Ernst Gombrich and the memory of Aby Warburg : emotion identity and scholarship
Abstract
This thesis in intellectual history examines the work of art historian Ernst Gombrich
(1909-2001), one-time Director of London's Warburg Institute, on that institute's
founder, Aby Warburg (1866-1929). The memory of War burg, as evoked in
Gombrich's scholarship, is investigated as a focal point for contemporary concerns on
the part of Gombrich and his peers, and as an influence on Warburg's reception in 20th
century scholarship.
The thesis gives a close account of Gombrich's particular intellectual
achievements, in order better to understand his status as a figure of great popular and
academic significance in mid-to-Iate 20th century art history and art theory. Gombrich
was an emigre who left his native Austria for the United Kingdom in the 1930s and this
thesis also considers the impact on intellectual history of the mid-20th century
emigration from Central Europe, which was driven by ethnonationalist and above all
Nazi persecution. Specifically, the thesis examines the significance for Gombrich's
work of his Austrian background, in terms of both the German-language humanist
culture of Bi/dung and Gombrich's sense, as a person of Jewish background, of Jewish
identity.
Using a methodology informed by the anthropology of emotions and the
discipline of memory studies, Warburg is approached specifically as a lieu de memoire
on Pierre Nora's model. The argument is that Gombrich invested his own concerns in
his scholarly representations of the older art historian. The means by which this
investment was made, and the negotiation of this investment amongst Gombrich's
colleagues at the Warburg Institute, are traced through archival research. The impact of
Gombrich's investment in Warburg on the older art historian's subsequent, posthumous
reception in academia is examined, and the potential for alternative visions of Warburg
marginalised by Gombrich's representation is also considered.
Authors
Finch, Matthew EdwardCollections
- Theses [4125]