Constance Jocelyn Ffoulkes (1858–1950) was a British art historian, translator, and scholar of
Italian Renaissance
The Italian Renaissance ( it, Rinascimento ) was a period in Italian history covering the 15th and 16th centuries. The period is known for the initial development of the broader Renaissance culture that spread across Europe and marked the trans ...
art. She participated in the adoption of the 'historical standpoint' method of research, a shift in art criticism that emerged in the early twentieth century. She was a student of
Giovanni Morelli
Giovanni Morelli (25 February 1816 – 28 February 1891) was an Italian art critic and political figure. As an art historian, he developed the "Morellian" technique of scholarship, identifying the characteristic "hands" of painters through s ...
and his methods of
connoisseurship
A connoisseur (French traditional, pre-1835, spelling of , from Middle-French , then meaning 'to be acquainted with' or 'to know somebody/something') is a person who has a great deal of knowledge about the fine arts; who is a keen appreciator o ...
, which involved assembling subtle clues and recognition of personal technique, the artist's 'hand', to determine a work's provenance and creators. She translated Morelli's ''Kunstkritische Studien über italienische Malerei'' and was instrumental in the communication of Morelli's methods and legacy.
Ffoulkes' own techniques involved the investigation of historical documentation, which came to be used by many modern art historians in support of their conclusions.
For example, her article on Vincenzo Foppa published in ''The Burlington Magazine'' in 1903 made use of a document from an archive in Brescia to establish Foppa's death date.
Ffoulkes' works include contributions to the ''
Encyclopedia Britannica
An encyclopedia (American English) or encyclopædia (British English) is a reference work or compendium providing summaries of knowledge either general or special to a particular field or discipline. Encyclopedias are divided into articles ...
'', instruction on scientific methodologies for analysis of artworks, the first major study of
Vincenzo Foppa
Vincenzo Foppa ( – ) was an Italian painter from the Renaissance period. While few of his works survive, he was an esteemed and influential painter during his time and is considered the preeminent leader of the Early Lombard School. He spent hi ...
(c. 1427–1515), and contributions to the journals ''Repertorium für Kunstwissenschaft,'' ''Rassegna d’arte, The Burlington Magazine'', and ''The Magazine of Art.''
References
Further reading
* Ventrella, Francesco. “Feminine Inscriptions in the Morellian Method.” In ''Migrating Histories of Art: Self-Translations of a Discipline'', edited by Maria Teresa Costa and Hans Christian Hönes, 37–58. Studien Aus Dem Warburg-Haus 19. De Gruyter, 2019. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110491258-004
1858 births
1950 deaths
Leonardo da Vinci scholars
British art historians
Women art historians
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