«Die beste Theorie der Kunst ist ihre
Geschichte»: origini e sviluppi di una
disciplina che disciplina
Alexander Auf der Heyde
This essay examines the ambivalent origins of art-history teaching within European academies of fine
arts, tracing its emergence to the intersection of Romantic historicism and the disciplinary politics of the
Restoration. Focusing on the pioneering case of Vienna’s Academy (1812), where a chair of art theory
and history was established under Metternich’s supervision, the essay shows how Friedrich Schlegel’s
programmatic claim — that “the best theory of art is its history” — served both an aesthetic and a political
function, replacing speculative theorizing with historically grounded models thought better suited to
disciplining artists’ imagination. The essay then follows this model’s diffusion to Prussia through Franz
Kugler, contrasting his empirically oriented, anti-Hegelian approach with the often troubled and improvised
careers of other early art-history instructors (Ellmaurer, Schorn, Springer), whose personal accounts reveal
the friction between erudite art history and a skeptical, practically-minded student audience