‘Bagley among the Germans’: Robert Bagley, Gombrich among the Egyptians and Other Essays in the History of Art, Seattle: Marquand Books, 2016

Abstract

Robert Bagley’s Gombrich among the Egyptians is an ambitious challenge to business as usual in the teaching and practice of art history, tackling subjects from style and iconography to pedagogy and cross-cultural comparison, all in light of an original account of artist’s materials and techniques centred on prehistoric China. The book concludes on a polemic confrontation with the Anglo-Austrian art historian E.H. Gombrich, which is flawed but offers plenty of grist for further thinking.

Keywords

• world art history
• Chinese Art
• Egyptian art
• Ernst Gombrich
• iconography
• style
• sculpture
• history of materials