Rochelle Gurstein's book explores the ephemeral life of the classic in art, revealing repeated episodes of soaring and falling reputations, rediscoveries of long-forgotten artists, and radical shifts in the canon. It challenges common knowledge and offers a richly imagined historical alternative to accounts of the politics of taste. Gurstein brings to life the competing responses of generations of artists, art lovers, and critics to specific works of art, making us see the same object vividly and directly through their eyes and feel what they felt.

Format: Hardback
Length: 520 pages
Publication date: 23 July 2024
Publisher: Yale University Press

  Gurstein's book is a deeply personal yet broadly relevant exploration of the ephemeral life of the classic in art,from the eighteenth century to our own day. It is a work of scholarship that is both rigorous and accessible, and it offers a fresh perspective on the enduring power of art to shape our understanding of the world.

A Deeply Personal Yet Broadly Relevant Exploration of the Ephemeral Life of the Classic in Art

Rochelle Gurstein's "The Classic in the History of Taste" is a groundbreaking book that explores the idea of the timeless classic in art. Published in 2024, it was awarded the Economist Book of the Year. Gurstein's research reveals that the concept of the timeless classic is not as fixed as we might think. Instead, it has undergone repeated episodes of soaring and falling reputations, rediscoveries of long-forgotten artists, and radical shifts in the canon. This goes against common knowledge and is hard to believe. Gurstein's book takes us into unfamiliar aesthetic and moral terrain, providing a richly imagined historical alternative to accounts offered by cultural theorists and those who cling to the ideal of universal values embodied in the classic. By recovering disputes about works of art from the eighteenth century to the close of the twentieth century, Gurstein makes us see the same object vividly and directly through their eyes and feel, in all its enlarging intensity, what they felt. Her book is a deeply personal yet broadly relevant exploration of the ephemeral life of the classic in art, from the eighteenth century to our own day. It is a work of scholarship that is both rigorous and accessible, and it offers a fresh perspective on the enduring power of art to shape our understanding of the world.

Weight: 904g
Dimension: 242 x 165 x 33 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780300215489