Is Art History? Selected Writings by Svetlana Alpers

Is Art History? is a definitive volume of writings by one of the most renowned art historians of the past century. The book brings together Alpers’s contributions to the art historical discipline and her considerations of the continuing possibilities of painting as an art. Her writing spans over six decades beginning with seminal essays written in examination of the constraints of her chosen discipline, including a foundational essay on Vasari (1960), "Is Art History?" (1970), "Style is What You Make IT" (1979), and "Art History and Its Exclusions" (1982); two influential but never before published lectures and other unpublished public presentations; notable critical essays on art, and recent texts on contemporary artists including Alex Katz, Catherine Murphy and Shirley Jaffe and others. Is Art History? also includes new prefatory notes written by the author for this occasion, an unexpected introduction by her former student the esteemed scholar-critic Richard Meyer (Robert and Ruth Halperin Professor of Art History, Stanford University), and a revealing interview with the German author and critic Ulf Erdmann Ziegler. This extensive view of Alpers’s prolific and varied career appeals both to new readers in need of an introduction as well as to audiences familiar with her stimulating writing on the great European tradition of painting.

“Svetlana Alpers is an artist’s art historian. Her wonderful writing goes from the canvas or the line, outwards. Starting with the making and expanding on to the meaning that accrues through the making.”
- WILLIAM KENTRIDGE, Artist

“This book quite literally opens our eyes to the wide range of art and artists discussed in it, and does so with an unflinching probity that provides deep insights into the ways in which art is intrinsically related to the human condition. Svetlana Alpers’s writing is pithy and incisive, impressively erudite but never pedantic, as she illuminates both individual works and broad art historical concepts with a unique combination of energy, passion, and clarity.”
- JACK FLAM
President & CEO, Dedalus Foundation

“At a time when writing about art is done with the same irresponsible ease and rhetoric as defending unjust wars, Svetlana Alpers is a must to read if you care about history and about art.”
- MARLENE DUMAS, Artist

“Svetlana Alpers's groundbreaking Is Art History? shows that art can shape historical understanding through its visual and material processes. Alpers's book provides a unique prospective and shows that the future is sometimes invented with fragments from the past.”
- HANS ULRICH OBRIST, Artistic Director, Serpentine

“This is a book of classic essays (this is a book of ceaseless questions) by one of the great art historians of our time. Beware: At the start, the collection offers up a quixotic self-categorization of its contents: articles, catalogue essays, book and exhibition reviews, lectures, commemorations, conversations. But over the course of a lifetime of writing, the author of The Art of Describing betrays a restless intelligence that refuses to be categorized. Alpers insists that we treat the work of art, every work of art, in the same way: beyond received ideas, each according to its specific ‘mode.’ It is her great lesson.”
- GEORGE BAKER, UCLA Department of Art History

“Svetlana Alpers is an extraordinarily important art historian best known for her publications on Dutch painting, including The Art of Describing (1983), and her contribution to the New Art History as founding co-editor of the scholarly journal Representations. What is much less well known is the extent to which she has gone on writing and thinking about the nature of art, the act of looking and museums, and about contemporary art and photography since she moved from Berkeley, California to New York in 1999. Is Art History? assembles examples of her writing, including reviews and memoirs, from her full career, starting with Vasari in 1960. Every piece is thoughtful, original and frequently unexpected.”
- CHARLES SAUMAREZ SMITH, Director, National Gallery, London (2002-2007)

Svetlana Alpers (BA Radcliffe College, PhD. Harvard University) is the author of "The Art of Describing", "Rembrandt’s Enterprise", "Tiepolo and the Pictorial Intelligence" (with Michael Baxandall), "The Making of Rubens", "The Vexations of Art", "Roof Life", and most recently "Walker Evans: Starting from Scratch". Alpers taught at the University of California, Berkeley from 1962-94 and is the recipient of numerous awards and honors including being named a Fellow of the American Academy of Art and Sciences, The American Philosophical Society, an officier of the French l’Ordre des Art and Lettres, a corresponding member of the British Academy and of the Royal Academy of Art. Most recently she was the recipient of the 2023 Distinguished Lifetime Achievement Award for Writing on Art from the College Art Association and the 2024 Silvers-Dudley Prize for Arts Writing. Alpers co-founded the interdisciplinary journal Representations in 1983. She is Professor Emerita at University of California, Berkeley and a visiting scholar at the Department of Art History, New York University.