Frederick Antal or a Connoisseur Turned Social Historian of Art

This paper intends to examine Frederick Antal’s methodological transformations, from an initial formalist outlook to the markedly sociological approach he is best known for. The analysis of some significant examples from his writings will shed some light on the pivotal moments in this theoretical and personal migration. Dissatisfied with Wölfflin’s strictly stylistic views, Antal opened up to the geistesgeschichtlich teachings of Strzygowski and Dvořák, which consistently shaped his method in the first two decades of the 20th century. Indeed, before turning in the English years to the more overt sociological penchant developed alongside his Sunday Circle fellows, Antal was a keen connoisseur, whose shrewd eye was highly praised for instance by Roberto Longhi in the 1920s. Moreover, as editor of Kritische Berichte in Berlin, Antal furthered the theories of the Second Vienna School, marked by a resurgence of Riegl’s formalism in Hans Sedlmayr’s Strukturanalyse. We shall thus attempt to offer a more nuanced perspective on the Hungarian art historian who was, despite himself, made into a champion of Marxist art theory, focusing on the gradual methodological shift of a connoisseur turned social historian of art, who – in John Berger’s words – «worked to release a vision».