"...art is often the key, and in many nations the only key, to understanding their philosophy and religion."

Fresco wall painting in a cubiculum (bedroom)
Villa of P. Fannius Synistor at Boscoreale, ca. 40–30 B.C.Late Republican Roman

We can see how Hegel’s historicism and holism are linked; if art changes over history, as it surely does, those changes are embedded in, and indicative or expressive of, the wider context of change in society as a whole.  It’s because the way a society sees itself changes over time that art has a history; “In works of art the nations have deposited their richest inner intuitions and ideas, and art is often the key, and in many nations the only key, to understanding their philosophy and religion” (Hegel, 1998:7).  It’s not enough to know the history of art itself; Classical mythology, holy scriptures, psychology of perception, the chemistry of color, economics and many, many other considerations impose themselves on the art historian in a variety of ways.