![Die Zukunft der Wissensspeicher - Horst Bredekamp 1 (cropped)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e2/Die_Zukunft_der_Wissensspeicher_-_Horst_Bredekamp_1_%28cropped%29.JPG)
Horst Bredekamp (born 29 April 1947, in
Kiel
Kiel () is the capital and most populous city in the northern Germany, German state of Schleswig-Holstein, with a population of 246,243 (2021).
Kiel lies approximately north of Hamburg. Due to its geographic location in the southeast of the J ...
) is a German
art historian
Art history is the study of aesthetic objects and visual expression in historical and stylistic context. Traditionally, the discipline of art history emphasized painting, drawing, sculpture, architecture, ceramics and decorative arts; yet today ...
.
Life and work
Bredekamp studied art history,
archeology
Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...
,
philosophy
Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
and
sociology
Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of Empirical ...
in Kiel, Munich, Berlin and Marburg. In 1974 he received his doctorate at the
Philipps-Universität Marburg
The Philipps University of Marburg (german: Philipps-Universität Marburg) was founded in 1527 by Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse, which makes it one of Germany's oldest universities and the oldest still operating Protestant university in the wor ...
with a thesis on art as a medium of social conflicts, especially the "Bilderkämpfe" of late antiquity to the
Hussite revolution. He worked first as a volunteer at the
Liebieghaus
The Liebieghaus is a late 19th-century villa in Frankfurt, Germany. It contains a sculpture museum, the ''Städtische Galerie Liebieghaus'', which is part of the Museumsufer on the Sachsenhausen bank of the River Main. Max Hollein was the direc ...
in
Frankfurt am Main
Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...
, from 1976 as assistant in the division of Art History at the
University of Hamburg
The University of Hamburg (german: link=no, Universität Hamburg, also referred to as UHH) is a public research university in Hamburg, Germany. It was founded on 28 March 1919 by combining the previous General Lecture System ('' Allgemeines Vor ...
.
In 1982 he was appointed Professor of art history at the University of Hamburg, in 1993 he moved to the
Humboldt University Berlin. Since 2003 he has been a Permanent Fellow of the
Institute for Advanced Study, Berlin, in 2005 the Gadamer-endowed chair. Bredekamp was a fellow at the
Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton
The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS), located in Princeton, New Jersey, in the United States, is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholar ...
(1991), Institute for Advanced Study in Berlin (1992),
Getty Center
The Getty Center, in Los Angeles, California, is a campus of the Getty Museum and other programs of the Getty Trust. The $1.3 billion center opened to the public on December 16, 1997 and is well known for its architecture, gardens, and views over ...
, Los Angeles (1995 and 1998) and the
Collegium Budapest
A (plural ), or college, was any association in ancient Rome that acted as a legal entity. Following the passage of the ''Lex Julia'' during the reign of Julius Caesar as Consul and Dictator of the Roman Republic (49–44 BC), and their reaff ...
(1999).
The research foci of Horst Bredekamp are
Iconoclasm
Iconoclasm (from Ancient Greek, Greek: grc, wikt:εἰκών, εἰκών, lit=figure, icon, translit=eikṓn, label=none + grc, wikt:κλάω, κλάω, lit=to break, translit=kláō, label=none)From grc, wikt:εἰκών, εἰκών + wi ...
,
Romanesque sculpture
Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...
, art of the
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...
and
Mannerism
Mannerism, which may also be known as Late Renaissance, is a style in European art that emerged in the later years of the Italian High Renaissance around 1520, spreading by about 1530 and lasting until about the end of the 16th century in Italy, ...
, political iconography, art and technology, new media. In the course of his move to Berlin, Bredekamp supported the incorporation of the
''Census'' research project into the Humboldt University. In 2000 he founded the project "The Technical Image" at the Hermann von Helmholtz-Centre for Cultural Techniques (HZK) of the
Humboldt University Berlin, which developed under his leadership visually critical methods, a theory of pictorial knowledge in the fields of science and technology and medical visualizations. From 2008 to 2018 Bredekamp was co-founder and director of the DFG-Kolleg research group "Image Act and embodiment" ("Bildakt und Verkörperung") at Humboldt University Berlin.
From 2012 to 2018, together with Wolfgang Schäffner, he served as speaker of the Cluster of Excellence “Image Knowledge Gestaltung” at the Humboldt University in the second phase of the
German Universities Excellence Initiative. The research project operated as an interdisciplinary laboratory that brought together Humanities, Natural and Technical Sciences, as well as Medical and – for the first time in basic research – Design and Architecture.
Subsequently, since 2019, both Bredekamp and Schäffner are Directors of the Cluster of Excellence “Matters of Activity. Image Space Material”. The cluster investigates the culture of materials in the digital age and is composed of researchers from more than 40 disciplines.
From the spring of 2015 until 2018 he served, next to the British museum director Neil MacGregor (director) and the archaeologist Hermann Parzinger, as one of the three founding director of the future Humboldt Forum in the walls of the reconstructed
Berliner Stadtschloss
The Berlin Palace (german: Berliner Schloss), formally the Royal Palace (german: Königliches Schloss), on the Museum Island in the Mitte area of Berlin, was the main residence of the House of Hohenzollern from 1443 to 1918. Expanded by order of ...
. He emphasizes a collection history that is based on the Cabinet of Curiosities as a world museum, where collections of initially foreign objects act as means for critical self-reflection and offers for understanding ‘the other’. This connection to a decidedly anticolonial tradition of collecting was argued most recently in Bredekamp’s book “Aby Warburg der Indianer” (2019, German).
In 2007, Bredekamp's monograph ''Galilei der Künstler''
'Galileo the artists''appeared in German newspapers. This monograph was based on the discovery of an edition of Galileo's ''
Sidereus Nuncius'' including unknown Galileo-attributed ink drawings. After a thorough inspection including material technical studies, Bredekamp and his co-authors declared this newly discovered work to be the genuine work of Galileo. In 2012, historian
Nick Wilding
Nick Wilding is a British-born American historian. He became internationally known after exposing as a forgery a copy of Galileo’s “Sidereus Nuncius” that purportedly included Galileo’s own watercolors of the moon.
Life
Wilding studied ...
discovered that this copy was, in fact, a complete forgery which had been brought by the Italian antiquarian and convicted criminal Marino Massimo De Caro in the U.S. antique trade.
Bildwissenschaft
Bredekamp is known for his work in the field of ''
Bildwissenschaft
''Bildwissenschaft'' is an academic discipline in the German-speaking world. Similar to visual studies, and defined in relation to art history, ''Bildwissenschaft'' (approximately, "image-science") refers to a number of different approaches to imag ...
'' ("image science", see also
Visual Culture), a subdiscipline of art history founded by
Aby Warburg. which considers the cognitive functions performed by the image , the question of a stylistic history of scientific imagery, and the role played by visual argumentation during the
Scientific Revolution
The Scientific Revolution was a series of events that marked the emergence of modern science during the early modern period, when developments in mathematics, physics, astronomy, biology (including human anatomy) and chemistry transfo ...
. His interests lay in the implementation of image-critical methods and theories of visual cognition from the fields of scientific, technical and medical imaging. Both the scientific journal Bildwelten des Wissens (since 2003) and the compendium The Technical Image (2015) result from this research.
Focusing primarily on images that fall outside of a narrowly defined idea of art, such as those used in the works of the philosophers
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes ( ; 5/15 April 1588 – 4/14 December 1679) was an English philosopher, considered to be one of the founders of modern political philosophy. Hobbes is best known for his 1651 book ''Leviathan'', in which he expounds an influent ...
and
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
Gottfried Wilhelm (von) Leibniz . ( – 14 November 1716) was a German polymath active as a mathematician, philosopher, scientist and diplomat. He is one of the most prominent figures in both the history of philosophy and the history of mathema ...
and the scientists
Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all species of life have descended fr ...
and
Galileo Galilei
Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642) was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a polymath. Commonly referred to as Galileo, his name was pronounced (, ). He was ...
, Bredekamp argues that images inculcate a particular kind of understanding that could not be formed without them. Bredekamp criticises the idea, associated with , that ''Bildwissenschaft'' might be constructed by amassing the pre-existing insights of various disciplines, arguing that a new science cannot be straightforwardly established through the adding together of existing disciplines.
Against Sachs-Hombach's argument that art history is one of many disciplines on which ''Bildwissenschaft'' should draw, and
Hans Belting
Hans Belting (born 7 July 1935 in Andernach, Rhine Province) is a German art historian and theorist of medieval and Renaissance art, as well as contemporary art and image theory. He was born in Andernach, Germany, and studied at the universities ...
's argument that art history is outdated or obsolescent, Bredekamp argues that (Austro-German) art history has always contained an incipiently universal orientation and a focus on non-art images.
Publications
Monographs:
* ''Kunst als Medium sozialer Konflikte. Bilderkämpfe von der Spätantike bis zur Hussitenrevolution'', Frankfurt am Main (Suhrkamp) 1975.
* ''Kunst am Mittelrhein um 1400'' (mit Herbert Beck und Wolfgang Beeh), Frankfurt am Main (Liebieghaus) 1975.
* ''Vicino Orsini und der heilige Wald von Bomarzo. Ein Fürst als Künstler und Anarchist'', Worms (Werner) 1985; 2., überarb. Aufl. 1991.
* ''Botticelli: Primavera. Florenz als Garten der Venus'', Frankfurt am Main (Fischer) 1988; New edition Berlin (Wagenbach) 2002.
* ''Antikensehnsucht und Maschinenglauben. Die Geschichte der Kunstkammer und die Zukunft der Kunstgeschichte'', Berlin (Berlin) 1992.
* ''Florentiner Fußball. Die Renaissance der Spiele. Calcio als Fest der Medici'', Frankfurt am Main (Campus) 1993; revised edition Berlin (Wagenbach) 2001.
* ''Repräsentation und Bildmagie der Renaissance als Formproblem'', München (Carl Friedrich von Siemens-Stiftung) 1995.
* ''Sankt Peter in Rom und das Prinzip der produktiven Zerstörung. Bau und Abbau von Bramante bis Bernini'', Berlin (Wagenbach) 2000.
* ''Thomas Hobbes visuelle Strategien. Der Leviathan: Urbild des modernen Staates. Werkillustrationen und Portraits'', Berlin (Akademie) 1999. New edition under the title ''Thomas Hobbes: Der Leviathan. Das Urbild des modernen Staates und seine Gegenbilder. 1651–2001'', Berlin (Akademie) 2003.
* ''Die Fenster der Monade. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz' Theater der Natur und Kunst'', Berlin (Akademie) 2004.
* ''Darwins Korallen. Die frühen Evolutionsdiagramme und die Tradition der Naturgeschichte'', Berlin (Wagenbach) 2005.
* ''Bilder bewegen. Von der Kunstkammer zum Endspiel'', Berlin (Wagenbach) 2007.
* ''Galilei der Künstler. Der Mond, die Sonne, die Hand'', Berlin (Akademie) 2007.
* ''Der Künstler als Verbrecher. Ein Element der frühmodernen Rechts- und Staatstheorie'', München (Carl Friedrich von Siemens-Stiftung) 2008.
* ''Michelangelo. Fünf Essays'', Berlin (Wagenbach) 2009.
* ''Theorie des Bildakts. Frankfurter Adorno-Vorlesungen 2007'', Berlin (Suhrkamp) 2010.
* ''Leibniz und die Revolution der Gartenkunst. Herrenhausen, Versailles und die Philosophie der Blätter'', Berlin (Wagenbach) 2012. .
829]
0* ''Der schwimmende Souverän. Karl der Große und die Bildpolitik des Körpers'', Klaus Wagenbach, Berlin 2014, .
1* ''Galileis denkende Hand. Form und Forschung um 1600'', Berlin, Boston (de Gruyter) 2015. .
* ''mit Claudia Wedepohl: Warburg, Cassirer und Einstein im Gespräch. Kepler als Schlüssel der Moderne'', Berlin (Wagenbach) 2015. .
* ''Das Beispiel Palmyra'', Köln 2016.
* ''Der Behemoth. Metamorphosen des Anti-Leviathan (Carl-Schmitt-Vorlesungen)'', Berlin 2016.
* ''Image Acts. A Systematic Approach to Visual Agency'', Berlin, Boston (de Gryuter) 2017, .
* ''Art History and Prehistoric Art. Rethinking their Relationship in the Light of New Observations'', Groningen (The Gerson Lectures Foundation) 2019, .
*''Michelangelo'', Berlin 2021, ISBN 9783803137074.
*''Die Wirklichkeit findet statt! Über notwendige Präsenz in Kunst und Sport'', (mit Gunter Gebauer), Köln 2021, ISBN 9783753300788.
As editor(selection):
* (as coeditor): ''
Aby Warburg. Akten des internationalen Symposions'', Berlin (Akademie) 1990.
* (as coeditor): ''Edgar Wind. Kunsthistoriker und Philosoph'', Berlin (Akademie) 1998.
* (as coeditor): ''Theater der Natur und Kunst. Wunderkammern des Wissens'', 2 Bände, Berlin (Henschel) 2000.
* (as guesteditor): ''Jahrbuch für Universitätsgeschichte'' Bd. 5 (2002): Themenband „Universität und Kunst“, Stuttgart (Steiner) 2002.
* (as coeditor) ''Visuelle Argumentationen. Die Mysterien der Repräsentation und die Berechenbarkeit der Welt'', München (Fink) 2006.
* (as coeditor) ''Klassizismus/Gotik. Karl Friedrich Schinkel und die patriotische Baukunst. München/Berlin (Dt. Kunstverlag) 2007.
* (as coeditor): ''Das Technische Bild. Kompendium zu einer Stilgeschichte wissenschaftlicher Bilder'', Berlin (Akademie) 2008.
* (as coeditor): ''In der Mitte Berlins. 200 Jahre Kunstgeschichte an der Humboldt-Universität'', Berlin (Gebr. Mann) 2010.
* (as editor of the series): ''Bildwelten des Wissens. Kunsthistorisches Jahrbuch für Bildkritik'', Berlin (Akademie), halbjährlich seit 2003. Bd. 1.1: Bilder in Prozessen – Band 1.2: Oberflächen der Theorie – Band 2.1: Bildtechniken des Ausnahmezustandes – Band 2.2: Instrumente des Sehens – Band 3.1: Bildtextile Ordnungen – Band 3.2: Digitale Form – Band 4.1: Farbstrategien – Band 4.2: Bilder ohne Betrachter – Band 5.1: Systemische Räume – Band 5.2: Imagination des Himmels – Band 6.1: Ikonographie des Gehirns – Band 6.2: Grenzbilder – Band 7.1: Bildendes Sehen – Band 7.2: Erscheinende Mathematik – Band 8.1: Kontaktbilder – Band 8.2: Graustufen
* (as editor of the series): ''Actus et Imago. Berliner Schriften für Bildaktforschung und Verkörperungsphilosophie (Hg; Horst Bredekamp, John Michael Krois und Jürgen Trabant, Berlin (de Gruyter) seit 2011.
* (as coeditor): ''IMAGE WORD ACTION. IMAGO SERMO ACTIO. BILD WORT AKTION (Hg.: Horst Bredekamp, David Freedberg, Sabine Marienberg, Marion Lauschke, Jürgen Trabant) seit 2017. * (as coeditor): ''+ultra knowledge & gestaltung (Hg.: Nikola Doll, Horst Bredekamp and Wolfgang Schäffner for the Cluster of Excellence Image Knowledge Gestaltung. An Interdisciplinary Laboratory at Humboldt Universität zu Berlin), Leipzig 2017.
Honors and Prizes
* 2001:
Sigmund Freud Prize for scientific prose of the German Academy for Language and Poetry, Darmstadt
* 2004:
Aby-M.-Warburg-Prize of the City of Hamburg
* 2006: Max-Planck-Science Prize of the
Max Planck Society
The Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science (german: Max-Planck-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaften e. V.; abbreviated MPG) is a formally independent non-governmental and non-profit association of German research institutes. ...
and the
Humboldt Foundation
* 2009: Richard Hamann Prize of the Philipps-Universität Marburg for outstanding scientific achievements in the history of art
* 2010: Meyer-Struckmann Prize for Human and Social Science Research
* 2010: Full member of the
Academia Europaea
* 2012: Fritz Winter Prize of the Fritz Winter Foundation
* 2012: Berlin Science Prize
* 2014:
Pour le Mérite
The ' (; , ) is an order of merit (german: Verdienstorden) established in 1740 by Frederick the Great, King Frederick II of Prussia. The was awarded as both a military and civil honour and ranked, along with the Order of the Black Eagle, the Or ...
* 2015:
Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
The Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (german: Verdienstorden der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, or , BVO) is the only federal decoration of Germany. It is awarded for special achievements in political, economic, cultural, intellect ...
with star
* 2016: Member of the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...
* 2017:
Schiller Prize of the City of Marbach
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bredekamp, Horst
German art historians
1947 births
Living people
German male non-fiction writers
Knights Commander of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class)
Members of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina