THE INVISIBLE MASTERPIECE

This book is a provocative conceptual history of the modern work of art, from its emergence c. 1800 through to the 1960s. Before 180 0, art-works were either imitative (portraits, landscapes) or narrative (history painting), but under the impact of Romanic modernit y the physical object was reinterpreted in a novel way. Now the work of art was visible testimony to the artist´s attempt to acieve the impossible-absolute or ultimate art. The invisible masterpiece, then, is an unattainable ideal, an ideal that has both bewitched and bewi...[Read more]