The Warburg Institute is a research institution associated with the University of London. Its focus is the study of the influence of classical antiquity on all aspects of European civilization.
The Institute was founded by Aby Warburg (1866-1929), a student of Renaissance art and culture. Warburg became dissatisfied with a purely stylistic approach to art history and grew interested in a more interdisciplinary approach. While studying the culture of Renaissance Florence, he grew interested in the influence of antiquity on the culture, and, while professor at the University of Hamburg, built up his personal library around the question.
Warburg was joined by his fellow professor Fritz Saxl (1890-1948) who transformed Warburg's collection into a scholarly institute. In 1934, under the shadow of Nazism, the institute relocated from Hamburg to London. In 1944, it became associated with the University of London, and in 1994, it became a founding institute of the University of London's School of Advanced Study.
The Warburg Institute has a library of over 350,000 volumes, an archive and a photo collection. It offers numerous short- and long-term fellowships. Together with the Courtauld Institute of Art, it publishes The Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, an annual of about 300 pages.
Well-known scholars associated with the Warburg Institute include Ernst Gombrich (who served as director from 1959 to 1976), Erwin Panofsky, Frances Yates and Anthony Grafton.
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Last updated: 10-08-2005 13:05:44
