'No other book has ever attempted this ambitious project with such care and intelligence. . . . Important, timely, and provocative.' Professor Barbara McCloskey, University of Pittsburgh '[This] could be a defining text.' Professor Paul Jaskot, De Paul University Chicago This unique book is the first comprehensive introduction to Marxist approaches to art history. Although the aesthetic was a crucial part of Marx and Engels's thought, they left no full statement on the arts. Although there is an abundant scholarship on Marxist approaches to literature, the historiography of the visual arts has been largely neglected. This book encompasses a range of influential thinkers and historians including William Morris, Mikhail Lifshits, Frederick Antal, Francis Klingender, Max Raphael, Meyer Schapiro, Walter Benjamin, Henri Lefebvre and Arnold Hauser. It also addresses the heritage of the New Left. In the spirit of Marxism, the authors interpret the achievements and limitations of Marxist art history in relation to the historical and political circumstances of its production, providing an indispensable introduction to contemporary radical practices in the field. 'No other book has ever attempted this ambitious project with such care and intelligence. ... Important, timely, and provocative.' Professor Barbara McCloskey, University of Pittsburgh '[This could be a defining text.' --Professor Paul Jaskot, De Paul University Chicago Frances Stracey (1963-2009) was Senior Lecturer in the History of Art Department, University College London, and organising committee member for the 'Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture' seminar, London. Marxism and the History of Art From William Morris to the New Left By Andrew Hemingway Pluto Press Copyright © 2006 Andrew Hemingway All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-0-7453-2329-9 Contents Illustrations, vii, Series Preface, ix, Acknowledgments, xi, Introduction Andrew Hemingway, 1, 1. William Morris: Decoration and Materialism Caroline Arscott, 9, 2. Mikhail Lifshits: A Marxist Conservative Stanley Mitchell, 28, 3. Frederick Antal Paul Stirton, 45, 4. Art as Social Consciousness: Francis Klingender and British Art David Bindman, 67, 5. Max Raphael: Aesthetics and Politics Stanley Mitchell, 89, 6. Walter Benjamin's Essay on Eduard Fuchs: An Art-Historical Perspective Frederic J. Schwartz, 106, 7. Meyer Schapiro: Marxism, Science and Art, 123, 8. Henri Lefebvre and the Moment of the Aesthetic Marc James Léger, 143, 9. Arnold Hauser, Adorno, Lukács and the Ideal Spectator John Roberts, 161, 10. New Left Art History's International Andrew Hemingway, 175, 11. New Left Art History and Fascism in Germany Jutta Held, 196, 12. The Turn from Marx to Warburg in West German Art History, 1968-90 Otto Karl Werckmeister, 213, Notes on Contributors, 221, Notes, 223, Index, 268, CHAPTER 1 William Morris: Decoration and Materialism Caroline Arscott From the late 1870s William Morris delivered lectures on art and society, and published articles on the subject, seeking to promote a new vision of art that would rescue it from the position to which it had been relegated by modern social conditions. His involvement in liberal anti-war politics in the period 1876-78 and his subsequent involvement in socialist politics in the 1880s and beyond led him to articulate a politicised art theory that ought to be recognised as the first English-language attempt to produce a Marxist theory of art. The debate over whether Morris's Marxist politics were compatible with his art practice (producing handcrafted luxury goods for bourgeois consumers) is a tired one and I do not intend to repeat the standard terms of the debate, which is one with which Morris himself was wearily, if anxiously, familiar. Walter Crane's comment on the fact that Morris produced 'costly things for the rich' while campaigning for socialism puts the issue starkly in terms of the alternative, within a capitalist era, of making cheap goods for the common people. He explained Morris's view that according to the quality of the production must be its cost; and that the cheapness of the cheapest things of modern manufacture is generally at the cost of the cheapening of modern labour and life, which is a costly kind of cheapness after all. The questions that this chapter seeks to address are: 'How did Morris's politics shape his understanding of the nature of art?' and 'What currents of thought were available to Morris to help him develop his aesthetic theory?' I suggest that, although he was working in the absence of an established repertoire of Marxist writings on art, cultural debates in the latter part of the nineteenth century foregrounded the question of development and degeneration. The terms of these debates and the polarisation of positions that emerged played a part in the way he understood art. It is well established that Morris's concern over the state of modern art and craft production, his e