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Wesleyan University
Art Museums, Old Paintings, and Our Knowledge of the PastAuthor(s): David CarrierSource: History and Theory, Vol. 40, No. 2 (May, 2001), pp. 170-189Published by: Wiley for Wesleyan University
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History and Theoiy 40 (May 2001), 170-189 ? Wesleyan University 2001 ISSN: 0018-2656
ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND
OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THEPAST'
DAVID CARRIER
ABSTRACT
Art museumsfrequentlyremove old paintingsfrom theiroriginal settings.In the process,
the contextof these works of artchangesdramatically.Do museumsthenpreserveworks
of art? To answer this question, I consider an imaginary painting, The Travels and
Tribulationsof Piero's Baptism of Christ,depictingthe historyof display of Piero della
Francesca'sBaptism of Christ. This example suggests that how Piero's paintingis seen
does dependuponits setting.Accordingto theIntentionalist, uchchangesin context have
no real influenceupon the meaningof Piero'spainting,andconsequentlymuseums can be
saidto preserveworksof art.Accordingto theSkeptic,if suchchangesare drasticenough,
we can no longer identify the picture's originalmeaning,and museums thus fail to pre-serve works of art.Skepticismdeserves attention, or such varied influentialcommenta-
tors as TheodoreAdorno, WalterBenjamin, MauriceBlanchot, Hans-Georg Gadamer,
MartinHeidegger,Hans Sedlmayr,and Paul Valeryhold this pessimistic view of muse-
ums. I develop the debatebetween the Intentionalistand the Skeptic. Ultimately skepti-
cism is indefensible,I argue,because it fails to take account of the continuities n the his-
tory of art'sdisplay.But Intentionalism s also deficient because it is ahistorical.In pre-
sentingthe historyof Piero'spainting,TheTravelsand Tribulations f Piero'sBaptismof
Christshows that we can re-identifythe originalsignificanceof Piero's work and the rec-
ognizablecontinuities hatobtainthrough ts changes.It thus makessense to claim that atleast in certaincircumstancesart museumscan preserveworksof art.
"Somesymbolic scheme of orientationsmay be necessaryfor
people to relateto one another n time andspace."
Mary Douglas2
At the start of Analytical Philosophy of Action, Arthur Danto considers this strik-
ing case study:
Inthe middleband of six tableaux,on the northwall of the ArenaChapel n Padua,Giotto
has narratedn six episodes the missionaryperiodin the life of Christ.In each panel, the
dominatingChrist-figures shown with a raised arm.This invariantdispositionof his arm
notwithstanding,a different kind of action is performed by means of it from scene to
scene.... Disputingwiththeelders,the raised arm s admonitory .. at the weddingfeast
of Cana,it . . . has caused water to become wine; at the baptismit is raised as a sign of
1. I thank Paul Barolsky,Bill Berkson, ArthurDanto, Brian Fay, Lydia Goehr, and anonymous
readers or History and Theory or critical comments, and the Getty ResearchInstitute or appointing
me a Getty Scholar, 1999-2000.
2. MaryDouglas,NaturalSymbols:Explorationsn Cosmology New York:PantheonBooks, 1970),11.
Thi t t d l d d f 140 122 127 100 M 30 S 2013 05 28 49 AM
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ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THE PAST 171
acceptance; t commandsLazarus; t blesses the people at the Jerusalemgate; it expels the
lenders at the temple. Since the raised arm is invariantlypresent, these performativedif-
ferences must be explained throughvariations n context....3
Danto describes Giotto's spatial dispersionof six raised arms, indiscernible
until placed in the context of the narratives old in those six individual framedimages. Christ,young in thefirstscene, is dressed n variousgarments n the next
five scenes, and in the expulsion he holds his hand horizontally.Still, to a good
enough approximation, he same hand gesture appears every time. The mean-
ing(s) of that raised hand depend, Danto concludes, upon the contexts in which
it is raised.
ImitatingGiotto, let us envisage a paintingwith a sequenceof panels depict-
ing the life history of one workof art displayed differently n variousplaces as it
has changed location over time. Danto's Analytical Philosophy of Action begins
with the descriptionof a real work of art, but in The Transfiguration f the
Commonplaceandelsewherehe frequentlyemploys imaginarypaintings.Let us
emulate his procedure.
First consider some essential background nformationabout the work of art
presented n our imaginarypainting, Piero della Francesca'sBaptism of Christ
(1450).4 Piero's paintingwas commissionedfor the chapelof St. Johnthe Baptist
in an abbeyin Borgo San Sepolcro,his hometown.In 1808 it was moved to the
cathedraland set in an elaboratealtarpiececontainingpaintingsby other artists.
By 1859 Piero had been forgotten,and so the local authoritieswere happy to sell
his painting o an English merchant.When it left Italy,the frame was left behind,
and thepaintingbecamepartof the collection of the NationalGallery n London.
In the 1970s it was set nearthe entrance; oday, rehung, t is one of the treasures
of the new Sainsburywing of thatMuseum.Thepaintinghas movedmanytimes.
For ourpresent purposes,considerjust five of its positions: in the chapel of St.
John the Baptist; n the Cathedralof San Sepolcro;in the merchant'sstoreroomjust beforebeing shippedout of Italy;in the NationalGallery,early in the twen-
tieth century;and in the Sainsburywing of the NationalGalleryin the twenty-
first century.
The one physical object, the paintingmade by Piero, has been in these five
places. (That Piero's painting suffered some relatively minor physical damage
need not concern us.) Suppose, now, that an ingenious artist,the Masterof the
London Piero's Travels as he in his modesty prefers to be known, tells that story
in a painting, The Travels and Tribulations of Piero's Baptism of Christ. Thiswork of art,done in a style not unlikethe saints' lives paintedso oftenby Piero's
quattrocentro ontemporaries,shows the journeys of Piero's picturefrom San
Sepolcroover theAlps to London.A heroicjourney!-like thejourneyof a saint,
butextendingover a muchlongerintervalof time. Justas a storyof a saint'slife
3. ArthurDanto, Analytical Philosophy of Action (Cambridge,Eng.: CambridgeUniversity Press,
1973), ix.
4. My discussion draws on MarilynAronbergLavin, Piero della Francesca's Baptism of Christ
(New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1981), and Erika Langmuir,The National GalleryCompanionGuide (London:National Gallery Publications, 1994), 80-81.
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172 DAVID CARRIER
might show him or her performingdifferentacts at differentages, so Travelsand
Tribulations,a five-panel painting, shows one painting at various times in its
career.Baptismof Christ appears n every panel, but the settings and the figures
near Piero's painting vary.5
The Master of the London Piero's Travels accompanies the exhibition of hispaintingwith a shortautobiographical atalogue essay.
ApartromDanto'sphilosophy-anobvious nfluence!-my greatest rtisticnspirationhas been the story-telling aintings y MarkTansey.6 ut whereTanseyhasrestrictedhimself o stories boutmodernism,focusattentionnimages evealing road oncernsof aestheticheory.Tansey's ictures re unny.Minearenot.
What a richly revealing history pictureThe Travels and Tribulationsof Piero's
Baptism of Christwould be! Let us look moreclosely at it.Panel One shows Piero's painting oyously being received by his patron and
contemporariesn an abbey in Borgo San Sepolcro. How proudthey are to show
off this paintingby a native son famous for the slowness of his production.The
Master of the London Piero's Travels has outdonehimself, imaginingconvinc-
ingly theappearance f thatgreatartist.Since Pierodella Francescanever depict-
ed himself in any of his surviving pictures, the Master of the London Piero's
Travelshas had to imagine Piero'sappearance.His portraitof this calm detached
genius is judged by all to be masterful n its psychological insight. "It shows,"writes one critic, "Piero as he really must have been-calm, almost inhuman n
his detachment."
Panel Two presents a forlorn scene depicting the way Baptism of Christ
appeared n the Cathedralof Borgo San Sepolcro sometime in the early nine-
teenthcentury.Pierohas been forgotten,and so in thispanel Baptismof Christ s
a little dusty. Panel Three shows Baptism of Christ removed from its frame,
packed in the English merchant'shouse, readyfor its transalpine hipping.But
just as the darkestmomentin a hero's life may comejust before his time of tri-umph,so the samemay be true in the life of a painting.Baptism of Christ,about
to leave Italy,soon will enterits time of glory.
In Panel Four,the still youngish BernardBerenson is looking at Baptism of
Christearly in the twentiethcentury.In his 1897 essay on the central Italian
painters, Berenson, afterpraisingPiero's impersonality,expressed his reserva-
tions about Piero's art: "Unfortunatelyhe did not always avail himself of his
highest gifts.... Now and again those who areon the outlookfor their favourite
type of beauty, will receive shocks from certain of Piero's men and women.
Othersstill may find him too impersonal, oo impassive."7
5. One of the artist'smodels is Hans Memling's Panoraimaof the Passion (Gallery Sabauda,
Turin), which shows the events of the passion in one large elaborate pictorial space. See K. B.
McFarlane,Hans Memling (Oxford:ClarendonPress, 1971), and,for discussion of this composition-
al technique,LeeAndrews,Story and Space in RenaissanceArt:TheRebirthof ContinuousNarrative
(Cambridge,Eng.:CambridgeUniversity Press, 1995).
6. See ArthurDanto,MarkTansey:Visionsand Revisions(New York:Abrams, 1992).7. BernhardBerenson, The Italian Painters of theRenaissance (London:Phaidon, 1967), 135.
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ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THE PAST 173
But in a late book Berenson expressed unqualifiedapprovalof Piero. In the
Master of the London Piero's Travels' scene, Berenson looks as if alreadypre-
pared o revisehis earlierestimateof Piero's achievement.Even critics who com-
plain that the Master of the London Piero's Travels is a merely literarypainter
admirePanelFour. "Wefind here,"one commentatorwrites,a remarkablyoriginal visual image revealing an art historian's nner life, letting us see
how an intellectualmay change his mind. When JacquesCallot shows Saul becoming St.
Paul, that scene is dramatic.Clouds part,the space around he saint-to-bewho has fallen
from his horse is empty, and we see the great struggle.By comparison,Berenson's scruti-
ny of Baptism of Christ, an inner, intellectual drama,seems an unpromising hemefor a
painter,but the Masterof the London Piero's Travels has shown that a brooding connois-
seurmay be as dramatican artisticsubjectas the processof becominga saint.
Panel Five of TheTravelsand Tribulations f Piero'sBaptismof ChristshowsBaptism of Christ as it appearstoday, familiar to art lovers. It is installed in a
place of honor in the new wing of the National Gallery,where even visitors who
have so little love of artthat they "do"the museumin two hours stop to look at
this very famouspainting.Some critics finda gentle humorin thejuxtaposition
of the touristgroupto the left of Piero's paintingwith the good likeness of Paul
Barolsky,the tall, slim intenseAmericanartwriterwho stands alone to its right.
Travels and Tribulations,a complex painting, received mixed reviews from
the critics,who worriedabout ts unity."That he storyof one pictureby Piero istold,"one of themwrote,"is not in itself sufficientto unify a picturetelling such
varied incidents: the packingof a painting,its display in London,and this odd
episode linking Piero's paintingto Berenson." But the best commentatordis-
agreed.Lookingback at Giotto'sArenaChapel,he argued hatthe scenes picked
by the Master of the London Piero's Travels are no more various than the
episodes in Christ's ife chosen by Piero. "The belief that Christ's life is neces-
sarily more dramaticor more unified thanthe story of a picture,"as he put it,
"deservescriticaldiscussionand,I think,rejection."Apart rommerely parochial
disputesabout the validity of narrativepainting,what really is at stake in this
debatearequestionsabouthow to understandTravelsand Tribulations. f we see
in it merelythe same Piero painting,set in five very differentcontexts, then we
may find it to be weakly unified. But if Baptism of Christplays almostas active
a role in the storyof its historyas Christdoes in Giotto'sfresco,thenTravelsand
Tribulationss a powerfulcoherentvisual narrative.Christ,God incarnate,caus-
esmiraclesacting
as aman. "Giotto's mages,"HansBelting says,
"donotpro-vide a mirrorof the outer world as much as the stage of a dramawhere actors
perform...."8 Baptismof Christ,a merepainting,takeson some of the qualities
of a humanagent.Is it surprising, hen,thataccording o some aesthetictheories
paintingsarenot physical objects?
8. Hans Belting, "The New Role of Narrative n Public Paintingof the Trecento: Historiaand
Allegory,"Volume 18. Studies in the History of Art: Pictorial Narrativein Antiquityand theMiddle
Ages, ed. HerbertL. Kessler and MariannaShreve Simpson (Washington,D.C.: National Gallery ofArt, 1985), 153.
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174 DAVID CARRIER
The Master of the London Piero's Travels himself has reflected deeply on
these conceptual dilemmas, which lie at the heart of his aesthetic theorizing.
Paintings, he thinks,are more like persons than is commonly recognized. One
inspirationfor the Master of the London Piero's Travels is installationart in
which "somethingcould be contributedby the spectatorwithin the structureestablished by the artist.... The visitors helped to create the work, to complete
it. The situationprovidedan active experiencefor the viewer."9
"My essential goal," the Master of the London Piero's Travels writes, "is to
show how this is the best way to understand he old master art displayedin the
museum."Not only a painterbut also a philosopher-a philosopher-painter-he
believes thatsometimes a philosophicalarguments bestpresented n a picture. 0
And as a readerof Danto, he has ideas about the indiscernibles n Travels and
Tribulationswhichhe will develop in his forthcomingbookAnalytic Philosophy
of the Art Museum,dedicatedto Danto."Myteacher,"he writes in the acknowl-
edgments, "beganhis careeras a philosopherwho also painted,and then he gave
up his career as an artist. Me, I am a painter-philosopher,llustrating n my art
the (Dantoesque!) heoriesdevelopedin my studio."
His paintingaims to show that the life history of Baptism of Christhas the
same structureas Christ'sbasic action as revealed in Analytical Philosophy of
Action.A simple, intuitively plausible parallel-he thinks-but when published
his argumentwill proveto be controversial.
The Master ustifieshis procedureby producingwhatis, he admits,a pastiche
of the Preface to Danto's Analytic Philosophy of Action. In his Preface to
Analytic Philosophy of the Art Museumthe Master writes:"It is just my aim in
this prologueto wash away the contextualfactors which convert artifactsmade
by painters ntoworksof artand vest paintingswith interpretations. wantto iso-
late those bareobjectsbefore they arecoloredby the sorts of meaningsthey are
shown to have in Travelsand Tribulations."
This parallelbetween Danto's account of action and his own discussion of
museums can, he notes, be taken further."Justas the philosophyof action sub-
tractsout the rich humanrealitiesstudiedby novelists, and looks to the essential
structureof acting, so"-here he writes in a style close to Danto's-"I leave
aside all the humanlyattractive eaturesof museums,to focus on the conceptual
puzzles posed by these institutions."Just as Christ'sraisedrighthand has quite
distinctlydifferentmeaningsin the scenes showing admonition,blessing, expul-
sion, and so on, so Piero'sBaptismof Christ,appearingn every panelof Travelsand Tribulationsbut in each set in a differentcontext, has a different signifi-
cance. Like Christ'sraisedright hand, Baptismof Christthus is an indiscernible.
The lesson the Masterof the London Piero's Travels drawsis Dantoesque.The
same object has very differentmeaningsat the various stages of its career.The
9. Julie H. Reiss, FromMarginto Center:TheSpaces of InstallationArt (Cambridge,Mass. and
London: MIT Press, 1999), 14. As she notes, although many installationartists originally were hos-
tile to museums, soon enough their art was incorporatednto these institutions.
10. See the "Overture" f my Artwriting (Amherst, Mass.: University of MassachusettsPress,1987), an account not discussed in the literatureon Danto.
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ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOFTHEPAST 175
significance of a work of art is determinednot just through ts visual qualities,
but by the contexts in which it is placed.A painting by an honoredlocal son; a
work of art too obscure to attractattention,and of so little value that it was sold
to foreigners;a paintingby youngBerenson'suneven artist;and a paintingby the
most loved early Renaissanceartist:how differentare they! "Youneed only lookat Travels and Tribulations," he notes, "to see that!"
Having read the academic literatureon museums, the Master of the London
Piero's Travelsis aware of the debatesabout whether old works of art are pre-
served in museums. Indeed, as some commentators have noted, to identify
Baptism of Christ as a work of artalready s to beg some questions. Piero made
an altarpiece;the National Gallery owns a work of art. And so, althoughthe
objectmadeby Piero is now in London, his altarpieceperhapshas not survived.
What has survived is the paintedsurface Piero created,an artifactwhose func-tion has changed radically.The Masterof the LondonPiero's Travelssuggests
that his representation ives a good visual explanationof how to understandhat
history.Baptismof Christwas an altarpiece; n the National Gallery, t became a
workof art.
Should this change in identity be puzzling? How, withoutphysically chang-
ing, can Piero's artifact cease to be an altarpieceand become a work of art?
Asking that question, the Masterof the London Piero's Travels argues, is like
asking how Christ's one handgesturecan in different contexts be such diverse
actions as commanding, blessing, and expelling. As Danto has explained, the
raised hand does not have a fixed meaning, but rather a significance which
depends upon the context in which it is raised. Exactly the same is true, the
Master of the London Piero's Travels argues, of a work of art. "My painting
shows," he says,
how to identifythe transformations f Baptismof Christ.We see how a sacred workturns
into a masterpiece,viewing a transformationike those describeddiscursivelyin Danto's
Analytic Philosophy of History.When Danto writes, "Tospeakof a change is implicitly
to supposesome continuous dentityin the subjectof change,""1 e says whatmy picture
shows.
A painting'ssignificance s not fixed butdependsuponthe contextin which it
is displayed. "Danto,"he adds with an understandable ouch of boasting, "has
envisagedthepossibilityof overcomingthe division betweenartandphilosophy,
exactly what I now have accomplished."
The Masterof the LondonPiero's Travels also has another nteresting,deeplyoriginal dea abouthow to write arthistory.At present,the familiar ormatsof art
history writingare monographson individualartists,and volumes studyingthe
visual culture of a period-Holland's Golden Age, the baroque, and so on.
Travels and Tribulationssuggests a different way to organize art-historical
books. The Masterof the LondonPiero's Travelstitles one section of his book
"PaintingsandTheirCareers." n this he is influencedby the cataloguingsystem
11. ArthurC. Danto, Narration and Knowledge (New York: Columbia University Press, 1985),235.
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176 DAVIDCARRIER
of the Getty Research Institute, which groups some books-catalogues raison-
nes, histories of collections, and the various Indexesof paintingpublishedby the
Getty-in a special section, the ProvenanceIndex. 2 Just as people may be cate-
gorized according to whether they be stay-at-homesor adventurers,monoga-
mous or promiscuous, early-morningor late-night writers, so pictures can bedescribed accordingto their careers. Unlike Baptism of Christ,the Arezzo Piero
frescoes are stay-at-homes.Even though they are by the same artistthey do not
appear n the same chapterof the Master's book as Baptism of Christ.
Some paintingshave alwaysbeen famous.Others, amousonce, have lost their
reputation.Some works of art,afterdisappearingromsight,have seen theirrep-
utationsrevived.And of coursemostpaintings, ike averagepeople,never having
much of a worldly career,at most achieve a private reputation."Paintingsand
Their Careers"will studyall of these situations.13A painting'scareerconsists ofhow much it is seen and writtenabout.The informationneeded by the Masterof
the LondonPiero's Travels s given in museumcatalogues,which trace the histo-
ry of paintings n order o establishattributions. he connoisseurneeds to traceout
thathistory n order o attribute painting.Butbecausenormally hehistoryof col-
lecting is only a specialist concern among arthistorians, nformationabout the
location of paintings has not traditionallybeen gathered systematically.Almost
every famous artisthas a catalogueraisonne;anartist'soeuvre s a familiarunit of
art-historical iscourse.But to find how works of art weredisplayed,one needs to
search, for art historiansdo not usually keep systematicrecordsshowing how
paintingswere displayed.Knowingthehistoryof displayof a paintingpermitsone
to knowhow its significancehaschangedover time. Justas Chinese collectorsput
seals on paintings hey admired, husaddingpermanent isual recordsof theirhis-
tory to admiredscrolls, so museumsettingsleave traceswhich can be recovered
in a picture ike Travelsand Tribulations.For the Chinese connoisseur"the aes-
theticqualityof thepainting .. is enhancedby handsomelydesigned,well-placed
seals.... Through he commentsof formerowners, greatcritics,or formerstates-
men,he senses keenlyhis own continuitywiththepast."14"So should it also be,"
the Masterof the LondonPiero's Travelsargues,withEuropeanart.
II
But when the Master of the London Piero's Travelspublishesthis argument,he
meets with resistance.The Intentionalist,as his intellectualprotagonist dentifies
12. See Corpus of Paintings Sold in The Netherlandsduring the Nineteenth Century,ed. Burton
B. Fredericksen with archival contributionsby Ruud Priem assisted by Julia I. Armstrong (Los
Angeles: ProvenanceIndex of the Getty Information nstitute, 1998-), and The Index of Paintings
Sold in the British Isles during the Nineteenth Century,ed. Burton B. Fredericksenassisted by Julia
I. Armstrongand Doris A. Mendenhall(Santa Barbara,Calif.: ABC-CLIO,1988-), 4 vols.
13. One precedent or "Paintingsand their Careers" s BernardBerenson, Homeless Paintings of
the Renaissance, ed. HannaKiel (London:Thames and Hudson, 1969), a book aboutpaintingsthat
have disappeared.
14. Lawrence Sickman, "Introduction,"Chinese Calligraphyand Painting in the Collection ofJohnM. Crawford, r (New York:PierpontMorgan Library,1962), 27.
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ART MUSEUMS,OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THE PAST 177
herself, arguesthat thisparallelbetween Christ'sbasic actions and the identityof
Piero's Baptismof Christ s both contrary o the spirit of Danto's whole analysis
and intrinsically mplausible."My view," she opines, "is that a paintingmeans
whatthe artist ntends that it mean.Nothingthathappensto a paintingafter it is
completedcan change its meaning. How indeed could that be possible? This isbutgood common sense. How can my claim be controversial?"
Respondingto Travels and Tribulations, he Intentionalistdevelops an argu-
ment about the essential deep difference betweenworks of art and persons:
In Travelsand Tribulationswe see a mere physical object,Piero's panel, at five moments
in its history.All the actionsshown are performedby people.Thepainting s a mere thing
manipulatedby these people who are depicted. The painting tself doesn'tdo anything; t
isn't an agent. This is why the parallel between Travels and Tribulationsand Giotto's
panel is only a (marvelous!)literaryconceit. The Master of the LondonPiero's Travelshas read too much aboutmetonymy.All that fantastical alk aboutmerethingsacting has
causedhim to lose his sense of reality.
Danto's discussion of actionsdisplayedin the Arenachapel involves genuine
indiscernibles: t is the same raisedhand in each of the six differentpictures,but
in each instancethe handperformsa distinct action. The Travelsand Tribulations
of Piero'sBaptismof Christdoes not show indiscernibles,butmerelyrecords he
appearanceof the very same thing at different times. To launch Danto's argu-
ment, you needtwo things which look similarbut turnout to be different.To cite
his classic case in aesthetics,Brillo Box is indiscernible rom thephysicallyiden-
tical objectin thegrocery.Danto needs two things,in eachcase, because he must
explain how they are different.He tells a storyin which at first those thingsseem
to be identical,but thenwe learnthatthey are in fact different.Prisingthemapart
takesphilosophy. f you have butone thing,therecan be no suchnarrative.Every
thing-what is more obvious?-is entirelyidenticalto itself; a thing cannot be
its own discernible.15
But mightn'tthe Masterreply "How many people areLydia? Two, counting
her as one today and another tomorrow."But this answer is sophistical, the
Intentionalistmight retort.If we count the day aftertomorrow,Lydia would be
three people; if we count her every twelve hours, six people; and so on. By
choosing how to count, we may find as many Lydia-indiscernibles s we need.
But this procedure s philosophicallymuddled.It confuses person-stageswith a
person.Lydia,one person,is constitutedby numerous infinitely many?) person-
stages.But this last claim may have less power than the Intentionalistbelieves. As
soon as we pickout the samethingat two different imes, we have indiscernibles.
The raised hand of Christblessing, and the raised handof Christexpelling, are
nothingbut that same handpicked out at two differenttimes acting differently.
15. What maygive support o thisconfused way of thinking s a misleadingformulationof Danto's
argument. nsteadof startingwith two distinct things, andexplaininghow they are different,someone
might ratherimagine that one thing had two very different origins. I discuss this issue in my
"Indiscernibles nd the Essence of Art:The Hegelian Turn n ArthurDanto's Aesthetic Theory," orth-coming in the Libraryof Living Philosophersvolume devotedto Danto.
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178 DAVID CARRIER
And exactly the same point can be made aboutphysical things like paintings.As
soon as we compareand contrastPiero's Baptismof Christat two different imes,
we have indiscernibles.In one significantway, Danto's use of Giotto's fresco
acknowledges ust thatpoint. Christ'srighthand at any one momentcannotbe
an indiscernible, or at any one time there is but one such entity. But when rep-resented repeatedly,Christ's right hand is an indiscernible. The Master of the
London Piero's Travels proposes that we thinkof Piero's Baptism of Christ in
exactly the same way.
Danto's other favorite examples-dreams and waking experience; conduct
conformingto moralexperience and conductnot so conforming; dentical uni-
verses, one deterministic, he othera worldof pure chance;a computer ndistin-
guishablefrom a Turingmachine; and,of course,Brillo Box and a Brillo box-
involve two distinctthingsthatexist, or could be imaginedto exist, at the sametime.16They look similarbut turnoutto be entirelydifferent. n the ArenaChapel
Giotto shows six representationsof one thing at different times. Insofar as
Danto's usual presentation nvolves two things existing at the same time, appeal
to those images of Christmay confuse matters.Christperformedhis six actions
at six distincttimes. We canonly see his six indiscernibleraised hands all at once
in Giotto's representation.
To this the Intentionalist might respond by undercuttingthe comparison
between the Arena Chapel fresco and Travels and Tribulations. The basic
actions,Christblessing someone by raisinghis arm,or commandingLazarusby
raising his arm, and so on, are what Christdoes. "Clearly here is no event dis-
tinct from the raisingof the arm in which the blessing [orthe command,or the
expelling, .. .] consists...."17 In the ArenaChapel,we see representations f
various basic actionsperformedby Christ.His handgesturethus cannotbe sub-
tracted rom the context that makes sense of it; the context is constitutiveof the
identityof the act. Only because bottlesof wine are laid out can Christ'sraising
of his hand constitute the action of changing water into wine; similarly in the
other five panels.But in Piero's case the situation s different: he identityof the
painting s notconstitutedeven in partby the circumstancesof its viewing. Piero
made the artifactBaptism of Christ.This artifactcertainlycan be placedin con-
texts he did not envisage. But since the meaningof an artifact s determinedby
its creator,puttinghis paintingin a new context cannotchange its meaning.We
valueBaptismof Christbecausewe value whatPieromade.Supposethat the sig-
nificance of this work of art didchangein each new context,as the Masterof the
LondonPiero's Travelsclaims. Then thepaintingwould not have been preserved
as it was movedfromplace to place.Theobjectwe see in London,weretheargu-
ment of the Master of the London Piero's Travelscorrect, would be something
quitedistinctfrom the paintingshown in the firstpanel.
To this the Master of the London Piero's Travels might reply that the
Intentionalisthas missed the point of his argument.We value the London work
16. ArthurC. Danto, Connections o the World:TheBasic Conceptsof Philosophy (Berkeley,Los
Angeles, and London:University of CaliforniaPress, 1989), 6-8.
17. Danto, Analytic Philosophy of Action, 29.
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ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THE PAST 179
of art Baptism of Christbecause it looks very much like the altarpiecemadeby
Piero. But this is compatiblewith thinking that the identity of the paintinghas
changedwith time. We talk about the painting Piero made differently than did
Piero's and Sir Charles Eastlake's and Berenson's contemporariesbecause a
great deal of time has gone by, because new ways of talking about art have beeninvented,because much other arthas been made, andbecause we have new insti-
tutionslike art history and the museum.The paintingwe see looks roughly the
same as what Pieromade,butbecauseof its history this object has come to have
a differentsignificance.This way of speakingbothacknowledgesthatbecause of
its history we now see the paintingdifferentlysuch that it is thereforea different
painting,but that we value it because its original appearancehasbeen preserved.
"Perhapsmy critics will better understandmy theory,"the Master of the
London Piero's Travels adds, "if they consider how I have been influencedby
Duchamp."
Theready-madesausedme to rethink ow to describe hetraditional ivisionof laborbetween rtist ndspectator.ieromakesa painting-and he viewer ees what he artistdid. So people hought!Thatwayof understandingrtwas underminedhen,by seem-ingto doless, Duchampllowed he spectatoro do more.Heselected heready-mades,leaving t to the viewers o determinehemeaning f theseobjects.
Travelsand Tribulationsprojectsthis Duchampianway of thinkingback into
the past. Pieropainted Baptism of Christ,but how that artifacthas been viewed
dependsupon a long traditionof commentaryon it. "Projectionof our ways of
thinkingonto thepast,"he notes, "is aninevitableresult of our museumculture."
The Master of the London Piero's Travelsis inspired by PhilipFisher's beauti-
fully condensedphrase,which summarizesFisher's account of museums: "The
life of Thingsis in reality manylives."18
III
Thus far the debate has been between two parties, the Master of the London
Piero's Travels and the Intentionalist.But now a thirdposition must be intro-
duced, the viewpoint of the Skepticaboutmuseums.In the presentdebate about
museums, skepticism opens up the discussion about the identityof artworksand
the role of museumsin a way that revealsdeep philosophical ssues.
The Travelsand Tribulationsof Piero's Baptism of Christ purports o show
that the meaningof Piero'sBaptism of Christchanges accordingto its context.The Skepticmakes a strongerclaim. This claim is so drasticthat if it is true the
originalsignificanceof old paintingswould be utterly ost in the museum.Using
the evidence assembledby the Masterof the London Piero'sTravels,the Skeptic
arguesas follows:
Thisassembledvidence, sedsoamusinglynTravels ndTribulations,omymind ug-gestsa quitedifferent,much ess optimistic onclusion han hatdrawnby theMaster.
18. Making and Effacing Art: ModernAmerican Art in a Culture of Museums (New York andOxford:Oxford University Press, 1991), 3.
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180 DAVID CARRIER
Given that the setting of Piero's Baptism of Christ has changed so dramatically-and
repeatedly!-what reason have we to think that its original significancehas been pre-
served at all? That the appearance of the object has not changed shows nothing, not once
we allow that the significance of Piero's painting s not given by its appearance.
My view is but good common sense. No one not blindedby the need of museumsto
claim thatthey preserveart of the pastwould seriouslyhold any otheropinion.
How can old works of art be preserved when everything around them has
changed?This questiontakes on special urgencyonce we consider how muse-
ums originated.In the late eighteenth century,"museumcuratorswould take a
work of artand by framingit-either literallyor metaphorically-strip it of its
local, historical, and worldly origins, even its human origins. In the museum,
only its aesthetic propertieswould metaphorically emain."9
Can any artworksurvive this radical transformation?Maybe the work of artexists as such only in relation to its local, historical, worldly,or human origins.
Perhaps when these origins are stripped away, nothing remainsof the original
workof art.
One way to understand hese worries aboutmuseums,the Skeptic might sug-
gest, is to analyze changeof other kinds of things.20Buildingsarerenovatedand
used for new purposes;nations expandandmake new laws; persons age, learn,
and travel. In some cases the same building, the same nation, and the same per-
son continue to exist even as their propertieschange. In the past 220-some yearsthe United States has banned slavery,establishedwomen's suffrage,andextend-
ed its territorydramatically.But it is the same countryas that nationestablished
in 1776 because there s continuity hrough hese gradualchanges.In othercases,
however, this continuity s absent, and the changes resultin changes of identity.
Hagia Sophia, built as a Byzantine church,was convertedby the Muslim con-
querorsof Istanbul nto a mosquein 1453.Afterthe end of the OttomanEmpire,
in the 1920s Ataturkturned Hagia Sophia into a museum preserving both
Christianmosaics and signs of its Islamic past.The buildinghas been so much
modified that there is not enough continuityin these changes for Hagia Sophia
to survive being, in turn, a church,a mosque, anda museum.
"WhatI propose,"the Skeptic would say, "is to take a view of artworks n
museumslike that takenby those who deny that the samebuildingsurvives rad-
ical change."Althoughno one doubtsthat museumspreservephysical objects,
that is no reasonto reject skepticism.Since the workof art s not identical to the
physical object, preserving heobjectin themuseumdoes not mean thatthework
of arthas survived.For that to be so theremust be sufficientcontinuity n the dif-
ferent settings, social as well as natural,such that the conditions for identity
obtain.
19. Lydia Goehr, The ImaginaryMuseumof Musical Works:An Essay in the Philosophy of Music
(Oxford:ClarendonPress, 1992), 173. Describing musical works,she is noting how the moderncon-
cept of the musical work of art was created at the same time as the museum devoted to visual works
of art.
20. The best known accountof these issues, David Wiggins, Sameness and Substance(Cambridge,Mass.: HarvardUniversity Press, 1980) has only brief remarksabout art.
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ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THE PAST 181
The Skeptic might cite RichardWollheim'sArtand Its Objects, whose claims
can be nicely summarized n his phrase:"Art,and its objects, come indissolubly
linked."21 he might go on to observe that Danto also says some things which
may supporther position.
So much of what is contemporaryart is so internallyrelated to aspects of contemporary
culturethat the meaningsof objects, intended as vehicles of our cultural dentity,will be
lost if knowledge of their references and allusionsare unknown.It is as though we must
transmit he whole of our culture f any partof it-any work-is to be more than a pick-
led object....22
Whatcould a cultureunfamiliarwith bottle racksandwhite porcelainurinals
make of MarcelDuchamp'sready-mades?To understandhis transferof utilitar-
ian objects into the artworld, one needs to recognize that the ready-madesare
bottle racks and whiteporcelainurinals,and this means that one needsto be able
to identify the originals.Art commenting upon everyday culture by appropriat-
ing utilitarianartifacts oses its meaningwhen those artifactsareunfamiliar.
Danto is describing contemporaryart, but it may be plausible to extend his
accountto all works of art. A Greek sculpture s carvedfor a temple;a Persian
carpetwoven for ceremonialuse; a sacred Renaissancepaintingmadefor a high
altar.Such worksof artarepartandparcelof living ways of life. Someone who
knew nothingaboutGreek religion, Islamic culture,or Christianitywould not be
able to understandhese objects.When works of art are separated rom the way
of life associatedwith them, they lose their function.A museumis the place for
displaying objects that have lost theiroriginalfunction.Turningsculptures,car-
pets, and paintingsinto objects we appreciateaesthetically,the museum might
preserve he physical artifacts,but doingthis, the Skeptic would assert, "does not
preservethe worksof art."
Supposethat the skeptical analysis of museums were to be generally accept-
ed.Thenwe mightcease to buildand maintain heseexpensive institutions.True,few people who go to museums, apartfrom academics,are likely to take these
skepticalconcernsseriously.Butperhaps his only shows that most museum vis-
itorsaretoo uncritical.Who has the will to criticallyexaminethese institutions?
Certainlynot the curators who work there-or the art historians, who often
depend closely uponmuseums.
Many important hinkershave offered skeptical argumentsabout the powers
of museums,andaboutthe meaningandidentityof the artworks hey supposed-
ly preserve.PaulValerydescribedhis experienceof entering
this wax-flooredsolitude, savoringof templeanddrawingroom,of cemeteryand school.
... I am ... weirdlybeset with beauties,distractedat every momentby masterpiecesto
the rightor left compellingme to walk like a drunkman between counters....
21. RichardWollheim, "Preface,"Art and Its Objects:An Introduction o Aesthetics (New York:
Harper& Row, 1968). Wollheimdoes not take a skepticalview of museums.
22. "Lookingat the FutureLooking at the Presentas Past,"MortalityImmortality?:The Legacyof
20th-CenturyArt, ed. Miguel Angel Corzo (Los Angeles: Getty ConservationInstitute, 1999), 9.Danto does not sharethe Skeptic'sview of museums.
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182 DAVID CARRIER
Only an irrationalcivilization, and one devoid of the taste for pleasure, could have
devised such a domain of incoherence.This juxtapositionof dead visions has something
insane about it, with each thing jealously competingfor the glance that will give it life.23
Valery's museum was a mausoleum, the art it contained dead. I once had a
similarexperience. Sitting in the sculpturegallery of the MetropolitanMuseum,
tired from too much looking, I saw nothing but a mass of fragments. Bits of
Islamic ceramics, tribal masks from Oceania,pieces of Romanesquechurches:
all thiselegantly displayed oot looked like the contents of an upscale thriftshop.
These fragmentsdid not tell the story of art. Maurice Blanchot offers a similar
view:
One has but to enterany place in which worksof artare put together n greatnumber o
experiencethis museumsickness, analogousto mountainsickness,which is madeup of a
feeling of vertigoand suffocation.... Surelythereis something nsuperablybarbarousn
the customof museums.24
In his commentaryon Valery'sessay,TheodorAdorno also takes such a position:
"The natural-history ollections of the spirit have actually transformedworks of
artinto the hieroglyphicsof history and broughtthem a new content while the
old one shriveledup."25MartinHeidegger,similarly,held a skepticalview of the
museum's power to preserve art.
The worksthemselves stand and hangin collections and exhibitions. But arethey here in
themselves as the works they themselves are,or arethey not ratherhere as objectsof the
artindustry? .. Even when we make an effort to cancel or avoid such displacementof
works . . . the world of the work that standsthere has perished.26
The museumsupposedlykills artby removingit from the life of the commu-
nity. Oswald Spengler's Decline of the West akes up this idea when it prophe-
sizes, "one day Rembrandt's ast portraitwill cease to exist, even though the
paintedcanvas will still be intact;because the eye that can apprehend his lan-
guage of forms will have disappeared."27or Rembrandt'spainting to exist,
viewers must understandt. Merely preservingRembrandt's aintedcanvas is not
enough to preservehis work of art. Hans Sedlmayr,a figure of the far right,
expressedthis idea when he explainedhow from
23. Paul Val6ry,"The Problem of Museums" n Degas, Manet, Morisot, transl. David Paul (New
York:Pantheon, 1960), 203.
24. Maurice Blanchot, Friendship,transl. Elizabeth Rottenberg (Stanford: Stanford UniversityPress, 1997), 45.
25. TheodorAdorno, "Val6ryProust Museum," n his Prisms, transl.Samuel and ShierryWeber
(London: N. Spearman, 1967), 185. Lambert Zuidervaartgives a useful gloss on Adorno's word
"hieroglyphic":"Adornouses 'hieroglyphic script' to describe how, as humanly produced aesthetic
objects, artworkshint atmore than can be pinned down in their organizedsensuousness, even though
they make their suggestions only in their sensuousness and organization." (Adorno Aesthetic
Theory:TheRedemptionof Illusion [Cambridge,Mass. andLondon:MITPress, 1991], 188.)
26. Quotedin Didier Maleuvre,MuseumMemories: History, Technology,Art (Stanford:Stanford
University Press, 1999), 47. This book offers a good commentaryon this worry.
27. Quotedin T. J. Clark, Farewell to An Idea (New Haven and London: Yale University Press,1999), 237.
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ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THE PAST 183
the old churches, castles and palaces there issues from the end of the eighteenth century
onwardan endless stream of works of art, each separateand isolated from its context,
fragments of what once had been a coherent whole. Torn from their mother soil, they
wander, ike forlornrefugees, to take shelter n the art-dealer'smarketor into the soulless
institutionalmagnificenceof publicor privateartgalleries.
In the museum ... things which were originally integral partsof a single whole are
shown forth after this heartlessprocess of dismemberment s exhibits.... 28
Writing from a committed extreme leftist point of view, Walter Benjamin made
similar claims:
The uniquenessof a work of art is inseparable rom its being imbeddedin the fabric of
tradition.... An ancientstatueof Venus,for example, stood in a different raditional on-
text with the Greeks, who made it an object of veneration, than with the clerics of the
MiddleAges, who viewed it as an ominous idol. Both of them, however, were equallyconfrontedwith its uniqueness,that is, its aura.29
Like Heidegger, Benjamin thinks that old works of art cannot survive into an age
of mechanical reproduction. The physical object survives, but the work of art
does not.
Sometimes skeptics claim that museums are essentially paradoxical because
they both preserve historical records of the past and aim to be outside of time. As
Maleuvre put this point:
A monument s an object takenout of history,by history.Yet it standsfor history, andis
pervadedwith historical spirit.A monument'shistoricalcharacter s our knowledge that
the objectno longer belongs immanently o history:being a monument s, paradoxically,
being separated rom history.Were the monumentto be truly immanent n its historical
backgroundt would vanish back into it. On the contrast, n becominga historicalmonu-
ment, the objectis removed from its nativeground n history.30
In envisaging a dispute between those commentators who assert, and those
who deny, that museums preserve works of art, a third possible position also
deserves consideration.31 Perhaps museums are important not because they pre-
serve artbut because they emancipate it, permitting us to see aspects of paintings
and sculptures that were hidden or under-appreciated when they were in their
original settings. For Hans-Georg Gadamer, the argument about whether muse-
ums do, or do not, permit us to know the work of art as it originally appeared
mistakenly presupposes that the best we can do is see a painting or sculpture as
it appeared to its creator. But why should that be the whole story? "As soon as
the concept of art took on those features to which we have become accustomedand the work of art began to stand on its own, divorced from its original context
28. Hans Sedlmayr,Art in Crisis: The Lost Center, transl.Brian Battershaw London:Hollis &
Carter,1957), 88-89.
29. WalterBenjamin,"The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction," lluminations,
transl. HarryZohn (New York:Schocken Books, 1969), 225.
30. Maleuvre,MuseumMemories, 58.
31. I owe the suggestionthat there is such a thirdposition, and some of my phrasesdescribing t,
to BrianFay.The presentanalysisbuilds upon my "Piero and His Interpreters:s ThereProgressinArtHistory?,"History and Theory26 (1987), 150-165.
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184 DAVIDCARRIER
of life, only then did art become simply 'art'in the 'museum without walls' of
Malraux."32Museums liberateart,revealingmore of a paintingor sculpture han
was available in its original culture."The workof artis the expression of a truth
that cannot be reduced to what its creatoractually thought n it."33
Gadamer'sargument s abstract,and so what is required or ourpurposes areexamples of such would-be liberation.When Baptism of Christ was moved to a
museum, good lighting permittedus to see the paintingbetter than was possible
in its original site. Because the painting is now near other paintings of its time,
comparisons with other fourteenth-century ltarpiecesis easier. And since in
LondonBaptismof Christ s physicallyclose to earlierandlaterpaintings,under-
standingof Piero in historical perspective s facilitated.In those threeways, the
physical placement of the picture is liberating.And in other,broaderways, the
cultureof museumsenhances our appreciation.Because Baptismof Christ s dis-
cussed in easily accessible, fully illustratedbooks and essays, viewers are aware
of its multifacetedsignificance.Recent political historians ike CarloGinzburg
have placed Piero's paintings in political context; social historians ike Michael
Baxandallhave linked Baptism to fourteenth-centurymathematicsand capital-
ism; and arthistorians ike MarilynAronbergLavinhave discussed its iconogra-
phy.The developmentof such sophisticated nterpretationss inevitably closely
linked with the art museum, which secularizes sacred paintings.
However, whatever the general interestof Gadamer'sclaims, or the value of
his hermeneutics,n the presentcontextthe thesis thatmuseums iberateworks of
art,rather hanpreserve(orfail to preserve) hem,is irrelevant o the concernsof
the art historian.What would it mean to claim that we understandBaptism of
Christbetter hanPiero'scontemporaries, r Pierohimself,did?Piero,not know-
ing most of the paintingsof his Flemish contemporaries, ould not have com-
paredhis altarpiece o theirs.And of coursehe could not havecomparedhis paint-
ing to laterworks of art.So certainlywe cansee Baptismof Christ n ways impos-
sible for fourteenth-century iewers. But this does not reveal something new
aboutPiero'spainting; t only providesnovel accountsof its relationship o other
works of art. Hereit is easy to give a reductioad absurdumof Gadamer'sargu-
ment. Piero'spaintingmay be comparedwith Chinesescrolls, Duchamp'sready-
mades, and FrankStella's 1960s abstractions.Thatthese comparisonsget us to
see Baptism of Christin new ways does not show that new meanings of Piero's
paintingarebeing actualized.When set in novel contexts, Baptism of Christcan
32. Hans-GeorgGadamer,The Relevance of the Beautiful and Other Essays, transl. Nicholas
Walker (Cambridge,Eng.: CambridgeUniversity Press, 1986), 19. In his sympathetic summary,
David Couzens Hoy speaks of how Gadamer'sposition "can be called contextualism, or according
to it, the interpretations dependentupon, or 'relativeto,' the circumstances n which it occurs....
Since no context is absolute, different ines of interpretation repossible. But this is not radicalrela-
tivism, since not all contexts areequally appropriate r justifiable."(The Critical Circle:Literature,
History, and Philosophical Hermeneutics [Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of
CaliforniaPress, 1978], 69.)
33. Hans-GeorgGadamer,Philosophical Hermeneutics,transl. David E. Linge (Berkeley, LosAngeles, and London:University of CaliforniaPress, 1976), 101-102.
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ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THE PAST 185
be comparedwith any work of artwhatsoever.Such comparisons,however inter-
esting, do not tell us anythingnew about the meaningof Piero's painting.
Ginzburg,Baxandall, and Lavin disagreeabout how to understandPiero, but
they agreethattheir goal is to reconstruct, s best as possible,Baptismof Christ's
originalhistoricalsignificance.Did they not agree about that, then there wouldbe no point to their projects, for thenthey would not need to assemble so much
evidence showing that their ways of thinkingabout political history,the social
historyof art,and iconographywere present n Piero's culture.Arthistory claims
to reconstruct riginalhistoricalsignificance.34 here is nothing wrongwith ask-
ing a differentquestion("leavingaside its historicalsignificance,what does this
work of artmeanto us?")so long as we recognize that this is not the questionart
historianscustomarilyask.
Moreover, he theory of meaningGadameremploys to undergirdhis idea that
museums iberate s in fact just anothervariantof the skepticalposition. Consider
these remarksby Gadamer n his masterwork:
Thereconstructionf theoriginal ircumstances,ike all restoration,s a pointless nder-
takingn viewof thehistoricity f ourbeing.What s reconstructed,life brought ack
from he lost past, s not the original.... Even hepaintingaken rom he museum nd
replacedn the church, rthebuildingestoredo its original ondition renot what hey
oncewere-they become imply ourist ttractions.35
The discoveryof the truemeaningof a text or a work of art,he argues,"isnever
finished; t is in fact an infinite process"becausethe "truehistoricalobject is not
an objectat all,"but a projectof the creative encounterbetweenthe artifactcre-
atedby the artist and its interpreter.36n interpretation,nterpreters lways pro-
ject somethingof themselves into the artbeing interpreted,herebychangingthe
artwork tself. There is no "inherentmeaning" n an artworkand thus no single
artworkwhose identity may (or may not) be preserved hrough ime. Gadamer's
position thus reduces to a version of skepticism,offering no argumentbeyondthose we have alreadyconsidered.
IV
This is not to say, obviously, thatskepticismcan be ignored.It presentsa clear
challenge to both the Intentionalistand to the Master.How might they respond
to the Skeptic?
In responding o skepticism,the Masterof the London Piero'sTravels andtheIntentionalistwould find themselves in complete agreement.Radicalskepticism
defeatsitself, they would say; they might suggest an analogywith epistemology
34. All writersabout visual art do not agree that this is their goal. To cite a very distinguished
example, in ReadingRembrandt:Beyond the Word-ImageOpposition(Cambridge,Eng. Cambridge
UniversityPress, 1991), Mieke Bal clearly indicates thather interpretationn not a historical recre-
ationin this sense.
35. Hans-GeorgGadamer,Truthand Method, transl. GarrettBarden and John Cumming (New
York:Continuum,1975), 149.36. Ibid., 265, 267.
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186 DAVID CARRIER
to see why. If one sets the standards or knowledge too high, then one will be
forced to conclude that we know nothing. Suppose, analogously, hatthe changes
occurringwhen works of art are moved were so drastic hat the original meaning
of these pictures was lost. Then how could we know that their meaning had
changed?All we would know would be the new meaningof the pictures.In orderto speak of a change of meaning, one needs to compareoriginal and present set-
tings. We know that Piero's paintings look different in museums than in their
original settings because we know both how the pictures appear oday and how
they appeared n theiroriginal settings. Of course, our informationabout origi-
nal settings is incomplete. But we know enough to estimate how much the
appearanceof the pictureshas changed.
Skepticsoffer a dreadfullyahistoricalpictureof tradition.To supposethatpic-
tures andsculpturesonly beganto change settingsin the late eighteenthcentury,when publicart museums were created, s mistaken.Once objects become high-
ly valued, they are often sold or readily become loot. Long before there were art
museums, Greekartwent to ImperialRome, Chinesemasterworks raveled fre-
quently,and famous Renaissance altarpieceswere removedfrom their original
churches.Too much fuss is made, the Master of the London Piero's Travels and
the Intentionalist orrectly say, about the claim that only the museum permitsus
to respondaestheticallyto the art it exhibits. If we believe that museums impose
alien ways of thinking upon their collections, then we are likely to doubt that
works of artsurvivethe transition nto the museum.But that belief is mistaken.
The Maori of New Zealand did not have museums, but after learning that the
intendedresponse to their carving contains an element of awe and fear-"the
spine tingles, one's body hair may straightenup, and the whole body trembles
with excitement,"as Sidney Mead so vividly put it37-we see close connections
to Europeansculpture.Like many Europeanartists,the Maori carvers intended
that their works of art would inspire a sense of awe. Until very recently, the
Chinesedid not have artmuseums,butTsung Ping (375-443) describes aesthet-
ic pleasure n termsrecognizable o Westernart overs: "As I unrollpaintingsand
face them in solitude,while seatedI plumbthe ends of the earth.Withoutresist-
ing a multitudeof naturaldangers,I simply respond to the uninhabitedwilder-
ness, wheregrottoedpeakstoweron high andcloudy forests mass in depth."38
Nor did the Persians have museums. But the miniatureKsjanderJudges the
Greek and Chinese Painting (1449-1450), illustratingthe rivalrybetween the
Greekartistwho painteda sceneand his Chinese rival who polisheda wall reflect-ing the Greekpainting ike a mirror, ells a highly subtle story aboutthe natureof
art.39Any numberof Chelseagallerieswould be proudto show this installation.
37. Sidney Moko Mead, "The Ebb andFlow of Mana Maori and the Changing Context of Maori
Art," Te Maori: Maori Art from New Zealand Collections, ed. Sidney Moko Mead (New York:
Abrams n association with the AmericanFederationof Arts, 1984), 24.
38. Susan Bush, The Chinese Literati on Painting (Cambridge,Mass.: HarvardUniversity Press,
1971), 146.
39. See Priscilla P. Soucek, "Nizamion Paintersand Painting,"Islamic Art in the MetropolitanMuseumof Art, ed. RichardEttinghausen New York:MetropolitanMuseum of Art, 1972), 12-13.
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ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THEPAST 187
Imagine thatspace explorersdiscover stones thatlook like sculptures.Maybe
these objectswere carved by intelligent aliens, butperhaps hey were made only
by natural orces. The explorerswould have no way of knowing if they under-
stood themproperly.But the artifacts rom New Zealand,China, or PersiaI have
just mentionedare not like that,for we know a greatdeal about the intentionsofthe peoples who made them,and we know that in many ways these people were
not so unlikeus museum-goers.It can be too easy to think of museumsas break-
ing with the past in overly dramatic ways. Some writers (such as Valery,
Sedlmayr,or Benjamin quoted above) lament the loss of art's function in the
museum,looking back nostalgicallyto societies in which works of art had some
non-aesthetic unction. Others ike Gadamer hinkthe developmentof the muse-
um a good thing, liberatingart from serving religious needs so that it can be a
source of aestheticpleasure.These otherwiseopposedways of thinkingsharethe
belief thatthe creationof museums involves a dramatichistoricalbreak.But this
belief deservescriticalquestioning.
Failing to offera well-developed argument, he Skeptic tends to rely upon not-
ing the shock felt when artworksare uprootedand their setting significantly
changed.But if one attendsto the continuities n these changes, the psychologi-
cal rootsof skepticism are undercut.We know thattherealways have been aes-
theticresponsesto works of art,not only because thereis muchrelevantempiri-
cal evidence to this effect, but also because oureyes tell us that what we call art
was madeto be seen aesthetically.Museumshelp us to see the alreadyexisting
aesthetic qualities of art. When Benjamin identifies the loss of the painting's
aura,or the influentialrecent commentatorCarol Duncan describes the rituals
associated with museumart,they imply that therewas recently a complete break
with the past.40This claim is mistaken.Photographyand the museum are new,
but not unprecedenteddevelopments.Before photography, herewere engraved
reproductionsf paintings.Andtherearesome significantanalogiesbetween vis-
its to museumsand the ritualsassociatedwith premodern eligious life.
In a famous letterAlbrechtDurerdescribedpre-Columbian rt:
I saw ... a sun entirelyof gold ... a moon, entirelyof silver ... very odd clothing,bed-
ding,andall sortsof strangearticlesfor humanuse.... I saw ... amazingartisticobjects,
andI marveledover the subtleingenuityof the men in these distant ands. Indeed I can-
not say enoughabout the thingswhich were there before me.41
He was able to recognize the skill of these artists.The Aztecs used "beautifully
chippedflint knives"for ritual human sacrifice.Their knives aredecoratedwith
demon faces, "a kind of personificationof the fearsome instrumentritually
employed to dispatchthe victims whose heartsandblood nourishedthe sun on
which the survival of the universedepended."42
40. See Carol Duncan, Civilizing Rituals: Inside Public Art Museums(London and New York:
Routledge, 1995).
41. Quoted in MaryEllen Miller, TheArt of Mesoamerica: From Olmec to Aztec, rev. ed. (New
York:Thames andHudson, 1996), 202.
42. H. B. Nicholson with Eloise QuinonesKeber,Art of Aztec Mexico. Treasuresof Tenochtitlan(Washington,D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1983), 40.
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188 DAVID CARRIER
Because we know the intendeduse of these Aztec artifacts, akingan aesthet-
ic attitude towards them requires bracketing our knowledge of their original
function.Like medieval Europeanarmoror Persian carpets,Aztec daggerscan
then be appreciatedas works of artwhen set in an artmuseum or when viewed
by a sixteenth-century ainter.A continuityruns amongthe Aztec artists,Dfirer,
andcontemporarymuseum-goers.A museum of art seeks to preservethe original painting as well as possible.
But in setting that painting n a novel context, unavoidably he museumchanges
how we see the work of art.TheTravelsand Tribulationsof Piero'sBaptism of
Christsuggests that how we see works of artchanges with the setting.But this
imaginarypicturedoes not justify skepticism, for in seeing how Piero's painting
was viewed in differing ways, we can still imaginehow it looked in its original
setting, and we can see continuitiesamongthe varioussettings in which it was
placed. Indeed,the point of the Master's workis to show just this continuity.Justas the United States of 2001 is the same countryas the US of 1801 despite the
changes during these 200 years precisely because of the recognizablecontinu-
ities between them, so is Baptism's identity preservedthroughthe recognizable
continuitiesthat obtain through ts changes.
Having recognized this we are now in a position to see a certain symmetry n
the positions of the Intentionalistand the Skeptic.The Intentionalistargues that
moving the painting has no effect in how it is viewed, while the Skepticclaims
that such movements make it impossible to identify the paintingas the same
painting.The truth s in between. Were it obvious, as the Intentionalistclaims,
thatpaintingsin museums arepreserved,then the worriesof skepticswould be
pointless.Werewe, conversely,to findthe skeptics' arguments onvincing, then
museumscouldnot preserveworks of art.What,rather, urdiscussion has shown
is thatmoving paintingsdoes change howwe thinkaboutthem, andthatthisdoes
in fact change them. Nevertheless, these changesarenot radical changesresult-
ing in deep discontinuity-on the contrary, ontinuitiesrootedin sharedhuman
capacitiesandtherelativechangelessnessof thephysical painting tself preserve
the identityof the paintingover time.
In offering a pictorial expression of that tension between the claims of
Intentionalistsand Skeptics,The Travelsand Tribulationsof Piero's Baptism of
Christprovidesa nicely condensedimage of the philosophicalissues raisedby
the artmuseum.But an image is not an argument.As suggestive as The Travels
and Tribulations f Piero'sBaptism of Christ s, it cannotby itself tell us how to
understandmuseums or the identities of the artworks hey contain. But in iden-tifying the philosophicalissues at stake,and giving reasonto reject skepticism,
our account of this imaginarypicture suggests how to develop a philosophical
argument. norder o fully understand ow we canidentifythechangesproduced
when paintingsare set in museums, what is required s not a bare, ahistorical
analysis,but studyof the historyof the way artworkshave been viewed in dif-
ferent times andplaces, includingthe art museum. We would need in particular
to amplifyin detail the claim merely sketched in this article,that thereis a sig-
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ART MUSEUMS, OLD PAINTINGS,AND OUR KNOWLEDGEOF THE PAST 189
nificant overlap between the ways museum-goersappreciateworks of art and
how they were viewed before there were art museums.The complete develop-
ment of such an analysis must be the task for anotheroccasion. But for now, if
this article has demonstrated hat museums raise serious philosophicaland art-
historical problems, and shown that skepticism is indefensible, then we havemade a very satisfactorybeginning.
CarnegieMellon University