title: About the Genuine Author of the Magical Hypothesis of Art Origins
metadata.name: dc.contributor.author
metadata.value: Vishnyatsky, Leonid B.
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.accessioned
metadata.value: 2019-09-13T19:59:17Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.available
metadata.value: 2019-09-13T19:59:17Z
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.date.issued
metadata.value: 2019-06
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.citation
metadata.value: Vishnyatsky L. B. About the Genuine Author of the Magical Hypothesis of Art Origins. Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. History, 2019, vol. 64, issue 2, рp. 584–598.
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.identifier.other
metadata.value: https://doi.org/10.21638/11701/spbu02.2019.210
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.identifier.uri
metadata.value: http://hdl.handle.net/11701/16345
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.description.abstract
metadata.value: The paper deals with the history of formation of the “magical hypothesis” of art origins, which replaced the “art for art’s sake” one at the turn of the last century and dominated the field till the middle 1960’s. The birth of the magical hypothesis is usually dated to 1903, when Salomon Reinach published his “L’art et la magie”. However, contrary to the traditionally held view, the magical hypothesis was first formulated and substantiated not by S. Reinach but by the Russian journalist and popular science writer L. K. Popoff. In 1880 he published a book entitled “From the prehistoric life of man”. One of its chapters was devoted to the question of functions of the drawn and sculptured animal images dated to “l’age du renne”. Popoff used ethnographic evidence to suggest that these images were “inspired by belief in the existence of a material relation between a being and its image and in the possibility of acting on the first through the second”. Though he presented his ideas and arguments also in French (1890) and English (1891), his hypothesis, born before its time, went unnoticed and received no recognition. The author gives account of Popoff ’s works devoted to the problem of art origins and assesses the degree of their novelty in comparison with works of his West European predecessors (E. Tylor) and contemporaries. Some consideration is given to the question as to whether S. Reinach had known of the hypothesis of his Russian forerunner. In addition, the paper includes a biographical essay containing little known facts of Popoff ’s life.
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.language.iso
metadata.value: en
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.publisher
metadata.value: St Petersburg State University
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.relation.ispartofseries
metadata.value: Vestnik of St Petersburg University. History;Volume 64; Issue 2
metadata.lang: -
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: Paleolithic
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: art origins
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: history of science
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: S. Reinach
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.subject
metadata.value: L. K. Popoff
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.title
metadata.value: About the Genuine Author of the Magical Hypothesis of Art Origins
metadata.lang: en_GB
metadata.name: dc.type
metadata.value: Article
metadata.lang: en_GB
resources.filename: 584-598.pdf
resources.url: https://dspace.spbu.ru/bitstream/11701/16345/1/584-598.pdf
resources.format: Adobe PDF
resources.size: 1,37 MB