Historia sztuki w dobie szaleństwa

History of art, as formulated by Warburg, comprised a critical reference to the beginnings of the discipline where not only the name but also the object of research and the method defined their sense and limits. Such critique was paradigmatic and questioned the epistemological foundations and methodological discourses of the “scientific” history of art. Taking into consideration this basic transformation we must become aware of the fact that due to Warburg the ”first history of art” based on an Enlightenment model was replaced by a “second history of art”, which came into being in the psychiatric clinic and on the excavation site of memory. The first emerged under the sign of the Sun, while the second turned towards the melancholy of Saturn. Its centre was the motif of the threat looming over man and the experience of a permanent crisis.