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Cesare Brandi | |
|---|---|
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| Born | (1906-04-08)8 April 1906 |
| Died | 19 January 1988(1988-01-19) (aged 81) |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | University of Florence |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | art history |
| Institutions | Istituto Centrale per il Restauro |
| Main interests | conservation-restoration theory |
| Notable works | Le due vie Teoria generale della critica |
Cesare Brandi (Siena, 8 April 1906 –Vignano, 19 January 1988) was an art critic and historian, and a specialist inconservation-restoration theory.
In 1939 he became the first director of theIstituto Centrale per il Restauro (Central Institute for Restoration, now theIstituto Superiore per la Conservazione ed il Restauro) inRome.[1]
His main books areLe due vie (1966, Bari), andTeoria generale della critica (1974).[2][3]Le due vie was presented and debated in Rome byRoland Barthes,Giulio Carlo Argan and Emilio Garroni.[2] The philosopher he felt mostly closer to wasHeidegger, although their positions didn't coincide;[4] he felt also close toDerrida, particularly to his theorization ofDifférance.[4]
Brandi's broad practical experience and his phenomenological references ranging from Plato to Kant, passing throughBenedetto Croce,Martin Heidegger,Jean-Paul Sartre, Bergson and especially Edmund Husserl and Hegel, culminated in what became known as Theory of Critical Restoration. In 1963 Brandi published his theories in the bookTeoria del Restauro (Theory of Restoration).
Brandi's Theory of Restoration, which champions techniques liketratteggio, is considered the foundational text of the modern Italian school of conservation and has been highly influential internationally.[5] The approach is not without its critics, however.[6] The "controversy" stems less from outright opposition and more from philosophical disagreements between different schools of thought. Some critics, particularly those from an older tradition of "imitative" restoration, found the visible lines of tratteggio to be aesthetically distracting and a violation of the artwork's original unity. Others have questioned the objective applicability of Brandi's more abstract principles, arguing that concepts like an artwork's "potential unity" are ultimately subjective judgments made by the conservator.[7]
Brandi's ideas had a great influence on the Italian Restoration Letter of 1972 and, consequently, in the current practice of restoration around the world.[8]
Cesare Brandi was born inSiena inVia di Città, and graduated in literature fromUniversity of Florence in 1928. In 1930 he was commissioned by the Superintendence of Monuments and Galleries of Siena to catalogue and rearrange the collection of paintings of the Academy of Fine Arts of the Tuscan city in the new headquarters ofPalazzo Buonsignori.
In 1932 he dedicated his first contemporary art essay toFilippo de Pisis after visiting the artist's studio in Paris. In 1933, after being nominated Inspector in the roles of the Administration of Antiquities and Fine Arts, he worked for the Superintendency of Monuments in Bologna. The assignment lasted about three years; during this period he organized the first restoration workshop and the "Exhibition of Riminese Painting of the Fourteenth Century" (1935).
In 1936 he assumed inspection functions at the Antiquities and Fine Arts Department and was subsequently appointed Superintendent of Studies inUdine from where he was transferred to the Superintendency in the Governorate of the Italian Aegean islands. In 1938 he was recalled to the Ministry of National Education in Rome. In 1939 Giulio Carlo Argan proposed Brandi as Director of the Royal Central Institute of Restoration[9]
For his work as a critic, Cesare Brandi won the Feltrinelli Prize, conferred by the Accademia dei Lincei, in 1958 and in 1980.
Brandi's adopted son, Vittorio Brandi Rubiu, is also an art critic and historian.[10]
{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)