determine whether a creation is of the artistic or scientific order. Understanding an object’s significance contributes to the emotion it produces.
Art can be enjoyed at various levels; aesthetic landmarks exist in science as well, but their appreciation is generally left to specialists. The teaching of science is not expected to emphasize aesthetic aspects and tends to concentrate on theories that “work.”
Traditionally, art’s end point was “to produce beauty,” not to provide information. However, art is a testimony and, as such, generates knowledge. The “research” of contemporary artists often resembles a mental construction, transmitted in a visual form, appealing more to the intellect than to the senses. Artists originate ideas which, when sufficiently innovative, become a form of information.
Gallery of the Louvre, Samuel F. B. Morse, 1831–33
As of 1737, the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture started to organize regular exhibitions at the Louvre. Artists could hone their skills by copying the masters, but the general public was rarely admitted. Samuel Morse (1791–1872), who developed the electrical telegraph and its code, also painted at the Louvre. He was president of the New York Academy of Design.
Oil on canvas, 733⁄4 × 108 in. (187.3 × 274.3 cm)
Terra Foundation for American Art; Daniel J. Terra Collection, 1922.51
Museums are reliable indicators of the value that a society places on culture. Created in Ancient Greece around 300 B.C., the Museion was a sanctuary for the muses, a study center principally for mathematics—although specimens of plants and animals were assembled there. During the Renaissance, “antiquarians” started once again to collect objects which were displayed in their “curiosity cabinets.”
In the eighteenth century, the age of the great explorers, the idea of a national museum took root in various countries, as it became increasingly necessary to house nature’s marvels as well as multiple treasures of the wealthy. The next step might possibly have been the creation of a vast “encyclopedic space,” but for practical reasons, specialized museums were favored instead. Science and art had taken divergent routes.
Regardless of the nature of their collections, museums today give priority to activities such as conservation, research and teaching. In some art museums, vast spaces lavishly deploy technology to enhance the presentation of paintings and sculpture. Science museums exhibit their collections from an aesthetic vantage point. In this way, museums, ancient or modern, remind us that art, science and spirituality are intrinsically linked. As repositories of knowledge, they are real teaching laboratories: “Museums are houses which only host thoughts,” said Marcel Proust.
Restoration of the Sistine Chapel
This computerized map illustrates the restoration process. Conservation has always been a subject of intense controversy. In Imperial Russia, hundreds of paintings were detached from their original supports with deleterious effects. The contemporary approach emphasizes damage prevention rather than repair—in the manner of modern medical practices, and utilizing some of its tools: X-rays, lasers, electronic microscopes, echography.
Art and science: an adventure
Modern art history starts in the Renaissance, when patrons such as the Medici family began collecting Greco-Roman objects. It did not unfold chronologically, but rather like a puzzle—whose different pieces appeared at irregular intervals, in places without any apparent link.
Another two centuries elapsed before scientists started to show interest in prehistory. When cave art was discovered, scholars were at a loss to determine its origin. Indeed, how could they have imagined that such astonishing works were made prior to biblical times? (The term “prehistory” was coined in 1867.)
The history of art varied through time and from one culture to another. Sculpture, for instance, was considered a major art form in the Western world, whereas in Ancient China it was regarded as just another product of manual labor carried out by the lower classes. Conversely, in the West writing was viewed as a communication tool, while in China it was revered as the highest art.
For a long time, the story of art was one of styles. New currents were received with scepticism. The Romanesque style was named for its resemblance to Roman art, which was considered unrefined. Gothic, from the word “Goth,” was brought into use by Renaissance humanists, with pejorative intent. Arrogance was expressed towards those whom critics dubbed “Impressionists” or “Fauves”! (In science, too, innovation can disturb; concepts such as “universal gravitation” or the Big Bang were long subject to scientists’ scornful laughter.)
Initially developed by amateurs, art history has become a discipline using advanced technology: measurement of carbon-14 levels in organic material reveals the age of ancient objects (this technique was invented in 1946 by Willard Frank Libby, whose combined passion for chemistry and archaeology earned him the Nobel Prize). The genetic study of ancient populations, and of organic materials (parchment manuscripts, bone artefacts, etc.) have prompted a complete reinterpretation of many concepts. Revolutionary results sent historians of all kinds back to their books.
The Beginnings of Art History, Serge Strosberg, 1998
Destroyed by Vesuvius’ eruption, the town of Pompeii was rediscovered in the eighteenth century. The information gathered about Ancient Roman culture had a considerable impact on the development of art history. The excavations were of such importance that the Bourbon rulers of Naples kept the operation secret. Even Johann Winckelmann, the father of “scientific” archaeology, was admitted with great difficulty to the site. Later, when European nobility flocked to Italy, “surprise excavations” with “guaranteed discoveries” were organized to that effect!
Art history’s interpretation, or questions of conservation, are influenced by multiple factors: biography, stylistic analysis, iconography, psychology, socio-political analysis, feminism, structuralism, and so on.… Science now plays a key role, but many see herein yet another trendy sign. Moreover, science is not infallible—its history has fluctuated, like that of art.
During Antiquity, science would go back to either its technical or spiritual roots: for example, in Greece c. 500 B.C., sophia meant “technical ability” before it became associated with the notion of wisdom.
Several schools of thought functioned in parallel: there were the Materialists; Plato’s followers who took a conceptual approach; the observers of nature, who were influenced by Aristotle; and finally the pragmatic thinkers of Alexandria. Philosophers revised rival theories, establishing in this way what would much later be called “an intellectual tradition.”
Scientia, in medieval Latin, referred to knowledge in general; reasoning, although based on different assumptions from ours, was nevertheless often elegant. The Arabs practiced, commented, taught and transmitted science.
Curiosity Cabinet, Serge Strosberg, 1998
During the Renaissance, collectors assembled coins, instruments, fossils, anatomical specimens, and miscellaneous objects. In 1657, Leopoldo de Medici founded the Academia del Cimento—the first organized research institute since the destruction of the museum
