The topic of this paper is one more alluded to than actually studied, both in current philosophy of art and in the theory of criticism. There is a reason for this, which both clarifies the issue and suggests how it is to be approached. To suppose that the person responsible for a work of art has at least something interesting to say about it is only natural, and even commonplace. But granted this, the qualifications to be put on that assumption (...) in individual and particular cases become of much greater interest. The major question would not then be whether or not, in an absolute sense, the artist is in a position to talk definitively about his own work, but rather on what basis or criteria a claim to that effect can be made to rest, and how far it extends in its implications. (shrink)

John Reichert and Stanley Fish, in their discussion of the finding of different "meanings" in Samson Agonistes,1 do not seem to recognize what is really in dispute between them. Certainly they step in to further confusions along the way. It is true that, as Fish reiterates, the "meaning" which is to be cumulatively grasped from a total work of art, such as a long dramatic poem or novel, is open in principle to unlimited divergencies of interpretation on the basis of (...) either external facts that can be brought to bear on the work or hypotheses that can be counted or presented as potentially relevant. This is so not only because people differ in their understandings in a great variety of ways but also because the fundamental indeterminacy of language—as distinct from the ambiguity of particular statements2—is capable of being understood as such. · 1. John Reichert, "But That Was in Another Ball Park: A Reply to Stanley Fish," Critical Inquiry 6 : 164-72; Stanley E. Fish, "A Reply to John Reichert; or, How to Stop Worrying and Learn to Love Interpretation," Critical Inquiry 6 : 173-78. Fish's original essay, "Normal Circumstances . . . and Other Special Cases," appeared in the Summer 1978 issue.· 2. See for this distinction my remarks in "On the Recognition and Identification of Objects in Paintings," Critical Inquiry 3 : 702. Mark Roskill, professor of art history at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, is the author of Van Gogh, Gauguin, and the Impressionist Circle, and What is Art History? He has contributed "On the Recognition and Identification of Objects in Paintings" to the Summer 1977 issue of Critical Inquiry. (shrink)

Dolce's Dialogo della pittura first appeared in Venice in 1557 and consists of a three-part dialogue between two Venetians, Aretino and Fabrini, on the particular merits of works of art and artists, including Michaelangelo, Raphael, and Donatello.

There are certain ways in which the spectator's response to a work of art is liable to interference or a potentially deflecting kind of persuasion. What one is told is there in the work, or relevant in it, may play such a role; and so may what one supposes to be there, as opposed to what actually is. Since similar problems apply in the perception of the real world, including the people and the actions in it, to say this is (...) not yet to say that there is, or should be, a pure and untrammeled kind of perception that one aims at or learns to use in front of works of art; that being already a form of critical theorizing which places some kinds of limits or ideal construction on what is permissible in the form of a response. But there are in fact two distinct realms in which perception and related cognitive processes occur, one artistic, the other nonartistic. For the present purposes, rather than any larger presupposition being entertained here, it is assumed simply that, differences of situation and context notwithstanding, there is no type of statement concerning the perception of a work of art which does not have a parallel or equivalent in the perception of the real world. Such is the philosophical basis for the line of inquiry to be followed here. Mark Roskill is the author of a book-length interpretation of cubism, from which the present essay has been adapted. The author of Van Gogh, Gauguin and the Impressionist Circle, What is Art History?, and a book on photography, he teaches courses in the history of modern art and in critical theory at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He has contributed "A Reply to John Reichert and Stanley Fish" to the Winter 1979 issue of Critical Inquiry. (shrink)

Anthony van Dyck’s period of service to the Stuart court stretches from 1632, when he was appointed “principalle Paynter in ordinary to their Majesties” and knighted, to his death at the end of 1641. After an earlier visit of a few months, beginning in December 160, van Dyck had gone to Italy to improve himself; there he had defected from the service of James I. On his return to England this was forgiven, and in the early years he was mainly (...) employed in making portraits of the royal family and household. Later he was again absent from England, spending an entire year beginning in July 1634 back in Antwerp. During the last six years van Dyck spent in England, his clientele widened further; it is chiefly the portraits of this latter period that I will consider here.These portraits have been approached and evaluated in two basic ways. First of all, they have been taken to demonstrate the adaptation of van Dyck’s preexisting skills, especially his command of the “grand style,” to the requirements of a court and aristocracy which prized grace and elegance as hallmarks of breeding and quality, and which at the same time welcomed the trappings of grandeur and the subtleties of variation, in costume, post, and gesture, that the artist could build into his presentation for their predilection.1 Second, where critical considerations have come up, these paintings have been evaluated in terms of whether the adoption of mannered and decorative traits now betokens a decline from the artist’s previous work, or whether it represents rather a different kind of achievement which gave rise, at its best, to equally outstanding successes in conveying refined and subtly enhanced distinction.2But both these approaches agree in finding no intellectual content in the works in question, either of van Dyck’s own devising or based on interests and concerns in which his subjects partook. This absence of implication to the portraits is seem as fitting with thea rtist’s tendency to make creative decisions on an ad hoc basis, as evidenced by his preference for rapidly made drawings from the life over the use of oil sketches and by the pentimenti that his finished works reveal.3 It is also seen as fitting with the whole pattern—cultural as well as social and economic—of his relationship to the Stuart aristocrazy, for which these images were fashioned. 1. See esp. Ellis Water house, Painting in Britain, 1530-1790 , pp. 49-50 ; and cf. more recently Christopher Brown, Van Dyck .2. See, for example, Erik Larsen, intro. to L’opera completa di Van Dyck 1626-1641 , p. 8 and Oliver Millar, intro. to exhibition catalog Van Dyck in England , p. 27 and esp. p. 31 .3. See Millar, Van Dyck in England, p. 31, citing the miniaturist Richard Gibson on the “Sketches made from the life,” mainly lost, and cat. no. 12, on the pentimenti found in the 1633 Charles I on Horseback. Mark Roskill is professor of the history of modern art at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. His most recent book is The Interpretation of Cubism . Previous contributions to Critical Inquiry include “On the Recognition and Identification of Objects in Paintings” and “A Reply to John Reichert and Stanley Fish”. (shrink)