The Invisible Masterpiece

Abstract

The invisible is an unattainable ideal, a work of art into which a dream of absolute art is incorporated but can never be realized. Using this metaphor borrowed from Balzac, Hans Belting explores history of the and how its status and meaning have been elevated and denigrated since early 19th century. Before 1800, works of art were either imitative (portraits and landscapes) or narrative (history painting). But under influence of Romantic modernity, physical object - a painted canvas, for example, or a sculpture -came to be seen as visible testimony of artist's attempt to achieve absolute or ultimate art; in short, impossible. This revolution in interpretation coincided with establishment of first public art museums, in which classical and Renaissance works were presented as real masterpieces, timeless art of such quality that no modern artist could possibly hope to achieve. The Mona Lisa and other celebrated paintings preoccupied artists who felt burdened by this cult of as it came to be insitutionalized. Belting explores and explains how 20th-century artists, following Duchamp, struggled with their personal dreams of absolute art. It was not until 1960s that artists, such as Warhol, finally began to reject idea of individual, totemic work of art and its permanent exhibition, as well as related concept of masterpiece and outmoded art market that fed off it.

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