Text by Roberto Ohrt, Axel Heil, Bernd Scherer, Bill Sherman, Claudia Wedepohl.
The essential panel-by-panel companion to Aby Warburg’s epic atlas
Accompanying the first ever English-language publication of legendary German art historian Aby Warburg’s (1866-1929) Bilderatlas Mnemosyne, this commentary volume provides an explication of each of the panels constituting Warburg’s modernist masterpiece. The Bilderatlas Mnemosyne was begun in 1925 and ended with Warburg’s death in 1929. He created it as a series of 63 large themed panels, each featuring a constellation of images—postcards, maps, adverts, reproductions of artworks—that trace the migration of symbols from antiquity to the present. Warburg’s goal was to show how certain gestures and icons repeated themselves across history, constituting what he called a “pathos formula”—that is, an enduring emotional metaphor. Warburg had the panels photographed, conceiving of their ultimate incarnation as being in book form—but never completed the atlas.
Assembled over several years through a collaborative process, the texts in this volume analyze each of the panels (which the English edition of the Atlas itself painstakingly reconstructs from the archives of the Warburg Institute). The book is prefaced by an introduction and a general analysis of the whole structure of the Atlas.
STATUS: Forthcoming | 3/30/2021
This title is not yet published in the U.S. To pre-order or receive notice when the book is available, please email orders @ artbook.com
NEW YORK Showroom by Appointment Only 75 Broad Street, Suite 630 New York NY 10004 Tel 212 627 1999
LOS ANGELES Showroom by Appointment Only
818 S. Broadway, Suite 700 Los Angeles, CA 90014 Tel. 323 969 8985
ARTBOOK LLC D.A.P. | Distributed Art Publishers, Inc.
All site content Copyright C 2000-2017 by Distributed Art Publishers, Inc. and the respective publishers, authors, artists. For reproduction permissions, contact the copyright holders.
The D.A.P. Catalog www.artbook.com
Distributed by D.A.P.
FORMAT: Hbk, 7 x 9.75 in. / 600 pgs / 200 color. LIST PRICE: U.S. $75.00 LIST PRICE: CANADA $105 ISBN: 9783775746953 PUBLISHER: Hatje Cantz AVAILABLE: 3/30/2021 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Forthcoming AVAILABILITY: Awaiting stock TERRITORY: NA LA
Aby Warburg: Bilderatlas Mnemosyne Commentary Volume
The essential panel-by-panel companion to Aby Warburg’s epic atlas
Published by Hatje Cantz. Text by Roberto Ohrt, Axel Heil, Bernd Scherer, Bill Sherman, Claudia Wedepohl.
Accompanying the first ever English-language publication of legendary German art historian Aby Warburg’s (1866-1929) Bilderatlas Mnemosyne, this commentary volume provides an explication of each of the panels constituting Warburg’s modernist masterpiece. The Bilderatlas Mnemosyne was begun in 1925 and ended with Warburg’s death in 1929. He created it as a series of 63 large themed panels, each featuring a constellation of images—postcards, maps, adverts, reproductions of artworks—that trace the migration of symbols from antiquity to the present. Warburg’s goal was to show how certain gestures and icons repeated themselves across history, constituting what he called a “pathos formula”—that is, an enduring emotional metaphor. Warburg had the panels photographed, conceiving of their ultimate incarnation as being in book form—but never completed the atlas.
Assembled over several years through a collaborative process, the texts in this volume analyze each of the panels (which the English edition of the Atlas itself painstakingly reconstructs from the archives of the Warburg Institute). The book is prefaced by an introduction and a general analysis of the whole structure of the Atlas.
