Hegel's Theory of Art History

According to Hegel, the idea of beauty should realize itself in certain external forms in accordance with its concept. As long as the idea remains still undetermined, universal and abstract, it is impossible for it to find any corresponding form; in seeking one, the idea only finds something which is of but a partial conformity with itself. Thus is found the symbolic type of art; architecture is the art most befitting this type. The idea, when further determined, manifests itself as the concrete and individualized. The form which is of immediate accord therewith is the man. Such a perfect harmony of the form with its contents will only be found in the classical type of art; and sculpture is the art which is able to express it with the utmost clearness. However, the individualized mind, as is manifested in the classical type of art, still remains in the stage of abstraction; the mind, as is in perfect correspondence with external forms, does not yet fully display itself. It must as subjectivity, free and infinite, go back to itself. The mind at this stage finds its forms only in those inner realms, such as expressions, feelings and the will; here the forms are no longer in perfect harmony with their contents; the mind overpasses the forms. And thus we get the romantic type of art, the appropriate species to which are : painting, music, literature. Hegel's theory on the types of art deeply inspires one's admiration. But in consideration of the facts observed in the history of art, we should not fail to remark that those three types, distinguished by Hegel as something to be realized one by one by way of development, are actually found to appear not solely in certain respective species of art, such as architecture, sculpture, paintings, etc., but in one and all species indiscriminately. They are to be called the primary styles for all the species of art; they have that quality of being ‘primary’ which would enable them to be developed throughout all the historical ages in every possible variety of forms and species. It is the task of the historians of art to pursue and understand the process of this multifarious development of the types thus understood which is gone through from age to age