American Icons: Transatlantic Perspectives on Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century American Art (Issues and Debates Series)

Brand New Book, Shrinkwrapped, in Nice Condition with Very Small Bumps at the Head and Base of the Spine which has caused Small Crinkling but has No Tears, Stains, Mold, or Other Major Damage. No Remainder Mark. Book Description: American Icons explores American self-definition through the creation of a national art. Like their writer counterparts, American artists of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries yearned to create their art in terms of a uniquely American experience of history and nature. Paradoxically, however, when they insisted upon American originality and uniqueness, they could not but mediate these qualities through European conventions. European methods and motifs were, nonetheless, used differently in the social, economic, and communicative contexts of the New World. For American artists, Europe was an ensemble, not to say a warehouse, of traditions and styles from which they could choose according to their interests and preferences. Innovation was therefore not necessarily a matter of breaking new ground but a matter of how established means were used in new circumstances and for different purposes. The present essays explore the construction of an American sublime, of a mythology of the frontier, of a democratic style of common people and common objects, all expressed through the language of European art, while changing that language in the process of coining a new usage. American painters and graphic artists of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries sought inspiration for their work in the uniquely American experience of history and nature. The result was a transformation of the conventional Old World visual language into an indigenous and populist New World syntax. The twelve essays in this volume explore the development of a frontier mythology, a democratic style depicting common people and objects, and an American artistic consciousness and identity. Conceived and written from the perspectives of both cultural and art historians, American Icons initiates an interdisciplinary discussion on the complex relationships between American and European art. Los Angeles is a city on the Pacific Rim where things appear on edge, for they lack a permanent footing even while occupying a specific locale. The city's genius loci produce this dual vision of fixed place in a state of constant dislocation. It is only appropriate for the edge-bound Getty Center to initiate a series of publications that aim to expose the historical study of artifacts to the oscillation of rigorous debate. Each of these books proceeds from a specific body of historical material, not because that material is in itself inherently imbued with controversy but because its exposure to different disciplinary approaches raises new questions of interpretation. In the realm of historical studies, issues often emerge at the intersection of the various perspectives scholars have constructed for the examination of their subjects. As their debate refracts and refocuses the material under scrutiny, it also invites reflection upon itself and thereby exposes the assumptions and tendencies of scholarship to no less assiduous criticism than it does the underpinnings of its subjects. Contributors are Herbert Beck, Werner Busch, Martin Christadler, Nicolai Cikovsky, Jr., Françoise Forster-Hahn, Ursula Frohne, Barbara Gaehtgens, Thomas W. Gaehtgens, Barbara Groseclose, Olaf Hansen, William Hauptman, Heinz Ickstadt, Barbara Novak, and Kathleen Pyne. The book's contents are: Introduction by Thomas W. Gaehtgens and Heinz Ickstadt American Genesis: The Landing of Christopher Columbus by Barbara Groseclose Copley, West, and the Tradition of European High Art by Werner Busch Self, Time, and Object in American Art: Copley, Lane, and Homer by Barbara Novak Romantic Landscape Painting in America: History as Nature, Nature as History by Martin Christadler Inventing the Myth of the American Frontier: Bingham's Images of Fur Traders and Flatboatmen as Symbols of the Expanding Nation by Françoise Forster-Hahn Fictions of Nationhood: Leutze's Pursuit of an American History Painting in Dusseldorf by Barbara Gaehtgens Kindred Spirits: Notes on Swiss and American Painting of the Nineteenth Century by William Hauptmann Strategies of Recognition: The Conditioning of the American Artist between Marginality and Fame by Ursula Frohne Winslow Homer's National Style by Nicolai Cikovsky, Jr. The Senses of Illusion by Olaf Hansen Resisting Modernism: American Painting in the Culture of Conflict by Kathleen Pyne Urban Iconography in Nineteenth-Century American Painting: From Impressionism to the Ash Can School by Hubert Beck Biographical Notes on the Authors Index Volumes in the Issues & Debates series will result from symposia and lecture series, as well as from commissioned writings. Their scholarly editors are invited to frame highly focused essays with introductions, commentaries and/or sources, documents, and illustrations that further contribute to their usefulness.