Approaching Enrique Lafuente Ferrari’s Theory Of Art History

Enrique Lafuente Ferrari is one of the most important Art Historians in the Spain of the 20th century. As a member of the second generation of the discipline of Spanish Art History, belatedly founded in this country, Lafuente assumed the mission of giving justification to Spanish Art History, and discovered its particular aesthetic traditions and general characters while narrating the Spanish Art. He connected the fragmented Spanish Art History with "the chaotic and discontinuous vitality", explained the "Veta Brava", analyzed the particular aesthetic taste of his nation and emphasized the Middle Ages tradition of the Spanish Art. By doing so, he revealed the character of the Spanish Art. Meanwhile, he indicated that the Spanish Art History is part of the European Art History, so the Spanish Art couldn’t be interpreted without considering Europe, and that Spain should have more exchanges in the Art with other European countries. Writing and theorizing in the regime of Franco after the Spanish Civil War, he had to find a balance between the acute critic and the main ideology of a dictatorship, but he always maintained a distance away from the official discourse.Lafuente criticized the theories of Art History based in the Positivism, the mediocre Sociology of Art and the Formalist Theories. He insisted that a interpretation of a piece of artwork could not be separated with the interpretation of the man who is hidden in the artwork. He indicated that the evolution of Art History is oriented by the great artists, and the core of the changes of Art History is the generations of artists, consequently, in the Art History studies, the study of the artist and his generation, the interpretation of the historic situation and the art critic should be put together. In his study of Velazquez, Goya and Zuloaga, three great Spanish painters, Lafuente used his theories of Art History. In that of Velazquez, Lafuente narrated the painter’s life and emphasized how Velazquez was interested in describing the daily life and gave the dignity to everyone, despite his or her social position. He interpreted Velazquez’s aesthetic ideas based in the philosophy of "Life as a dream". In the study of Goya, Lafuente focused on the personality of the artist who painted in an age of great revolutions, pointing out the modernity revealed by this Spanish artist. As for Zuloaga, Lafuente discovered the Spanish national characters in this modern painter’s works, and appreciated his solicitude of the human dignity. While choosing Zuloaga as an important representative of Spanish Modern Art, Lafuente manifested his conservative tendency.Lafuente’s theories of Art History inherited not only his masters in this subject, but also the thoughts of Ortega and Unamuno, the two important philosophers of the modern Spain. He gave a new interpretation of the theory of "the dehumanization of Art", formulated by Ortega, and proposed the return of the humanity in the Art by criticizing the Modern Art, which in his eyes had been guided in a wrong way. Inspired by Unamuno, he formulated concepts as "the Aesthetic of the Salvation of the Individual" and "the Aesthetic of the Salvation of the Circumstances", and by interpreting the portrait paintings, he deepened in the vision of that the Art and the individual life could not be separated. Both in classical paintings and modern paintings, he found the expression of the life. He realized the differences between Miro’s art and the pure abstract paintings, and proposed a paradigm of art interpretation based in the individual life. Lafuente’s theories of Art History always appreciated the humanity and the individual life, and have not lost its values in today’s humanities studies. His thoughts revealed Spanish cultural characters and reflected the paradoxes and conflicts in a Spanish intellectual, caused by the crisis of his time.