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Absorption and Theatricality

Painting and Beholder in the Age of Diderot

With this widely acclaimed work, Fried revised the way in which eighteenth-century French painting and criticism were viewed and understood.

"A reinterpretation supported by immense learning and by a series of brilliantly perceptive readings of paintings and criticism alike. . . . An exhilarating book."—John Barrell, London Review of Books

268 pages | 70 halftones | 7 x 10 | © 1988

Art: Art Criticism

Table of Contents

Preface
List of Illustrations
1. The Primacy of Absorption
2. Toward a Supreme Fiction
3. Painting and Beholder
Appendix A: Grimm on Unity, Instantaneousness and Related Topics
Appendix B: Two Related Texts: The Lettre sur les spectacles and Die Wahlverwandtschaften
Appendix C: David’s Homer Drawings of 1794
Notes
Index

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