Journal of Art Historiography (Dec 2014)
After Burckhardt and Wölfflin; was there a Basel School of Art History?
Abstract
This paper deals with the legacy of Jacob Burckhardt and Heinrich Wölfflin as founders of the department of art history at the university of Basel, Switzerland. Wölfflin’s pupils became his successors as head of the department and museum from H. A. Schmid, Friedrich Rintelen, Paul Ganz to Joseph Gantner and Hans Reinhardt until the 1960s. Wölfflin’s theories and teachings continued to be propagated throughout this period. During the intellectual isolation of Switzerland during the Nazi period and WWII, Swiss art historians turned to local topics for their research. Gantner’s scholarship then focused on modern and medieval art as well as on issues of aesthetics and art criticism. His pupils primarily chose medieval topics for their dissertations and future research, while some branched out into modern art. While thoroughly grounded in a formalist tradition, they now incorporated a contextual and interdisciplinary approach. In 1939, a strong counterforce to older traditional studies occurred at Basel with the appointment of Georg Schmidt as director of the Kunstmuseum and Kupferstichkabinett. He changed the direction of the museum towards modern and contemporary art and helped establish the present character of Basel as a contemporary art city rather than the traditional city and university it had been known for.
