Kurt Badt
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Kurt Badt (3 March 1890 in
Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
− 22 November 1973 in
Überlingen Überlingen (; ) is a German city on the northern shore of Lake Constance (Bodensee) in Baden-Württemberg near the German-Swiss border, border with Switzerland. After the city of Friedrichshafen, it is the second-largest city in the Bodenseek ...
) was a German
art historian Art history is the study of artistic works made throughout human history. Among other topics, it studies art’s formal qualities, its impact on societies and cultures, and how artistic styles have changed throughout history. Traditionally, the ...
.


Life and work

The son of a Berlin banker, Badt studied art history and philosophy first at the universities of
Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
and
Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...
and then in
Freiburg Freiburg im Breisgau or simply Freiburg is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fourth-largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Its built-up area has a population of abou ...
, where he was a student of
Wilhelm Vöge Wilhelm Vöge (16 February 1868 – 30 December 1952) was a German art historian, the discoverer of the Reichenau School of painting and one of the most important medievalists of the early 20th century. Whitney Stoddard called him the "fat ...
. Among his fellow students was the young
Erwin Panofsky Erwin Panofsky (March 30, 1892 – March 14, 1968) was a German-Jewish art historian whose work represents a high point in the modern academic study of iconography, including his hugely influential ''Renaissance and Renascences in Western Art ...
. Badt completed his doctoral dissertation on
Andrea Solario Andrea Solari (also Solario) (1460–1524) was an Italian Renaissance painter of the Milanese school. He was initially named ''Andre del Gobbo'', but more confusingly as ''Andrea del Bartolo'' a name shared with two other Italian painters, ...
in 1914. He started his career as an assistant at the
Kunsthalle Bremen The Kunsthalle Bremen is an art museum in Bremen, Germany. It is located close to the Bremen Old Town on the "Culture Mile" (). The Kunsthalle was built in 1849, enlarged in 1902 by architect Eduard Gildemeister, and expanded several more times, ...
, but most of his life he was an independent scholar teaching privately, as his family was wealthy and he did not need an academic job in order to earn a living. According to Alfons Rosenberg, he lived the life of a Renaissance humanist. In 1939 he left Germany gaining a research position at the newly founded
Warburg Institute The Warburg Institute is a research institution associated with the University of London in central London, England. A member of the School of Advanced Study, its focus is the study of cultural history and the role of images in culture – cros ...
in London. He returned to Germany in 1950, where he became a German citizen in 1952 and helped to reorganize the university system. His writings include studies on
Wilhelm Lehmbruck Wilhelm Lehmbruck (4 January 188125 March 1919) was a German sculpture, sculptor. One of the most important of his generation, he was influenced by realism (arts), realism and expressionism. Biography Born in Meiderich (part of Duisburg from 190 ...
,
Eugène Delacroix Ferdinand Victor Eugène Delacroix ( ; ; 26 April 1798 â€“ 13 August 1863) was a French people, French Romanticism, Romantic artist who was regarded as the leader of the French Romantic school.Noon, Patrick, et al., ''Crossing the Channel: ...
,
Nicolas Poussin Nicolas Poussin (, , ; June 1594 – 19 November 1665) was a French painter who was a leading painter of the classical French Baroque style, although he spent most of his working life in Rome. Most of his works were on religious and mythologic ...
,
Jan Vermeer Johannes Vermeer ( , ; #Pronunciation of name, see below; also known as Jan Vermeer; October 1632 – 15 December 1675) was a Dutch people, Dutch painter who specialized in domestic interior scenes of middle-class life. He is considered one of ...
,
John Constable John Constable (; 11 June 1776 – 31 March 1837) was an English landscape painter in the Romanticism, Romantic tradition. Born in Suffolk, he is known principally for revolutionising the genre of landscape painting with his pictures of Dedha ...
,
Paul Cézanne Paul Cézanne ( , , ; ; ; 19 January 1839 – 22 October 1906) was a French Post-Impressionism, Post-Impressionist painter whose work introduced new modes of representation, influenced avant-garde artistic movements of the early 20th century a ...
,
Raphael Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (; March 28 or April 6, 1483April 6, 1520), now generally known in English as Raphael ( , ), was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. List of paintings by Raphael, His work is admired for its cl ...
,
Vincent van Gogh Vincent Willem van Gogh (; 30 March 185329 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who is among the most famous and influential figures in the history of Western art. In just over a decade, he created approximately 2,100 artworks ...
,
Paolo Veronese Paolo Caliari (152819 April 1588), known as Paolo Veronese ( , ; ), was an Italian Renaissance painter based in Venice, known for extremely large history paintings of religion and mythology, such as ''The Wedding at Cana (Veronese), The Wedding ...
,
Ernst Barlach Ernst Heinrich Barlach (2 January 1870 – 24 October 1938) was a German Expressionism, expressionist sculptor, medallist, printmaker and writer. Although he was a supporter of the war in the years leading to World War I, his participation in th ...
and attacks on the methodology of the "second Vienna school" of art history dominated by
Hans Sedlmayr Hans Sedlmayr (18 January 1896, in Szarvkő, Kingdom of Hungary – 9 July 1984, in Salzburg) was an Austrian art historian. From 1931 to 1932 and from 1938 onwards, he was a member of the Nazi Party. Positions as a University Professor Sedl ...
. He considered "masterpieces" to be the only works of art worth studying. Badt radically separated works of art from the deeds in history: the first are what artists have in mind, their works interest and currently attract the viewer as such, whereas the historical deeds intend effects and are related to their consequences and therefore tend to be absorbed by them. Furthermore, Badt explained his new fundamental approach to interpretation with the difference between historical action and artistic making: he differentiated the artistic work process from the distinct plans and designs, seeing it in each stage to be identical with the work as a draft. Therefore, he was able to understand and explain the finished work out of its work process. He did not see the artistic process as a mere fabrication technique, but as a method making visible to our general understanding the essence of what is to be represented. His first marriage with Ella C. Wollheim dissolved in 1937, Badt married Helen "Leni" Arnheim (1906–1973), the sister of
Rudolf Arnheim Rudolf Arnheim (; July 15, 1904 – June 9, 2007) was a German-born writer, art and film theorist, and perceptual psychologist. He learned Gestalt psychology from studying under Max Wertheimer and Wolfgang Köhler at the University of Berlin and ...
. Aged 83, Badt committed suicide together with his second wife.


Influence

Badt was one of the most influential art historians of his time. His work influenced the German art historians such as
Gertrude Berthold Gertrude or Gertrud may refer to: Places In space *Gertrude (crater), a crater on Uranus's moon Titania * 710 Gertrud, a minor planet Terrestrial placenames *Gertrude, Arkansas * Gertrude, Washington *Gertrude, West Virginia People *Gertrude (g ...
,
Lorenz Dittmann Lorenz Dittmann (27 March 1928, in Munich – 11 March 2018) was a German art historian. Dittmann studied history of art at the University of Munich. In 1955 he completed a Ph.D. dissertation on Grünewald’s color, supervised by Ernst Strauss. ...
, , , and
Max Imdahl Max Imdahl (September 6, 1925 – October 11, 1988) was a German art historian specialized in art historical methodology and the interpretation of modern art after World War II. He was born in Aachen and died in Bochum. Life and work Imdahl s ...
. He is frequently quoted by English and American art historians. For instance,
Geoffrey Grigson Geoffrey Edward Harvey Grigson (2 March 1905 – 25 November 1985) was a British poet, writer, editor, critic, exhibition curator, anthologist and naturalist. In the 1930s he was editor of the influential magazine ''New Verse'', and went on to p ...
said, "Painting is a difficult subject to write about, and searching books on particular painters are as rare as unicorns... One of them, and how welcome, is Dr Kurt Badt's ''The Art of Cézanne''. According to Robert Hobbs, "Badt's study is particularly helpful in articulating certain aspects of alcolmMorley's overall program that has definite affinities with Cézanne's." Mary Jacobus calls Badt a "pioneering writer on Constable's clouds". ''
The Times Literary Supplement ''The Times Literary Supplement'' (''TLS'') is a weekly literary review published in London by News UK, a subsidiary of News Corp. History The ''TLS'' first appeared in 1902 as a supplement to ''The Times'' but became a separate publication ...
'' called ''Constable's Clouds'' the best book on Constable since ''Leslie's Life''.Alfons Rosenberg
"In Memory of Dr Kurt Badt"
''AJR Information'', volume XXIX, no. 2, February 1974, p. 5.
Rudolf Arnheim often cites Badt in his widely read ''Art and Visual Perception''. He writes: "It may seem paradoxical for Kurt Badt to say that Rubens is one of the simplest of all artists. He explains, 'It is true that in order to grasp his simplicity, one must be able to understand an order that dominates an enormous world of active forces.' Badt defines artistic simplicity as 'the wisest ordering of means based on insight into the essentials, to which everything else must be subservient.' " When Arnheim asked Badt what he meant by "intelligent" art, he answered with the following list: "Artistic intelligence: Michelangelo, Poussin, Delacroix. Lack of it: Memling, Riemenschneider, Ingres, Kandinsky."Rudolf Arnheim, ''Parables of Sun Light: Observations on Psychology, the Arts, and the Rest''. Berkeley: The University of California Press, 1989, p. 106. "Obituaries in German newspapers described him as one of the most distinguished art historians of Germany."


References


Further reading

*Martin Gosebruch, ed., ''Festschrift Kurt Badt zum siebzigsten Geburtstage''. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1961. *''Metzler Kunsthistoriker Lexikon''. Stuttgart: J. B. Metzler, 1999, pp. 4–6; *Ulrike Wendland, ''Biographisches Handbuch deutschsprachiger Kunsthistoriker im Exil: Leben und Werk der unter dem Nationalsozialismus verfolgten und vertriebenen Wissenschaftler''. Munich: Saur, 1999, vol. 1, pp. 21–24.


Select writings

*''Andrea Solario: Sein Leben und sein Werke: Ein Beitrag zur Kunstgeschichte der Lombardei''. Ph.D. dissertation. University of Freiburg, 1914. *"Cézanne's Watercolour Technique." ''The Burlington Magazine'', vol. 83, October 1943, pp. 246–248. *''Eugène Delacroix Drawings''. Oxford: B. Cassirer, 1946. *''John Constable's Clouds''. London: Routledge & K. Paul, 1950. *''The Art of Cézanne''. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1965. *"Raphael's Incendio del Borgo." ''Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes'', vol. 22, 1959, pp. 35–59. *''Modell und Maler von Jan Vermeer: Probleme der Interpretation. Eine Streitschrift gegen Hans Sedlmayr''. Cologne: M. DuMont Schauberg, 1961. *''Die Farbenlehre Van Goghs''. Cologne: DuMont, 1961. *''Raumphantasien und Raumillusionen. Das Wesen der Plastik'', Cologne: DuMont, 1963. *''Eugène Delacroix: Werke und Ideale''. Cologne: DuMont, 1965. *''Kunsttheoretische Versuche: Ausgewählte Aufsätze''. Cologne: M. Dumont Schauberg, 1968. *''Die Kunst des Nicolas Poussin''. Cologne: DuMont Schauberg, 1969. *"Ein angebliches Selbstbildnis von Nicolas Poussin." ''Pantheon'', vol. 27, 1969, pp. 395–398. *''Das Spätwerk Cézannes''. Constance: Druckerei und Verlagsanstalt Universitätsverlag, 1971. *''Ernst Barlach, der Bildhauer''. Neumünster: Wachholtz, 1971. *''Eine Wissenschaftslehre der Kunstgeschichte''. Cologne: M. Dumont Schauberg, 1971.


External links

*
Die wahre Schönheit der Dinge: Kurt Badt. Ein Leben für die Kunst.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Badt, Kurt 1890 births 1973 deaths German art historians Writers from Berlin German male non-fiction writers 1973 suicides Suicides in Germany Joint suicides