«The goal of art history is the descerning appreciation and enjoyment of art, from whatever time and place it may have come, by whatever hands it may have been made. Outside the academic world, the terms art and history are not often juxtaposed (norsk: sidestilt). People tend to think of history as the record and interpretation of past human actions, particularly social and political actions. Most think of art – quite correctly – as something present to the eye and touch, which, of course, the vanished human events that make up history are not. The fact is that a visible and tangible (norsk: til å ta på) work of art is a kind of persisting event. It was made at a particulare time and place by particular persons, even if we do not always know just when, where, and by whom. Although it is the creation of the past, art continues to exist in the present, long surviving its times; Charlemagne has been dead for a thousand years, but his chapel still stands at Aachen.»
Fra Helen Gardner‘s Art through the Ages, først publisert i 1926, fortsatt aktuell og i salg i nye og reviderte utgaver.
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