Ivan Gaskell | Bard College (original) (raw)
Papers by Ivan Gaskell
Paintings and the Past, 2019
Routledge eBooks, Nov 20, 2019
The Burlington Magazine, 1998
Oxford University Press eBooks, May 7, 2020
Antioch Review, 2016
I f building campaigns, publications, Web presence, and the actions of the founders of new instit... more I f building campaigns, publications, Web presence, and the actions of the founders of new institutions are anything to go by, museums have never been more in the public eye worldwide than at present. The social prestige attached to art ensures that art museums receive par ticular attention, but developments occur in other kinds of museums, too. Funding sources vary, but private money plays an ever-increasing role, even in museums that have long relied on state subventions. In creased dependence on so-called philanthropy has considerable con sequences for museums. One has been a spate of disputes and scandals at prominent institutions, including the Musee du Louvre, Paris, and the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. However unfortunate and embarrassing for the museums concerned, this may not matter very much if most people regard them as no more than sites of popu lar education and entertainment. Yet if museums are to serve as sites of scholarship, engaged in research, instruction, and publishing, they cannot afford to be compromised any more than can a college or a university. Commentators consistently overlook the scholarly role of muse ums of all kinds. They give far too much attention to the publically ac cessible parts of museums, notably their exhibits, both long-term and temporary. Contrary to popular and even dominant academic opinion, exhibition galleries are not the heart of a museum. The heart comprises the storage areas and the collections they contain, the study rooms and
Res: Anthropology and aesthetics, 2007
British Journal of Aesthetics, 2019
Citing works by Marcel Duchamp and others, this article argues that the transformation of what Da... more Citing works by Marcel Duchamp and others, this article argues that the transformation of what Danto termed a mere real thing into an artwork, and of an artwork into a mere real thing, are not symmetrical operations. It argues that mere real things and artworks not only belong to different categories, but that these categories are themselves of different kinds—the former being closed, and the latter open. Viewing mere real things through the lens of art leads to confusion. Amending Goodman’s question, ‘When is art?’, this article suggests that one can only arrive at working definitions of what constitutes both an artwork and a mere real thing on the basis of contingent function. The adequate analysis of any given thing or action necessitates viewing it in accordance with an appropriate paradigm, whether that of an artwork, a thought experiment, or even a prank. Adequate analysis requires disciplinary dexterity, deference when appropriate, and multi-disciplinary attention best achiev...
Since at least the eighteenth century, Western museums have constituted a technology for making k... more Since at least the eighteenth century, Western museums have constituted a technology for making knowledge claims based on the selection, observation, and categorization of a wide range of material things. The underlying schema of museums has changed little since that time, and it assumes certain fundamental distinctions such as that between things in nature and things human-made (the natural and the artificial), and between interchangeable representatives of kinds (specimens) and unique items valued for their aesthetic properties (artworks). This fundamental schema is so stable and authoritative that it can implicitly overrule conflicting taxonomic and systematic claims about museum collections. One example of such a challenge is the volume by the Dutch artist and medical illustrator active in England in the second half of the eighteenth century, Jan van Rymsdyk, and his son, Andreas or Andrew, Museum Brittanicum (1778; second edition, 1791). Rymsdyk proposes a taxonomy of things in the world based on resemblance rather than differentiation, using the technology of the folio book incorporating detailed realistic engravings after his own and his son’s highly naturalistic watercolor drawings of items in the British Museum. These conditions and practices have considerable implications for how historians might use as evidence actual material things in museum collections and representations of them in whatever medium, analog or digital.
British Journal of Aesthetics, Nov 20, 2019
Citing works by Marcel Duchamp and others, this article argues that the transformation of what Da... more Citing works by Marcel Duchamp and others, this article argues that the transformation of what Danto termed a mere real thing into an artwork, and of an artwork into a mere real thing, are not symmetrical operations. It argues that mere real things and artworks not only belong to different categories, but that these categories are themselves of different kinds—the former being closed, and the latter open. Viewing mere real things through the lens of art leads to confusion. Amending Goodman’s question, ‘When is art?’, this article suggests that one can only arrive at working definitions of what constitutes both an artwork and a mere real thing on the basis of contingent function. The adequate analysis of any given thing or action necessitates viewing it in accordance with an appropriate paradigm, whether that of an artwork, a thought experiment, or even a prank. Adequate analysis requires disciplinary dexterity, deference when appropriate, and multi-disciplinary attention best achieved through collaboration.
Zeitschrift Fur Kunstgeschichte, Sep 1, 2022
West 86th: A Journal of Decorative Arts, Design History, and Material Culture, Sep 1, 2014
Res: Anthropology and aesthetics, 2007
International Symposium on Computer Modeling, Measurement and Evaluation, 1989
Paintings and the Past, 2019
Routledge eBooks, Nov 20, 2019
The Burlington Magazine, 1998
Oxford University Press eBooks, May 7, 2020
Antioch Review, 2016
I f building campaigns, publications, Web presence, and the actions of the founders of new instit... more I f building campaigns, publications, Web presence, and the actions of the founders of new institutions are anything to go by, museums have never been more in the public eye worldwide than at present. The social prestige attached to art ensures that art museums receive par ticular attention, but developments occur in other kinds of museums, too. Funding sources vary, but private money plays an ever-increasing role, even in museums that have long relied on state subventions. In creased dependence on so-called philanthropy has considerable con sequences for museums. One has been a spate of disputes and scandals at prominent institutions, including the Musee du Louvre, Paris, and the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. However unfortunate and embarrassing for the museums concerned, this may not matter very much if most people regard them as no more than sites of popu lar education and entertainment. Yet if museums are to serve as sites of scholarship, engaged in research, instruction, and publishing, they cannot afford to be compromised any more than can a college or a university. Commentators consistently overlook the scholarly role of muse ums of all kinds. They give far too much attention to the publically ac cessible parts of museums, notably their exhibits, both long-term and temporary. Contrary to popular and even dominant academic opinion, exhibition galleries are not the heart of a museum. The heart comprises the storage areas and the collections they contain, the study rooms and
Res: Anthropology and aesthetics, 2007
British Journal of Aesthetics, 2019
Citing works by Marcel Duchamp and others, this article argues that the transformation of what Da... more Citing works by Marcel Duchamp and others, this article argues that the transformation of what Danto termed a mere real thing into an artwork, and of an artwork into a mere real thing, are not symmetrical operations. It argues that mere real things and artworks not only belong to different categories, but that these categories are themselves of different kinds—the former being closed, and the latter open. Viewing mere real things through the lens of art leads to confusion. Amending Goodman’s question, ‘When is art?’, this article suggests that one can only arrive at working definitions of what constitutes both an artwork and a mere real thing on the basis of contingent function. The adequate analysis of any given thing or action necessitates viewing it in accordance with an appropriate paradigm, whether that of an artwork, a thought experiment, or even a prank. Adequate analysis requires disciplinary dexterity, deference when appropriate, and multi-disciplinary attention best achiev...
Since at least the eighteenth century, Western museums have constituted a technology for making k... more Since at least the eighteenth century, Western museums have constituted a technology for making knowledge claims based on the selection, observation, and categorization of a wide range of material things. The underlying schema of museums has changed little since that time, and it assumes certain fundamental distinctions such as that between things in nature and things human-made (the natural and the artificial), and between interchangeable representatives of kinds (specimens) and unique items valued for their aesthetic properties (artworks). This fundamental schema is so stable and authoritative that it can implicitly overrule conflicting taxonomic and systematic claims about museum collections. One example of such a challenge is the volume by the Dutch artist and medical illustrator active in England in the second half of the eighteenth century, Jan van Rymsdyk, and his son, Andreas or Andrew, Museum Brittanicum (1778; second edition, 1791). Rymsdyk proposes a taxonomy of things in the world based on resemblance rather than differentiation, using the technology of the folio book incorporating detailed realistic engravings after his own and his son’s highly naturalistic watercolor drawings of items in the British Museum. These conditions and practices have considerable implications for how historians might use as evidence actual material things in museum collections and representations of them in whatever medium, analog or digital.
British Journal of Aesthetics, Nov 20, 2019
Citing works by Marcel Duchamp and others, this article argues that the transformation of what Da... more Citing works by Marcel Duchamp and others, this article argues that the transformation of what Danto termed a mere real thing into an artwork, and of an artwork into a mere real thing, are not symmetrical operations. It argues that mere real things and artworks not only belong to different categories, but that these categories are themselves of different kinds—the former being closed, and the latter open. Viewing mere real things through the lens of art leads to confusion. Amending Goodman’s question, ‘When is art?’, this article suggests that one can only arrive at working definitions of what constitutes both an artwork and a mere real thing on the basis of contingent function. The adequate analysis of any given thing or action necessitates viewing it in accordance with an appropriate paradigm, whether that of an artwork, a thought experiment, or even a prank. Adequate analysis requires disciplinary dexterity, deference when appropriate, and multi-disciplinary attention best achieved through collaboration.
Zeitschrift Fur Kunstgeschichte, Sep 1, 2022
West 86th: A Journal of Decorative Arts, Design History, and Material Culture, Sep 1, 2014
Res: Anthropology and aesthetics, 2007
International Symposium on Computer Modeling, Measurement and Evaluation, 1989