Michelangelo’s Design Principles, Particularly in Relation to Those of Raphael - Hardcover

Panofsky, Erwin

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0691165262 ISBN 13: 9780691165264

Publisher: Princeton University Press, 2020

Synopsis

The first English translation of Erwin Panofsky's long-lost work on Michelangelo

In 2012, a manuscript by renowned art historian Erwin Panofsky was rediscovered in a safe in Munich, in the basement of the Central Institute for Art History. Hidden for decades among folders and administrative files was Panofsky's thesis on Michelangelo—originally submitted to Hamburg University in March of 1920, abandoned when Panofsky fled Hitler's Germany in 1934, and thought to have been destroyed in the Allied bombings. A century on, Michelangelo's Design Principles makes this remarkable work available for the first time in English.

Casting Panofsky's thought in an entirely new light, Michelangelo's Design Principles is the legendary scholar's only book-length examination of the art of the Italian Renaissance. He provides a compelling analysis of Michelangelo's artistic style and deftly compares it with that of Raphael, situating both Renaissance masters in the broader context of Western art. This illuminating book offers unique perspectives on Panofsky's early intellectual development and the state of research on Michelangelo and the High Renaissance at a period of transition in art history, when formalist readings of artworks began to take precedence over a biographical approach.

Featuring an introduction by Gerda Panofsky that discusses the history of the manuscript and the significance of its rediscovery, Michelangelo's Design Principles is a crucial link between Panofsky's formalist training as a young art historian and his later work in iconology.

About this title

About the Author

Erwin Panofsky (1892–1968) was one of the most eminent art historians of the twentieth century. His many books include Early Netherlandish Painting and The Life and Art of Albrecht Dürer (Princeton). Gerda Panofsky (1929–2024) was professor emerita of art history at Temple University. She published on Michelangelo and prepared the revised and enlarged second edition of Erwin Panofsky’s Abbot Suger on the Abbey Church of St.-Denis and Its Art Treasures (Princeton).

Edition details

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Publication date: 2020
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0691165262
• ISBN 13: 9780691165264
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 408
• Editor: Panofsky-Soergel Gerda