Thursday, March 17, 2011

Leo Steinberg Exits Modern Oblivion

Since his passing, I have been quoting my favorite Leo Steinberg quotes at twitter (that less time-consuming venue where much of this dissertating blogger's energy has been channeled of late, so do follow me). But Fred Sanders has posted the best piece I've seen on the occasion of the great art historian's death thus far.  Contrary to some reactions to postmodernism, it has never been a question of whether or not there is an infinity of interpretations... it's just a question of whether that infinity is the negative or beautiful kind (I challenge anyone to show me an intentionally meaningless sentence in that book by the way).  I attempted to read Steinberg as an October outsider in this piece a while back (as much as they disagreed, he was not unlike Bynum).  I can't speak for the man's soul, but his eyes were certainly well prepared for beatific vision.