The place of astrology in aby Warburg's studies on the Renaissance

• Grant number: 18/06913-1
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Effective date (Start): September 01, 2018
• Effective date (End): June 30, 2020
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Arts - Art Fundamentals and Criticism
• Acordo de Cooperação: Coordination of Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES)
• Principal Investigator: Cássio da Silva Fernandes
• Grantee: Priscila Risi Pereira Barreto
• Host Institution: Escola de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (EFLCH). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus Guarulhos. Guarulhos , SP, Brazil

Abstract

If the problem of Aby Warburg (1866-1929) focused on the question "what does the influence of the ancients mean for the artistic civilization of the first Renaissance?" (WARBURG, 2013: 461), the topic of man's orientation through the cosmos his intellectual research at a constant pace. Inquiring about the formation of the modern man, freed from medieval servility by rationality (Per monstra ad sphaeram), he investigates the migratory paths of the astrological and mythological imaginary for the italian peninsula, defending the "methodological enlargement of the boundaries of our art science in thematic terms and space "(WARBURG, 2013: 475). In an interdisciplinary key that considers the link between art and its historical-cultural context, Warburg attributes a sense of complementarity to pictorial and literary documents, overcoming a formalist aesthetic approach to art.In order to contribute to the debate on Warburg's (2013: 475) proposal for a "culture science" (Kulturwissenschaft), we will seek to understand the methodological role of astrological images in their studies, identifying their production relative to the theme, research and related studies of which he made use, as well as the historiographic production relative to his intellectual work. We will delve deeper into his studies of the Palazzo Schifanoia, which for Warburg (2013: 454) would demonstrate the dual ancient tradition (mythological and astrological) in a circulation of iconologies that breaks with the East and West barriers. Affirming that the "renewal of pagan antiquity in the Renaissance" would have inherited astrological conceptions of Greek mythology, mediated by an Indian and Arabic demonology, Warburg broadens the notion of 'Renaissance' and the very idea of 'Old'.