Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
How to Describe a Painting: Philostratus and Art Criticism in the Graeco-Roman World

How to Describe a Painting: Philostratus and Art Criticism in the Graeco-Roman World

Elsner, Jaś
Squire, Michael

Hardcover

Series: Greek Culture in the Roman World

Art History

PREORDER - Expected ship date September 30, 2026

ISBN10: 1009320076
ISBN13: 9781009320078
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: Sep 30 2026
Pages: 750
Language: English
How should we talk about material objects, especially the virtual two-dimensional impressions of painting? A particularly sophisticated answer is provided by Philostratus' Imagines, one of the world's earliest and greatest works of art criticism. Jaś Elsner and Michael Squire situate this Imperial Greek text in its various 'Second Sophistic' contexts, especially in relation to Graeco-Roman traditions of image-making, aesthetics, rhetoric and the evocation of visual impressions (so-called 'ecphrasis'). They also champion its extraordinarily rich significance for anyone interested in perception, subjective imagination and the emotional leverage of art. If the Imagines remains unsurpassed as one of the western tradition's most creatively original, scintillating and self-reflexive works of art criticism, Elsner and Squire argue, its relevance is also pressingly contemporary: there are modern lessons to be learnt from this ancient project of educating the young - lessons that have a particular urgency in our own dawning digital age.

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