ARTISTIC METHOD OF SIRARPIЕ DER-NERSESYAN – 2017-1

Summary

Siranush A. Beglaryan

Key words – Sirarpie Der-Nersesyan, Erwin Panofsky, Myrtilla Avery, André Grabar, Wellesley College, method, connoisseur, approach, medievalist, art historian.

This article is the addendum to our translation of the curriculum named “The Direct Approach in The Study of Art History”, which Sirarpie Der-Nersesyan proposed in the US. By referring to the author’s text, we attached great importance not that much to the curriculum but to the issues of art history and art study raised by the scientist who proposed a method.

In the beginning, we gave a brief summary of the method content, then sum it up by introducing the origin of the method.

We touched upon the issue of interpretation in the method and within this issue we represented the connection between the method she proposed and her studies by using one of her monographs.

We dwelt on the practice of description in the study of art by stressing its significance and the exact purpose factor both in the method of studying art proposed by Sirarpie Der-Nersesyan and directly in her studies.

The translated material is unique in its nature. Left out of the biography texts, it was overlooked, whereas the existence of the text reveals both Sirarpie Der-Nersesyan’s activities in the US as a scientist and art historian and in some way her contribution in strengthening a newly formed discipline. In this article, we tried to show Sirarpie Der-Nersesyan’s views on art study and on the issues of representing it, and also indicate the relation of Armenian medieval art historians to this method of study, which has become common to them.

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