Harold Wethey

Harold Edwin Wethey (Port Byron, New York 1902 – Ann Arbor, Michigan, September 22, 1984) was a prominent art historian. Wethey received a bachelor's degree from Cornell University and his doctorate from Harvard. He taught at Bryn Mawr College and Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri before joining the faculty of the University of Michigan in 1940, where he taught until his retirement in 1972. At the University of Michigan Wethey became chairman of the department of fine arts. He was survived by his wife, Alice, and a son, David.cite news
title = Harold E. Wethey
publisher = The New York Times
last =
first =
coauthors =
url = http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D01E5DC153BF93BA1575AC0A962948260
date = August 1984-9-28
accessdate = 2006-12-28] In 2006 a digital document was published, covering the life and work of Wethey as an entry from "Contemporary Authors", a reference volume issued by Thomson Gale. [cite web
title = Biography - Wethey, Harold E(dwin) (1902-1984): An article from: Contemporary Authors (HTML - Digital)
last = Gale Reference Team
url = http://www.amazon.com/Biography-Wethey-1902-1984-Contemporary-Authors/dp/B0007SG3PQ
accessdate = 2006-12-28 ]

Works

Wethey wrote a number of books, among them, "Colonial Architecture and Sculpture in Peru", [cite book|last=Wethey|first=Harold E.|title=Colonial Architecture and Sculpture in Peru |year=1949 | publisher=Harvard U.P. - Oxford U.P | id=ASIN B0000CHKCK] "El Greco and His School" in two volumes, [cite book|last=Wethey|first=Harold E.|title=El Greco and His School |year=1962 | publisher=Princeton University Press | id=ASIN B0007DNZV6] "Alonso Cano", [cite book|last=Wethey|first=Harold E.|title=Alonso Cano: Painter, Sculptor, Architect |year=1955 | publisher=Princeton University Press | id=ASIN B0007DEUTM] a study of the 17th- century Spanish painter, and three volumes on Titian. [cite book|last=Wethey|first=Harold E.|title=The Paintings of Titian, Complete Edition (Volumes: I-III) |year=1969-1975 | publisher=London Phaidon] Wethey had also contributed three articles in Encyclopaedia Britannica: "El Greco", "Titian" and "History of Western Architecture".cite encyclopedia|title=Greco, El - Author: Harold E. Wethey (d. 1984)|encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia Britannica|date=2002]

Research on El Greco

The publishing of "El Greco and His School" in 1962 had a huge impact in scholarly circles. In 1937 a highly influential study by art historian Rodolfo Pallucchini had the effect of greatly increasing the number of works accepted to be by Spanish Renaissance painter El Greco. Palluchini attributed to El Greco a small triptych in the Galleria Estense at Modena on the basis of a signature on the painting on the back of the central panel on the Modena triptych ("Χείρ Δομήνιχου", Created by the hand of Doménicos).cite book|last=Tazartes|first=Mauricia|title=El Greco (translated in Greek by Sofia Giannetsou) |year=2005 | publisher=Explorer|id=ISBN 960-7945-83-2, 25] There was consensus that the triptych was indeed an early work of El Greco and, therefore, Pallucchini's publication became the yardstick for attributions to the artist.Spanish art, recognized only 137.cite news
title = The Baptism of Christ New Light on Early El Greco
publisher = Apollo Magazine
last = Cormack
first = Robin
coauthors = Vassilaki Maria
url = http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0PAL/is_522_162/ai_n15950295/pg_1
date = August 2005
accessdate = 2006-12-17
* Tazartes, 70.] Wethey and other scholars rejected the notion that Crete took any part in his formation and supported the elimination of a series of works from El Greco's "oeuvre".cite journal|last=Arslan|first=Edoardo|title=Cronisteria del Greco Madonnero|journal=Commentari|volume=xv|issue=No.5|pages=213–231|date=1964]

Since 1962 the discovery of the "Dormition of the Virgin" and an extensive archival research initiated by other scholars, such as Nikolaos Panayotakis, Pandelis Prevelakis and Maria Constantoudaki, gradually convinced the academic world that Wethey's assessments were not entirely correct, and that his catalogue decisions may have distorted the perception of the whole nature of El Greco's origins, development and "oeuvre". The discovery of the "Dormition" led to the attribution of three other signed works of "Doménicos" to El Greco ("Modena Triptych", "St. Luke Painting the Virgin and Child", and "The Adoration of the Magi") and then to the acceptance of more works as authentic – some signed, some not (such as "The Passion of Christ (Pietà with Angels)" painted in 1566),cite news
title = Collector Is Vindicated as Icon Is Hailed as El Greco
last = Alberge
first = Dalya
publisher = Times Online
url = http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,13509-2326011,00.html
date = 2006-08-24
accessdate = 2006-12-17] – which were brought into the group of early works of El Greco. Even Wethey accepted that "he [El Greco] probably had painted the little and much disputed triptych in the Galleria Estense at Modena before he left Crete".cite journal|last=Wethey|first=Harold E.|title=El Greco in Rome and the Portrait of Vincenzo Anastagi |journal=Studies in the History of Art|volume=13|pages=171–178|date=1984] Nevertheless, disputes over the exact number of El Greco's authentic works remain unresolved, and the status of Wethey's catalogue "raisonné" is at the centre of these disagreements.cite journal|last=Mann|first=Richard G.|title=Tradition and Originality in El Greco's Work |journal=Journal of the Rocky Mountain|volume=23|pages=83–110|date=2002|url=http://humanities.byu.edu/rmmra/pdfs/23.pdf|publisher=The Medieval and Renaissance Association]

Notes