The Destruction of Art: Iconoclasm and Vandalism since the French Revolution

An excellent if unwelcome opportunity to judge Dario Gamboni's book on the destruction of art presented itself shortly after I began reading it, when, on Nov. 21, 1997, Barnett Newman's painting Cathedra was slashed by a visitor in the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam. The book turned out to contain an extraordinary amount of apposite information. The Destruction of Art provides a complete history of assaults on work by Barnett Newman, a study in depth of the ur-event -- the damaging of Who's Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue TV in Berlin on Apr. 13, 1982 -- and an accurate prediction of the way the museum was going to react ("this is a meaningless act by a deranged mind"). It even names the very perpetrator of a crime that followed upon the publication of the book.

This uncanny prescience was possible because in 1986 the same man had done the same kind of job on Newman's Who's Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue III, also in the Stedelijk. Since by Dutch law suspects may be identified in the press only by their initials, readers of The Destruction of Art were the only ones in Holland outside the museum and the courts who knew that "G.J.v.B" designated an Amsterdamer named Gerard Jan van Bladeren. Gamboni footnoted his concise report with references to six articles in the Dutch press. To say this was impressive, for a book by a Swiss art historian teaching in Lyon, is to say the least.

The Newman incidents are a perfect test case for discussing Gamboni's ideas about the motives and meaning of such acts, and I will return to them below. First, however, it is necessary to look at the book as a whole. Attacks on museum art form only one class in a species of event Gamboni calls, in a term that "avoids or delays judgement," the destruction of art. The main varieties of such behavior are identified in the subtitle as iconoclasm and vandalism. The one is a collective phenomenon which usually adheres to a conscious program of selective destruction, the other a small quotidian sacrifice exacted from society more or less at random by surprisingly normal people, acting alone or in packs. This is Gamboni's way of getting a grip on his elusive subject, but he wisely declines to elevate the formulation into a system. He draws our attention to other typologies as well, criss-crossing the terrain with chapters that deal with various kinds of motives, actors, contexts and themes. The book opens, for example, with a discussion, picked up later, on "Mistaking Art for Refuse," and it closes with a provocative critique of "Disqualification and Heritage," which Gamboni calls "two sides of the same coin."

Throughout, Gamboni demonstrates particular sensitivity to questions of power and status. He investigates the relationships between the attacker and attacked, the effect of class-related bullying and the shibboleth value of specific artifacts or reputations. While he seldom settles for a monocausal explanation, his judgment is never paralyzed. He qualifies all his basic definitions without retreating into endlessly regressive explanations or over-subtle nuances. He has such impressive command of the concepts involved that he can handle multiple aspects simultaneously, mixing abstractions with concrete events, without losing his footing or -- and this is even more unusual -- losing the reader.

I consider it a merit of The Destruction of Art that as it establishes a new, high standard for discussion of the issues it deals with, it seeks to open the debate rather than cap it with the pretense of definitiveness. In demonstrating how the antonym of creation, destruction, affects our perception of art, it challenges the reader to respond, to object. If I do so now, it is by way of a tribute to Gamboni and his outstanding book rather than a demurral from its quality,

One of the broader categories deployed in The Destruction of Art is the concept of "wars of images," borrowed from German art historian Horst Bredekamp. In the 1970s, Bredekamp engaged in a polemic on this matter with his colleague Martin Warnke. Bredekamp saw wars of images throughout history and expected more to come, while Warnke argued that "the conditions that had, for millennia, made iconoclasm a legitimate form of expression have become today obsolete." The fall of the Wall -- the demolition of which became an act of euphoric mass iconoclasm in its own right -- settled the matter in favor of Bredekamp. His victory provided Gamboni with a framework for interpreting many kinds of aggressive iconoclasm.

The millitarization of artistic imagery is an intoxicating as well as illuminating metaphor. It fits in with Thomas Mathews's thesis, not mentioned by Gamboni, concerning the role of art in the triumph of Christianity.[1] Art historians long supposed that Christianity, in its battle with paganism, co-opted imperial imagery to lend dignity to Christ. This would have been an administrative takeover rather than an act of conquest. Mathews holds the opposite view, arguing that the image of Christ derived its power from its non-imperial miens and modes. What appealed to believers was a god who was not a supreme commander but a shepherd and a philosopher. Christ was out to displace and defeat the emperor, not substitute for him. Gamboni's book is full of situations in which competing images, turned loose in the world by rival groups, inspire people to attack the icons of the opposition. Mankind, he sometimes seems to be saying, is one image's way of destroying another image.