STUDIES IN ANCIENT AMERICAN AND EUROPEAN ART: THE COLLECTED ESSAYS OF GEORGE

KUBLER by Thomas F. Reese

Review by: Christopher D. Roy
Art Documentation: Journal of the Art Libraries Society of North America, Vol. 4, No. 4
(Winter 1985), pp. 187-188
Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Art Libraries Society of North
America
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 Art Documentation, Winter 1985 187

Tiffany also produced metalware, ceramics, jewelry, fabrics, fur Indian "procurable culture." The competitors included traders,
niture, etc. And where Tiffany's experimental glass operation scientists, and museum officials, each driven by motivations
was carried on by others under his supervision, Carder seems to ranging from pure greed to a zeal to preserve artifacts of fast
have done his own experimenting. The Steuben Company flour changing cultures. After a Prelude which describes the earliest
ishes today producing ornamental glass of the highest quality. contact periods between whites and Northwest Coast peoples,
each subsequent chapter concentrates on one individual or
Helene H. Weis group of individuals who played an important role in the scramble
Willet Stained Glass Studios to collect artifacts. The greatest attention is given to Dr. Franz
Boas who spent much of his lifestudying the Northwest Coast
peoples. This emphasis on Boas reflectsboth his significance as
ALFRED GILBERT /Richard Dorment.-New Haven, Ct. : Pub an early anthropologist and the fact thatCole iscurrentlywriting
lished forthe Paul Mellon Centre forStudies inBritishArt byYale a biography of him.While several of the most famous names
UniversityPress, 1985.-ISBN 0-300-03388-5 ; LC 84-052241 : have their reputations tarnished,Cole demonstrates that inspite
$29.95. of stories of theft and skullduggery by collectors most
exchanges for artifacts were purely commercial in nature.
AlfredGilbert (1854- 1934) was arguably themost talented of Cole, an historian at Simon Fraser University, has conducted
the late Victorian sculptors. Unfortunately, his art and reputation meticulous research not only the appropriate facts and
revealing
were marred by his personal failures. Inthis excellent psychologi dates, but also the atmosphere inwhich collecting activity took
cal biography,Richard Dorment reveals to the reader the reasons
place and the personalities of those involved.The book is spar
forGilbert's artistic and personal failures.Using quotes from let sely illustrated,butwell documented with extensive explanatory
ters, diaries and other contemporary sources, the author traces footnotes and a detailed index.Captured Heritage would be a
Gilbert's early successes and later disappointments. The result is useful addition to any academic libraryand can be highly recom
a pleasant balance of artistic historyand personal biography. mended for libraries with a special interestinart, ethnography,or
Dorment claims, and does much to substantiate his claim, that North American history.
Gilbert's primaryworks actively reflect his attitude toward his
career his art. The works
and are analyzed with respect to his
Eugene C. Burt
relations with patrons, his parents, his wives and children, as well Cornish Institute
as in regard to contemporary sculpture in Britain and on the
Continent.
There have been three previous biographies written on Alfred STUDIES INANCIENT AMERICAN AND EUROPEAN ART: THE
Gilbert, the latest in 1952. The firsttwo were produced during COLLECTED ESSAYS OF GEORGE KUBLER /Edited by Thomas
Gilbert's lifetimeby Joseph Hatton and IsabelMcAllister, both of F. Reese.-New Haven, Ct. :Yale University Press, 1985.-ISBN
whom wrote with the expressed intentionof lionizingthe artist. 0-300-03662-5 : $60.00.
The third was written byAdrian Bury,Gilbert's nephew. The need
foran objective and modern biographyof this eminent sculptor is This isa collection of the essays published between 1936 and
obvious. Dorment's book fills this gap in an excellent manner. 1982 byGeorge Kubier,Sterling Professor Emeritus inthe History
The book itself isproduced on coated paper ina sewn binding. ofArt and Senior Research Scholar at Yale University.Fifty-three
An index,bibliography and notes section conclude the body of essays are organized into four chapters that deal with Iberian
the text.The index isexcellent fornames of persons but is inade colonial art in the New World, the art of Spain, Portugal and
quate for tracing specific works. The bibliography includes a list Europe, the art of ancient America, and methodology and theory.
of manuscript sources used by the author. The illustrationsare George Kubler was exposed to the study of art history very
numerous and of good quality. Unfortunately, the majority of early by his father,who received his degree fromW?rzburg in
them are in black-and-white?a real loss for the work of a colorisi 1906. Kubier entered Yale college at the beginning of the Depres
sculptor. sion, and spent summers in the early 1930s studying inGermany.
which covers the
The book is recommended for any library Beginning in 1932, he began to study art historyat Yale under the
period of nineteenth-century art, especially nineteenth-century influenceof Henri Focillon. He was drawn by his travels and his
British art. parent's intereststo the art of Spain and Spanish colonial art in
the New World. In 1936 he began study at the Instituteof Fine
KathrynVaughn Arts, and was influenced by Walter Cook, Karl Lehmnan, Erwin
Geneva, New York Panofsky, and Herbert Spinden. Focillon's lectures and methods
resulted in an interdisciplinaryapproach to art history that has
characterized Kubler's work, and the study of pre-Columbian and
tribal art, since the 1950s. He contributed two volumes to
Pevsner's Pelican series on the history of art: Art and Architec
ture of Spain and Portugal and their American Dominions
(1959), and The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The
OTHER REVIEWS Mexican, Maya, and Andean Peoples (1962).
The editor has organized Kubler's essays to make the most of
CAPTURED HERITAGE: THE SCRAMBLE FOR NORTHWEST similarities and contrasts between topics and methodologies.
COAST ARTIFACTS /Douglas Cole.-Seattle, WA :Universityof Notable in the first chapter, on colonial art, are The Tovar Calen
Washington Press, 1985.-ISBN 0-88894-460-8 ; LC 84-40674 : dar: An IllustratedMexican Manuscript ca. 1585, published in
$17.50. 1951, which explores a Mexican illustrated manuscript, and "The
Arts, Fine and Plain," a study of the distinctions between fine
The scramble for "native artifacts" inthe late nineteenth and and applied arts. Chapter II,devoted to Spain, Portugal, and
early twentieth centuries eventually led to the great collections Europe, includes such diverse topics as "A Late Gothic Computa
of African, Oceanic, and Native American art seen today in the tion of Rib Vault Thrusts" (1946) and "The Portraitof Hernando
major museums of Europe and America. But there are troubling Cortes at Yale" (1975). The most lengthyand interestingsection
questions about the collection practices of that period, questions deals with Ancient America, a field of study inwhich Kubier is
which fuel an internationaldebate over the concept of cultural widely respected. Seventeen essays span the period from 1943
property.UntilCole's book, littleserious research had been pub to 1977, includingThe Iconography of the Art of Teotihuacan
lishedto shed lighton this controversy. (1967), and "Renascence and Disjunction in the Art of Meso
Captured Heritage traces the historyof the collection of North american Antiquity," (1977). The finalnine essays are gathered
west Coast Indianartifacts fromthe earliest period of contact in intoa chapter on methodology, thatwill, perhaps, have a more
the late eighteenth century to the early 1930s. Cole focuses on durable impact on scholars in decades to come than more dated
the period from the 1880s to the Great Depression, when there studies of European and pre-Columbian art.
was an intense competition forany example ofwhat Cole calls This collection of essays will be of use primarilyto advanced

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All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
188 Art Documentation, Winter 1985

art historygraduate students and faculty interested inthe impact Great Drawings from the Art Institute of Chicago : the Harold Joachim Years
George Kubier has had on the study of the history of art. The 1958- 1983.-New York : Hudson Hills Press, 1985.-ISBN 0-933920-69-5 ; LC
in large, unsuitable for a general or undergraduate 85-70501 : $50.00.
essays are,
audience, and the book will be most appropriate ina specialized The Illustrated Zu/eika Dobson I Max Beerbohm. ?New Haven :Yale University
especially one with a pre-Columbian art history
art history library, Press, 1985.-ISBN 0-300-03389-3 : $19.95.
collection. : Art of the Supernatural
Japanese Ghosts & Demons I Edited by Stephen
Addiss. ?New York :G. Braziller inassociation with the Spencer Museum of Art,
Christopher D. Roy 1985. ISBN 0-8076-1125-5, ISBN 0-8076-1126-3 (pa.) : $20.00.
The Universityof Iowa Klee and Nature I Richard Verdi.-New York : Rizzoli, 1985.-ISBN 0-8478
05-78-6- ; LC 84-42872 : $37.50, $25.00 (pa.)

Monumental Islamic Calligraphy from India I byW. E. Begley.?Villa Park, III. :

Islamic Foundation, 1985.-ISBN 0-932815-00-6, ISBN 0-932815-01-4 (pa.) :n.p.
New Hampshire Scenery : A Dictionary of Nineteenth Century Artists of New
Hampshire Mountain Landscapes I by Catherine H. Campbell, with Marcia
Schmidt Blaine.?Canaan, N.H. :New Hampshire Historical Society, 1985.?ISBN
PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED 0-914659-12-X ; LC 85-3700 : $25.00.
(Subject to later review) New Museum Buildings in the Federal Republic of Germany IWith a text by
Markus L?pertz.-New York :Rizzoli, 1985.-ISBN 0-8478-0637-5 ; LC 85-42943 :
Aditi : the Living Arts of India IWashington D.C. :Smithsonian InstitutionPress,
$25.00 (pa.)
1985.-ISBN 0-87474-852-6 (cloth), ISBN 0-87474-853-3 (pa.) :n.p.
Olympian Dreamers: Victorian Classical Painters, 1860? 1914 I Christopher
Alessandro Algardi I JenniferMontagu. ?New Haven, Ct. : Published inassocia
Wood.-London :Constable, 1985.-ISBN 0-09-462170-5 : $30.00.
tion with th? J. Paul Getty Trust by Yale University Press, 1985.-2 v.-ISBN
0-300-03173-4 : $95.00. Robert Longo I Text by Carter Ratcliff.-New York : Rizzoli, 1985.-ISBN 0-8478
0602-2 : $19.95.
Art in the San Francisco Bay Area, 1945 - 1980 I Thomas Albright. Berkeley :
University of California Press, 1985.-ISBN 0-520-05193-9 (cloth), ISBN 0-529 Rococo : Art and Design in Hogarth's England I Catalogue edited by Michael
05518-7 (pa.) : LC 84-24112 : $60.00, $29.50 (pa.) Snodin.-Totowa, N.J. : Allanheld & Schr?m, 1985.-ISBN 0-8390-0353-6 :
$39.50.
Bar Ra Kei : Ordeal by Roses I Photographs of Yukio Mishima by Eikoh Hosoe. ?
New York :Aperture, 1985.-ISBN 0-89381-169-8 : $35.00. Rural Art of theWestern Himalaya I K. C. Aryan, Subhashini Aryan.?New Delhi,
Indian :Rekha Prakashan; distributed by Humanities Press International, 1985.?
Baroque Imagery I John E. Schi?der. ?Cleveland :Cleveland Museum of Art pub
$66.00.
lished incooperation with Indiana University Press, 1984.-ISBN 0-910386-79-X ;
LC 84-23019: $7.95 (pa.) The Sacral Treasure of the Guelphs I Patrick M. de Winter.?Cleveland : the
Cleveland Museum of Art in association with Indiana University Press, 1985.?
Bernardo Cavallino of Naples, 1616? 1656 I Introductionby Ann Percy, Essays by
ISBN 0-910386-81-1 ; LC 85-3820 : $14.95 (pa.)
Nicola Spinosa and Guiseppe Galasso, Catalogue, Ann T. Lurie and Ann Percy.?
Cleveland : Cleveland Museum of Art, Kimbell Art Museum, 1984.? ISBN Sculptural Monuments in an Outdoor Environment : a Conference held at the
0-910386-75-7 ; LC 84-072737 : $35.00. Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts I Edited by Virginia Norton Naude.?
- ISBN 0-943836-04-2
: Uni Philadelphia :The Academy, 1985. ; LC 85-3623 :n.p.
Cabbagetown I by Oraien E. Catledge, foreword by Robert Coles.?Austin
- ISBN 0-292-71094-1 LC 85-3340 : $24.95.
versity of Texas Press, c 1985. ; Textiles inDaily Life in theMiddle Ages I Rebecca Martin.?Cleveland :Cleveland
Museum of Art in cooperation with the Indiana University Press, 1985.?ISBN
Drawings from Venice :Masterworks from theMuseo Correr, Venice I Terisio
0-910386-80-3 ; LC 84-28492 : $7.95 (pa.)
?
Pignatti and Giandomenico Romanelli. Montclair, N.J. : Allenheld & Schram,
1985.-ISBN 0-86294-066-4 : $39.50. Turner's Venice I Lindsay Stainton. ? New York : G. Braziller, 1985.? ISBN
0-8076-1134-4 ; LC 85-14985 : $40.00.
French Gothic Architecture of the 12th& 13thCenturies I Jean Bony.? Berkeley :
University of California Press, c1983.-ISBN 0-520-02831-7 ; LC 82842 : $39.95 Wayne Thiebaud I by Karen Tsujimoto.?Seattle :Published for the San Francisco
(pa.) Museum of Art by the University of Washington Press, 1985. ?ISBN

Haven : Yale University Press, 1985. ?ISBN

0-295-96251-8, ISBN 0-295-96269-0 (pa.) ; LC 85-40351 : $35.00, $19.95 (pa.)
George Grosz I Hans Hess. ?New
: $35.00 (cloth), $14.95 (pa.) What is Japanese Architecture? ? New York :
0-300-03408-3 ; LC 84-052243 I Kazuo Nishi, Kazuo Hozemi.
Kodansha, 1985.-ISBN 0-970011-711-4 ; LC 84-48695 : $16.95.
Gongora I Pablo Picasso, Introductionby John Russell, Poetry by Luis de Gongora
? ISBN : the Splendid Decadent
y Argote, Translated by Alan S. Trueblood. ?New York :G. Braziller, c 1985. Yoshitoshi I Shinichi Segi, translated by Alfred
0-8076-1133-6 ; LC 85-9631 : $50.00. Birnbaum.-Tokyo; New York :Kodansha, 1985.-ISBN 0-87011-712-2 : $39.95.

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