The Purchase of the Past

Erscheinungsjahr 2020
ISBN: 978-1-108-47884-7
Verlag: Cambridge University Press

Buch, Englisch, 370 Seiten, Format (B × H): 152 mm x 229 mm, Gewicht: 667 g

Offering a broad and vivid survey of the culture of collecting from the French Revolution to the Belle Époque, The Purchase of the Past explores how material things became a central means of accessing and imagining the past in nineteenth-century France. By subverting the monarchical establishment, the French Revolution not only heralded the dawn of the museum age, it also threw an unprecedented quantity of artworks into commercial circulation, allowing private individuals to pose as custodians and saviours of the endangered cultural inheritance. Through their common itineraries, erudition and sociability, an early generation of scavengers established their own form of 'private patrimony', independent from state control. Over a century of Parisian history, Tom Stammers explores collectors' investments – not just financial but also emotional and imaginative – in historical artefacts, as well as their uncomfortable relationship with public institutions. In so doing, he argues that private collections were a critical site for salvaging and interpreting the past in a post-revolutionary society, accelerating but also complicating the development of a shared national heritage.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Stammers, Tom

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunstgeschichte Kunstgeschichte: Renaissance, Manierismus
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Mentalitäts- und Sozialgeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte einzelner Länder Europäische Länder
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Kultur- und Ideengeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Europäische Geschichte
• Sozialwissenschaften Ethnologie | Volkskunde Ethnologie Kultur- und Sozialethnologie: Materielle Kultur, Wirtschaftsethnologie

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Introduction. Collection, recollection, revolution; 1. Amateurs and the art market in transition (c.1780–1830); 2. Archiving and envisioning the French Revolution (c.1780–1830); 3. Book-hunting, bibliophilia and a textual restoration (c.1790–1840); 4. Salvaging the gothic in private and public spaces (c.1820–70); 5. Royalists versus vandals, and the cult of the old regime (c.1860–1880); 6. Allies of the Republic? Inside the sale of the century (c.1870–1895); Conclusion. The resilience and eclipse of curiosité.

Über Autor(innen)

Stammers, Tom
Tom Stammers is Associate Professor in Modern European Cultural History at the University of Durham. He is a historian of modern France, specialising in visual and material culture; he works frequently with museums and heritage organisations, including collaborating on exhibitions, and is a regular contributor to arts reviews like Apollo.