“Image-Centred”
Approach vs. Facts.
On Some Interpretations of Rodakowski’s
and Mehoffer’s paintings
(Folia Historiae Artium, Seria Nowa, vol.
10: 2005
published 2006, p. 161-171. ISSN 0071-6723)
Abstract
The author, referring to
methodological discussions conducted by historians of literature,
reflects on
the problem of unverifiable theories and overinterpretations in the
contemporary study of art. As an illustration, he lists Michael
Brötje's
publications (fashionable in Poland), which contain extended analyses
that - as
a rule - take no account of the artist's intention or of the work's
historical
background, sometimes ignoring even the chronological sequence of
events. The
author considers Brötje's assumptions as too arbitrary: they
are impossible to
corroborate and impervious to falsification (in the Popperian sense).
It remains
unclear which facts could eventually contradict them. Similar phenomena
have
recently occurred in Polish publications. The proposals contained in
them are
true only in a ‘consensual’ way: they are
positively evaluated in certain
milieus of specialists, even though they happen to contradict the
testimony of
sources and general knowledge. In the author's opinion, the formulation
of
radically new (though not necessarily reasonable) interpretations is
given a
boost by the battle for recognition among scholars. In Polish research
on art
the strategy of overinterpretation sometimes results in local success,
while
the lack of scholarly debate reinforces this situation.
The author points to dangers of
overinterpretation through the example of studies by two art historians
from
the Poznań circle devoted to Polish painting in the 2nd
half of the 19th
century. He claims that their concentration on certain arbitrarily
selected
visual aspects of the discussed paintings results in exaggerated
subjectivity
in their arguments. The rules and stages of source analysis are
neglected in
what concerns not only the work of art itself, but also the related
sources.
The written sources which could prove helpful e.g. in the
reconstruction of the
circumstances in which pictures originated are often overlooked, and so
the
painting analysed out of the historical and artistic context falls prey
to the
interpreter's unbridled activity. Instead of historical thinking about
a work
of art, the authors present their deepened impressions, which cannot be
accepted as scholarly statements.