Artworks: Repositories of the Self-image of a People

Villa of the Mysteries, Pompeii c. 50 B.C.E. Fresco

Hegel’s dictum about the deeply social nature of artworks calls attention to one way the human sciences may contribute to art history.   For example, take a case in which a sociologist of nineteenth-century Paris helps us read the work of Degas and Manet, or an anthropologist the carvings of Dogon or Yoruba artists.  The human sciences tend to interpret artworks as repositories of the self-image of a people or stratum of society, a self-depiction of a unique and dynamic form of life.  For example, the frescos at the Villa of the Mysteries at Pompeii, as well as being beautiful artworks of the most moving and mysterious quality, is one of the most valuable sources of information about the inner workings of the mystery religions in Rome.[1]

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[1]. See Robert Turcan, The Cults of the Roman Empire (Great Britain: Blackwell, 1997) pp. 307, 309-11