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The Books that Shaped Art History 
edited by Richard Shone and John-Paul Stonard
Thames & Hudson
Each of the 16 essays, written for The Burlington Magazine by critics and curators, looks at the impact of a single seminal book, mapping the intellectual development of its author, setting out the premise of the work and placing it within the broader disciplinary field.
All the usual suspects are here: Ernst Gombrich's Art and Illusion, Clement Greenberg's Art and Culture, Alfred Barr's monograph on Matisse and T.J. Clark's Image of the People. Taken together, they describe "a roadmap of sorts for reading art history".
Many of the art historians here turn out to have been remarkably long-lived, which means they had ample opportunity to tweak their texts to suit the unfolding moment.
The contributors to this volume have no qualms about splicing their critical analysis with biographical detail. Their brief was to tell "the personalities and stories" that lie behind the landmark texts of modern art history and these biographically informed essays achieve insights that would be lost if these great books were read as if they were self-contained artworks.
There are only two female art historians in this collection: Rosalind Krauss and Svetlana Alpers. This tells you something about how academic art history has always been keen to distance itself from the idea that looking at pictures is something women do.
All the essayists here are at pains to deny that there is an easily identifiable genealogy that shapes modern art history in which one great book begat the next. Nonetheless, you can't help noticing the connections that bind the writers of this core library together.
Sometimes these magi agree, sometimes they argue, more often than not they pointedly ignore one another. As a result, the overlaps between these 16 foundational texts are often messy and contested. Stonard's promise that this book will provide a "road map" of art in the 20th century may be misleading. What it does, in fact, is conduct an expertly guided tour along a rather marvellous scenic route.
Guardian News & Media


Book review: The Books that Shaped Art History

Lifestyle

Culture

Books

Each of the 16 essays, written for The Burlington Magazine by critics and curators, looks at the impact of a single seminal book, mapping the intellectual development of its author, setting out the premise of the work and placing it within the broader disciplinary field.
