal Library, appeared. In 1954 he obtained his doctoral degree from the University of Louvain with a dissertation on an important autograph manuscript of Thomas a Kempis (c. 1380-1471). The dissertation was published in 1956 as Le manuscrit autographe de Thomas a Kempis et ‘L’imitation de Jésus-Christ’. This study shows Delaissé’s interest in the material and technical aspects of manuscripts. This archaeological approach is also found in his studies on manuscript illumination. In 1956 he was appointed assistant curator of the department of manuscripts in the Brussels Royal Library. He wrote the catalog for the exhibition of Flemish illuminated manuscripts produced under the reign of Philip the Good, which was held in Brussels and in Amsterdam in 1959. He classified the manuscripts according to the workshops of the miniaturists as well as to the publishing houses. In 1959 he was given a leave to do research at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He remained for an extended period in the United States, during which he lectured at the University of California at Berkeley, and subsequently became visiting lecturer at the Fine Arts Department of Harvard University. In 1964 he resigned his position in Brussels and moved to Oxford where he stayed for the rest of his life, working as a research fellow at All Souls College. As a teacher he attracted students from different disciplines. In 1968 his book, A Century of Dutch Manuscript Illumination, appeared in which he pointed to the originality of the illuminators in the Northern Netherlands and their remarkable sense for the reproduction of nature and reality. From 1967 until his death in 1972, Delaissé, in collaboration with James Marrow, thoroughly studied the 26 manuscripts of the Rothschild collection, dating from the mid thirteenth to the mid-sixteenth century. After his death, the study was completed by John De Wit and edited by Anthony Blunt. In this 1977 publication, Illuminated Manuscripts: the James A. de Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor, Delaissé’s strong commitment to the archaeology of the book clearly appears. Delaissé often stated that manuscript illumination needed to be studied in relation to all other aspects of the manuscript, in a comprehensive approach which he defined as the archaeology of the medieval book. He also focused on the iconology of the miniatures and on their stylistic characteristics.


Selected Bibliography

[dissertation:] Le manuscript autographe de Thomas a Kempis et ‘l’imitation de Jésus-Christ’; examen archéologique et edition diplomatique du Bruxellensis 5855-61. University of Louvain, 1954, published, Paris: éditions érasme, 1956; [complete bibliography:] Dogaer, G. and König, E. A Bibliography of L. J. M. Delaissé and a Note on the Delaissé Papers Deposited in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. Quaerendo 6 (1976) : 352-359; Le livre d’heures de Mary van Vronensteyn, chef-d’œuvre inconnu d’un atelier d’Utrecht, achevé en 1460. Scriptorium 3 (1949): 230-245; Les ‘Chroniques de Hainaut’ et l’atelier de Jean Wauquelin a Mons, dans l’histoire de la miniature flamande. Miscellanea Panofsky, Bulletin Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts 4 (1955): 21-56; La miniature flamande à l’époque de Philippe le Bon. Milan: Electa editrice, 1956; Le siècle d’or de la miniature flamande: le mécénat de Philippe le Bon., [Dutch: De gouden eeuw der Vlaamse miniatuur: het mecenaat van Filips de Goede 1445-1475.] Brussels: Bibliothèque royale de Belgique, 1959; An Exhibition of Netherlandish Book Illumination. Allen Memorial Art Museum Bulletin 17 (1960): 94-113; Medieval Miniatures from the Department of Manuscripts (formerly the Library of Burgundy) the Royal Library of Belgium. New York: H. N. Abrams, 1965; A Century of Dutch Manuscript Illumination. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968; and Marrow, James, De Wit, John, and Blunt, Anthony ed. Illuminated Manuscripts: the James A. de Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor. Fribourg: Office du livre, 1977.


Sources

L. M. J. Delaissé, Authority on Manuscripts. The Times (Jan. 21, 1972): 14; Gilissen, L. In memoriam L. M. J. Delaissé 1914-1972. Quaerendo 2 (1972): 83-86; Boon, K. G. L. M. J. Delaissé. Burlington Magazine 114 (1972): 246-247; Gazette des Beaux-Arts 80 (1972): sup. 56; Dogaer, G. Delaissé, Léon M.J., kunsthistoricus, conservator, lector. Nationaal Biografisch Woordenboek 8 Brussel: Paleis der Academiën, 1979, pp. 221-224.



Contributors: Monique Daniels


Citation

Monique Daniels. "Delaissé, Léon M. J. Bob." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/delaissel/.


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Connoisseur of illuminated manuscripts; assistant curator at the Department of Manuscripts of the Royal Library in Brussels. He was born in Herseaux, Belgium. which is present day Herzele. Delaissé attended high school at Tournai, Belgium, and stu

Delaborde, Henri, vicomte

Image Credit: Wikipedia

Full Name: Delaborde, Henri, vicomte

Gender: male

Date Born: 1811

Date Died: 1899

Place Born: Rennes, Brittany, France

Place Died: Paris, Île-de-France, France

Home Country/ies: France

Subject Area(s): prints (visual works)

Career(s): curators


Overview

Curator, painter, and early authority on prints. Delaborde was a son of Henri-François Delaborde, a general in the French army who was honored in 1809 with the title comte de l’Empire (Count of the Empire). The young Delaborde attended high school at the Lycée Charlemagne and the Lycée Bourbon in Paris. After graduation he wanted to become an artist, but his parents decided that he study law. Soon after his enrollment, however, with the permission of his father, Delaborde entered the studio of the history painter Paul Delaroche, where he practiced painting between 1829 and 1834. He then traveled to Florence where he copied paintings of Fra Angelico as well as works of Masaccio and other painters of the Quattrocento. In 1839 he visited Ravenna and Venice and again for an extended stay in Italy from 1842 to 1845. He married in 1846. An acclaimed painter in France, his works were shown at the Paris Salon and he received official commissions for the execution of paintings for churches and other places. His career considerably changed around 1850, when due to poor health he had to give up painting. He instead became an art writer for Revue des deux mondes, in which periodical he published articles on the history of engraving. He also contributed to the Gazette des Beaux-Arts. In 1864 his collected articles were published as études sur les beaux-arts en France et en Italie. In 1855 his thirty-year career at the Print Room of the Paris Bibliothèque Nationale began, first as adjunct curator, rising to chief curator in 1858. He wrote entries for the Histoire des peintres de toutes les écoles, edited by Charles Blanc. In 1865 he edited the Lettres et pensées (letters and thoughts) of the portrait- and history painter Hippolyte Flandrin, who had died the year before. His Mélanges sur l’art contemporain appeared in 1866. In 1868 he became a member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts. From 1874 onwards, he served this institution as secrétaire perpétuel. A monograph on Ingres appeared in 1870 as Ingres, sa vie, ses travaux, sa doctrine, which he dedicated to the painter’s widow. In 1882 he wrote an essay on the origins, the techniques, and the history of engraving in Western Europe, La gravure: précis élémentaire de ses origines, de ses procédés et de son histoire. His later writings include a study on the Flemish engraver Gérard Edelinck (1886) and a major work on Marcantonio Raimondi: Marc-Antoine Raimondi: étude historique et critique suivie d’un catalogue raisonné des œuvres du maître (1888). Delaborde’s essay, La gravure, is a very informative introduction into the field, even though references to scholarly literature are lacking, while his Raimondi study offers a critical contribution to the research on this engraver.


Selected Bibliography

études sur les beaux-arts en France et en Italie. Paris: J. Renouard, 1864; Lettres et pensées d’Hippolyte Flandrin, accompagnées de notes et précédées d’une notice biographique et d’un catalogue du maître. Paris: H. Plon, 1865; Mélanges sur l’art contemporain. Paris: J. Renouard, 1866; Ingres, sa vie, ses travaux, sa doctrine, d’après les notes manuscrites et les lettres du maître. Paris: H. Plon, 1870; La gravure: précis élémentaire de ses origines, de ses procédés et de son histoire. Paris: A. Quantin, 1882; La gravure en Italie avant Marc-Antoine (1452-1505). Paris: Librairie de l’art, 1882; Marc-Antoine Raimondi: étude historique et critique suivie d’un catalogue raisonné des œuvres du maître. Paris: Librairie de l’Art, 1888.


Sources

Larroumet, G. Notice historique sur la vie et les travaux de M. le comte H. Delaborde, 1900; Blumer, M.-L. “Delaborde (Henri), peintre et écrivain d’art.” Dictionnaire de Biographie Française 10 (1965): 598-599; [obituary:] Michel, é. Gazette des Beaux-Arts 2 (1899): 71-81.


Archives


Contributors: Emily Crockett and Monique Daniels


Citation

Emily Crockett and Monique Daniels. "Delaborde, Henri, vicomte." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/delabordeh/.


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Search for materials by & about this art historian:

Curator, painter, and early authority on prints. Delaborde was a son of Henri-François Delaborde, a general in the French army who was honored in 1809 with the title comte de l’Empire (Count of the Empire). The young Delaborde attended hi

Deknatel, Frederick B.

Full Name: Deknatel, Frederick B.

Other Names:

  • Frederick Deknatel

Gender: male

Date Born: 1905

Date Died: 1973

Place Born: Chicago, Cook, IL, USA

Place Died: Boston, Suffolk, MA, USA

Home Country/ies: United States

Subject Area(s): Medieval (European) and Modern (style or period)


Overview

Modernist and Medievalist art historian at Harvard. Deknatel attended the Lawrenceville School in Lawrenceville, N. J., before graduating from Princeton in History in 1928 where the lectures of Charles Rufus Morey greatly impressed him. He entered Harvard Law School but changed his mind, switching to the Graduate school of Arts and Sciences. At Harvard, Deknatel studied under both A. Kingsley Porter and Chandler R. Post who suggested his dissertation topic on Spanish art to him. He married Virginia Herrick in 1931 and the following year began teaching as an instructor and tutor at Harvard. His dissertation on thirteenth-century sculpture was accepted in 1935. As a tutor for the museum classes of Paul J. Sachs, Deknatel became increasingly interested in the art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Though he supervised some students in medieval art, particularly after the retirement of Wilhelm Reinhold Walter Koehler in 1953, Deknatel focused his teaching on modern art. In 1940 he was appointed associate professor. He served as Associate Dean of Harvard College during World War II (1942-1945). In 1944 he was named chair of the Department of Fine Arts. He was appointed full professor in 1946. He served on the Board of the College Art Associate and was president 1947-1948. Deknatel published one of the early accounts in English of the painter Edvard Munch. He was succeeded as chair of the department in 1949 by Leonard E. Opdycke, Jr. In 1953 he was made William Dorr Boardman professor. His students included Kermit S. Champa, Theodore Reff and Linda Seidel. Deknatel published comparatively little as a scholar. He influence derives as an educator in modern art areas at Harvard. His scholarship, outside the modern, was in studying the influence of French Romanesque style in Spain.


Selected Bibliography

[disssertation] The Thirteenth Century Gothic Sculpture of the Cathedral of Burgos and Leon. Harvard University, 1935; “The Thirteenth Century Gothic Sculpture of the Cathedral of Burgos and Leon” Art Bulletin. September 1935. 243-389; Edvard Munch. Boston: Institute of Contemporary Art, 1950.


Sources

Bazin, Germain. Histoire de l’histoire de l’art; de Vasari à nos jours. Paris: Albin Michel, 1986 p. 276-277; Coolidge, John, et al. “Frederick Brockway Deknatel.” Fogg Art Museum Annual Report, 1972-74: 33-36; Freedberg, Sydney. [same text:] “Tribute to Frederick Deknatel.” Art Journal 33 no, 3 (Spring 1974): 238.




Citation

"Deknatel, Frederick B.." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/deknatelf/.


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Modernist and Medievalist art historian at Harvard. Deknatel attended the Lawrenceville School in Lawrenceville, N. J., before graduating from Princeton in History in 1928 where the lectures of Charles Rufus Morey greatly imp

Deichmann, Friedrich Wilhelm

Full Name: Deichmann, Friedrich Wilhelm

Gender: male

Date Born: 1909

Date Died: 1993

Place Born: Jena, Thuringia, Germany

Place Died: Mentana, Rome, Lazio, Italy

Home Country/ies: Germany

Subject Area(s): architecture (object genre), Late Antique, and sculpture (visual works)


Overview

Architectural historian of the late antique era. Deichmann was one of the art historians who worked at the DAI in Rome during the height of the Nazi doctrine, when others, like Ludwig Curtius, had been force to resign.


Selected Bibliography

Studien zur Architektur Konstantinopels im 5. und 6. Jahrhunder nach Christus. Baden-Baden: 1956; Ravenne: Hauptstadt des Spätantiken Abendlandes. 3 vols. Weisbaden: 1969.


Sources

Kleinbauer, W. Eugene. Modern Perspectives in Western Art History: An Anthology of 20th-Century Writings on the Visual Arts. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971, pp. 39, 50 mentioned, 87 mentioned; Duval, Noel. “In Memoriam Fr. W. Deichmann 1909-1993.” Antiquité tardive 2 (1994): 7-11; Farioli Campanati, Raffaella. “Friedrich Wilhelm Deichmann, Jena 17 XII 1909-Mentana (Roma) 13 IX 1993.” Corso di cultura sull’arte ravennate e bizantina 41 (1994): 10-16; Feld, Otto. “Commemorazione di Friedrich Wilhelm Deichmann.” Corso di cultura sull’arte ravennate e bizantina 41 (1994): 17-32; Feld, Otto. “Friedrich Wilhelm Deichmann 17.12.1909-13.9.1993.” Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts. Römische Abteilung 101 (1994): 7-17.




Citation

"Deichmann, Friedrich Wilhelm." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/deichmannf/.


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Architectural historian of the late antique era. Deichmann was one of the art historians who worked at the DAI in Rome during the height of the Nazi doctrine, when others, like Ludwig Curtius, had been force to resign.

Dehio, Georg

Image Credit: Wikipedia

Full Name: Dehio, Georg

Other Names:

  • Georg Gottfried Julius Dehio

Gender: male

Date Born: 1850

Date Died: 1932

Place Born: Tallinn, Harjumaa, Estonia

Place Died: Tübingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany

Home Country/ies: Germany

Subject Area(s): architecture (object genre) and sculpture (visual works)


Overview

Art and architectural historian; Professor at University of Königsberg and later Strasbourg; author of Handbuch der deutschen Kunstdenkmäler. He was born in Reval, Russian Empire, which is present-day Tallin, Estonia. Like many art historians, Dehio began as an historian. He studied history at Dorpat (Tartu) and 1869-71 in Göttingen with Georg Waitz (1813-1886), head of the Monumenta Germaniae Historica. In 1872 Dehio attained his doctorate in Munich, writing on the Archbishop Hartwig von Stade. His habilitation, on the history of the archbishopric of Hamburg-Bremen, was granted in 1877 in Munich under Wilhelm von Giesebrecht (1814-1889). Dehio’s interest in art history was sparked after a trip to Italy 1876-77. Initially Dehio wrote essays on Alberti, Raffael and the early Basilica. In 1883 he became an assistant professor and later full professor of art history in Königsberg. In 1892 Dehio succeeded Hubert Janitschek as the head of the Strassburger Institute, at that time connected to the Christian Archaeology Institute of Henry Kraus. Dehio was one of the first to recognize the talent and potential of the young art historian Wilhelm Vöge, suggesting Vöge’s habilitation topic in 1894. One of his first publications was Die kirchliche Baukunst des Abendlandes (atlas, 1887, text 1892-1901), written with Gustav von Bezold. For Die kirchliche Baukunst, Dehio and Bezold sketched out the plans and outlines of the buildings by hand. Dehio viewed architecture as symbolic form relevant as part of art-historical analysis. Wilhelm Pinder praised Dehio’s vocabulary for the precision it lent to art history. Dehio’s devotion, like Pinder’s, was to German art. In 1899 Dehio finished the outline for his Handbuch der Deutschen Kunstdenkmäler (Handbook of German Cultural Monuments), published beginning in 1901. The survey, based on the official inventories of the German states, appeared in five volumes between 1905-12. It has remained through newer editions, the standard survey of German architecture. Dehio’s dedication to things German, driven by his conservatism and nationalism, deepened. Although Germanic art histories had been previously authored by Wilhelm Bode, Karl F. A. von Lützow and Jakob Falke, Dehio wanted a truly synthetic survey of German art history. Beginning in 1908, Dehio drafted a text, Deutsche Kunstgeschichte und deutsche Geschichte, incorporating political and economic history to show the relationship between the nation and the art. World War I prevented its appearance. The three-volume Geschichte der deutschen Kunst appeared between 1919-26. By then, Dehio was teaching in Tübingen, a result of Alsace’s annexation by France in 1918. During the war years and after the war he spoke critically about the western democracies, that did not recognize the people as a body, Kleine Aufsätze (1930). Shortly after Dehio’s death in 1932, a fourth volume to Geschichte der deutschen Kunst was written by Gustav Pauli. In 1941 the architectural historian Ernst Gall founded the “Vereinigung zur Herausgabe des Dehio-Handbuchs” (Association for the Revision of Dehio’s Handbook) to further the publication and updating of the Handbook of German Cultural Monuments. In 1958 the organization was renewed as “Dehio-Vereinigung” (Dehio Society), and in 1976 as the “Dehio-Vereinigung: Wissenschaftliche Vereinigung zur Fortführung des kunsttopographischen Werkes von Georg Dehio” (Dehio Society: the Intellectual Foundation for the Furthering of the Artistic/Topographical Work of Georg Dehio), headquartered in Bamburg, Germany. Both Geschichte der deutschen Kunst and Handbuch der deutschen Kunstdenkmäler argue for the autonomy of German art. Previous art histories had often seen German art as derivative from other countries. Dehio’s art history is that of a people, rather than the prevailing conception of art created by “Great Masters.” The “hero” of German art was the youth of Germany. Dehio saw Gothic, Romantic and baroque as essentially the same thing. Geschichte der deutschen Kunst ends with the late 18th century, because, Dehio declared, German art ended there. The remaining years of art in Germany or elsewhere, he contended, could only be conceived of as stories of artists, not art history. A prominent member of the architectural conservation community, Dehio advocated “conservation, not restoration” for projects such as the Friedrichsbau of Heidelberg Castle (1895-1903) and Meissen Cathedral (1903 ff.) against the overzealous conjectural restorations advocated by Carl Schäfer (fl. 1878-1896) and others. Together with Aloïs Riegl, he espoused the concept of Alterswert (the value of aging) for monuments. Robert Hedicke in his Methodenlehre der Kunstgeschichte (1924) considered Dehio an historian rather than an esthetician, one who avoided the generalities and methodologies of others.


Selected Bibliography

and Bezold, Gustav von. Die kirchliche Baukunst des Abendlandes. Stuttgart: J. G. Cotta, [text published 1892-1901; atlas, 1887-1901], vol. 2 of text and v. 5 of atlas published, Stuttgart: A. Bergsträsser; Ein Proportionsgesetz der antiken Baukunst und sein Nachleben im Mittelalter und in der Renaissance. Strassburg: Karl J. Trübner, 1895; and Winter, Franz. Kunstgeschichte in Bildern: systematische Darstellung der Entwickelung der bildenden Kunst vom klassischen Altertum bis zum Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts. Leipzig: E. A. Seemann, 1898-1902; Handbuch der Deutschen Kunstdenkmäler. 5 vols. Berlin: E. Wasmuth, 1905-1912; Kunsthistorische Aufsätze. Munich: R. Oldenbourg, 1914; Geschichte der Deutschen Kunst. 3 vols in 6. Berlin and Leipzig: Vereinigung wissenschaftlicher verleger, 1919-26; Das strassburger Münster. Munich: R. Piper, 1922; Der bamberger Dom. Munich: R. Piper & Co., 1924; Kleine Aufsätze und Ansprachen. s.l.: s.n., 1930 [typewritten manuscript of collected speeches].


Sources

Hedicke, Robert. Methodenlehre der Kunstgeschichte. Strassbourg: Heitz, 1924; Dvorák, Max. Idealism and Naturalism in Gothic Art. Translated and noted by Randolph J. Klawiter. Preface by Karl Maria Swoboda. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1967, pp. 187-8; Panofsky, Erwin. “Wilhelm Vöge: A Biographical Memoir.” Art Journal 28 no. 1 (Fall 1968): 31; Wölfflin, Heinrich. Heinrich Wölfflin, 1864-1945: Autobiographie, Tagebücher und Briefe. Joseph Ganter, ed. Basel: Schwabe & Co., 1982, p. 490; Hubala, Erich. “Georg Dehio 1850-1932: Seine Kunstgeschichte der Architektur.” Zeitschrift fur Kunstgeschichte 46 no. 1 (1983): 1-14; Bazin, Germain. Histoire de l’histoire de l’art; de Vasari à nos jours. Paris: Albin Michel, 1986 p.152, 532 [listed as “Gustav Dehio”]; Kultermann, Udo. The History of Art History. New York: Abaris, 1993, pp. 137-8; Metzler Kunsthistoriker Lexikon. Stuttgart: J. B. Metzler, 1999, pp. 54-57; Dictionary of Art; Greulich, A. “Dehio, Georg.” vol. 25. Saur Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon: Die bildenden Künstler aller Zeiten und Völker. Munich: K.G. Saur, 2000, pp. 255-6; Betthausen, Peter. Georg Dehio: ein deutscher Kunsthistoriker. Munich: Deutscher Kunstverlag, 2004; [obituaries:] Scheffler, Karl. “Georg Dehio.” Kunst und Kunstler 31 (April 1932): 144; Gall, Ernst. “Georg Dehio.” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 1 no. 1 (1932): 2-4; Pantheon 9 (May 1932): 176.



Contributors: HB and Lee Sorensen


Citation

HB and Lee Sorensen. "Dehio, Georg." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/dehiog/.


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Art and architectural historian; Professor at University of Königsberg and later Strasbourg; author of Handbuch der deutschen Kunstdenkmäler. He was born in Reval, Russian Empire, which is present-day Tallin, Estonia. Like many art histor

Degenhart, Bernhard

Image Credit: Lexikon der Österreichischen Provenienz Forschung

Full Name: Degenhart, Bernhard

Gender: male

Date Born: 1907

Date Died: 1999

Place Born: Munich, Bavaria, Germany

Home Country/ies: Germany

Subject Area(s): drawings (visual works), Italian (culture or style), Italian Renaissance-Baroque styles, and Renaissance


Overview

Drawings scholar, especially of the Italian Renaissance; Pisanello expert. Degenhart’s father was a high school (Gymnasium) teacher. Degenhart began his dissertation work in 1931 at the University in Munich, researching Lorenzo di Credi under August Liebmann Mayer. Mayer, a Jew, was denounced by many in Munich, including Degenhart, and after Mayer’s dismissal, he completed his dissertation under Wilhelm Pinder. After a volunteer position at the Staatsgemäldesammlungen in Munich, he received a fellowship (Stipendium) in 1933 at the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florence followed by an assistantship at the Hertziana Library in Rome. Studies of other Quattrocento artists, including Botticini, Botticelli, Rosselli, Piero di Cosimo, Fra Bartolomeo, and on Venetian painting (Gentile and Giovanni Bellini, Jacopo de Barbari, and Basaiti) followed. One important essay, Dürer and German art in an Italian context, appeared in 1937. From 1940 to 1946 he was hired as a registrar at the Albertina in Vienna. Beginning in 1941, Degenhart began issuing his study of Pisanello (final volume, 1973). In Vienna he met a converted Jew, Adelgunde “Gundl” Krippel, whom he married in 1943. Her connection to the cultural scene in Austria (she came from a family of poets), led to Degenhart’s introduction to Kajetan Mühlmann, now the leader of art looting for the Nazis. Degenhart supplied expert opinions on art as part of a team of art historians in the Netherlands under Mühlmann, others included the Berlin art historian of Dutch art, Eduard Plietzsch, and Franz Kieslinger. All assisted in expertising works of art forcibly taken from fleeing or condemned Jews or institutions to be sent to the Führermuseum and the art collection of Reichsmarschall Göring. After the War, he was appointed a curator at the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung in Munich. His post-war years resulted in an interest in the 19th-century Hans von Marées. Two significant publication about that artist’s work were issued in the 1950s. Degenhart was apppointed Director of the Graphische Sammlung in 1965. In collaboration with Annegrit Schmitt, Degenart began publishing his monumental Corpus of Italian Drawings Between 1300 and 1450 in 1968. The series was awarded the “Stiftung zur Förderung der Wissenschaften in Bayern” by the Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften in 1970. He retired from the Munich museum in 1971, and awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Munich the following year. Degenhart saw the medieval era as a rich and complex time. He disagreed with art historian Robert Oertel that medieval drawing, for example, was limited to axiomatic drawing from pattern books, arguing instead the diversity of sketching from what was contemporarily termed “from nature” (Woods).


Selected Bibliography

Antonio Pisanello. Vienna: A. Schroll 1941; Marées Zeichnungen. Berlin: Gebr. Mann, 1953; Die Fresken in Neapel by Marées. Munich: Prestel, 1958; Corpus der italienischen Zeichnungen, 1300-1450. 4 vols. Berlin: Mann, 1968-1990.


Sources

Petropoulous, Jonathan. The Faustian Bargan: The Art World in Nazi Germany. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000, p. 194; “Giudizio della Commissione per l’attribuzione del Premio Internazionale Galileo Galilei dei Rotary Italiani, anno XV.” Sezione “Storia dell’Arte Italiana”. [website] http://www3.humnet.unipi.it/galileo/fondazione/Vincitori%20Premio%20Galilei/Bernhard_Degenhart.htm ; Fuhrmeister, Christian, and Kienlechnere, Susanne. “Exkurz 1: Bernhard Degenhart undKajetan Mühlmann Wien, Den Haag, Krakau (?), Wien, 1939 – 1942.” Kunstgeschichte im “Dritten Reich”: Theorien, Methoden, Praktiken. Berlin: Akad.-Verl. 2008, pp. 422- ; Woods, Kim, ed. Making Renaissance Art. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press/The Open University, 2007, p. 26; [obituary:] Ciardi Dupre Dal Poggetto, Maria Grazia. “Per Bernard [sic] Degenhart.” Rivista di storia della miniatura 5 (2000): 7.




Citation

"Degenhart, Bernhard." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/degenhartb/.


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Drawings scholar, especially of the Italian Renaissance; Pisanello expert. Degenhart’s father was a high school (Gymnasium) teacher. Degenhart began his dissertation work in 1931 at the University in Munich, researching Lorenzo di Credi under

Decorme, Gerardo

Full Name: Decorme, Gerardo

Gender: male

Date Born: unknown

Date Died: unknown

Subject Area(s): architecture (object genre), churches (buildings), religious buildings, and sculpture (visual works)

Career(s): clergy


Overview

Jesuit priest; study of the history of church architecture in his order


Selected Bibliography

La obra de los jesuitos mexicanos durante la epoca colonial 1572-1767. Mexico, 1941.



Archives


Contributors: Emily Crockett and Lee Sorensen


Citation

Emily Crockett and Lee Sorensen. "Decorme, Gerardo." Dictionary of Art Historians (website). https://arthistorians.info/decormeg/.


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Search for materials by & about this art historian:

Jesuit priest; study of the history of church architecture in his order