Richard Arthur Wollheim (5 May, 1923 – 4 November, 2003) was a British philosopher noted for original work on mind and emotions, especially as related to the visual arts, specifically, painting.
The son of an actress and a theatre impresario, Richard Wollheim attended Westminster School, London, and Balliol College, Oxford (1941-2, 1945-8), interrupted by active military service in World War II.For his own account of his active service in Europe during the war, see Wollheim, "Fifty Years On", London Review of Books 23 (23 Je 1994): 3-6. In 1949 he obtained a first in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, and began teaching at University College London, where he became Grote Professor of Mind and Logic and Department Head from 1963 to 1982. He was visiting professor at Harvard University, Columbia University, the University of Minnesota, Graduate Center, CUNY, the University of California-Berkeley, UC Davis and elsewhere. He chaired the Department at UC Berkeley, 1998-2002. On retirement from Berkeley, he served briefly as a guest lecturer at Balliol College. Wollheim gave several distinguished lecture series, most notably the Andrew M. Mellon lectures in Fine Arts, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (1984), published as Painting as an Art.
Besides his philosophical research and teaching on art (particularly, painting) Wollheim was well-known for his philosophical treatments of depth psychology, Wollheim was Ernest Jones Lecturer, Institute of Psychoanalysis, London, in 1968. notably Sigmund Freud. His Art and its Objects was one of the twentieth century\'s most influential texts on philosophical aesthetics. In a 1965 essay, \'Minimal Art\', he seems to have coined the meme term \'minimalism\', although the meaning of the term drifted from his.
Contents |
For an extensive bibliography of Richard Wollheim\'s publications by a professional bibliographer, see Eddie Yeghiayan\'s UC-Irvine site Richard Wollheim Bibliography. See also the \'Philweb\' listing Richard Wollheim.
Note: given his unique mind, personality, and distinctive writing styles, along with his curiosity and sociability, many of Richard Wollheim\' publications are not captured by academic categories. Besides books, he published many articles, in journals and edited collections, book reviews, and gallery catalogues for shows. Inquiries into his mss, letters and recordings of his talks might be begun.
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from Wikipedia