In this text, we will discuss three authors who, in their research, engaged with the life or recurrence of certain forms over time. To understand this phenomenon, they turned to the study of transformation, latency, and the permanence of images. 

Beginning with Henri Focillon, in The Life of Forms he reminds us of something elementary and even obvious, but which does not always receive due attention from art historians. He writes: “[...] the fundamental content of form is a formal content. Contrary to what one might think—that form is the accidental wrapping of content—it is the various meanings of the latter that are uncertain and changeable” (FOCILLON, 1934, p. 5). Form is what we have that is most tangible and constant, despite the action of time, which inevitably affects and transforms objects. The symbolic content attributed to an image, although it may have had a specific meaning at the time of its creation, changes over time: it is supplemented, altered, corrupted, ignored, or even forgotten by the generations that receive the images (cf. SAXL, 1970).

For mysterious and varied reasons, some images—some forms—fare better than others. Without considering here questions regarding the “formal vocation” that a material might have, this often relates to authorship. Every artistic object is the result of human action, of an intention of the spirit. Indeed, Focillon interweaves art and life in his work. He does so to challenge chronological ordering, to show that historical time is irregular and unpredictable. For him, “History is generally a conflict of precocities, actualities, and delays” (FOCILLON, 1934, p. 82). Because of this imbalance, he helps us see that contemporaries are not merely those who live in the same period or share the same cultural context; he also teaches us that one cannot assume a given generation had more influence on the next than another much earlier one. According to Focillon, there is a factor that transcends chronological and geographical boundaries—something that brings together spirits separated by those barriers: what he calls spiritual families. Every artist creates their own family through time and space.

If we now take a step further and set aside the names of the individuals who make up these families, what remains are the artistic objects they produced. And just as happens with spirits, these objects also seek one another, moved by the law of elective affinities. Without neglecting the natural, cultural, sociological, and economic aspects that surround artworks—as Focillon himself did—it is up to those who work with images to interpret this system and promote these connections, thus creating a kind of album of kindred images. Ultimately, this is one way to understand the longevity of certain forms.

Focillon published The Life of Forms in 1934. In Europe at that time, the themes he raised were already in the air. A particular characteristic of the human sciences is that, if the same problem is presented to different individuals, they will not only solve it in more or less time and through different paths—as happens in the exact or biological sciences—but will also arrive at different results. This is what had occurred a few years earlier, when Aby Warburg was faced with these same questions.

Warburg started from different assumptions than Focillon. Rather than assuming it was solely a matter of formal traditions, he preferred to propose that it involved an issue of collective psychology (GOMBRICH, 2003, p. 261).

Warburg began thinking about the Mnemosyne project in 1924 and devoted himself more intensely to it from 1927 onward. In 1929, the year of his death, he even wrote a draft for an introduction to the project, which he entrusted to Gertrud Bing (published in Portuguese in WARBURG, 2009). In practice, Warburg replaced the large tables on which art historians would arrange and compare photographs with black panels where he pinned groups of images—combinations that could be constantly rearranged.

Since then, interest in this project has only grown, which is quite understandable, especially when we consider the recent technological transformations. Today, Warburg’s panels have been replaced by folders on personal computers. Moreover, a simple image search using a digital tool now instantly provides an abundance of similar images. Contemporary ways of thinking maintain, at least on the surface, a strong proximity to the ideas Warburg was developing.

With the Mnemosyne Atlas, Warburg hoped to present his science of culture through images, almost entirely dispensing with words (GOMBRICH, 2003, p. 59). It was a final step—a project representing the culmination of a life dedicated to research in archives and libraries and to direct contact with artworks. However, if on one hand the Atlas constitutes a synthetic and conclusive framework of a long and rich intellectual trajectory, on the other hand, one cannot deny that it bears the appearance and characteristics of a project still in its early stages—as if the images were grouped based on formal similarities with the aim of initiating a new investigation. In fact, this is a common mistake among many who take an interest in Warburg’s method. The Atlas can be a beginning, but it is primarily an end. Between one phase and the other lies the research, which must confirm whether the initial ideas held firm until the conclusion.

Therefore, to follow Warburg in the creation of an Atlas—or, if we prefer, in the curation of an exhibition—one must pay close attention to the selection of images that will compose its panels, its sections. Warburg states that “With its visible materials, the Mnemosyne Atlas intends precisely to illustrate that process which could be defined as the attempt to inwardly incorporate expressive values that existed before the intention to represent life in movement” (WARBURG, 2009, p. 126). He sought to illustrate the subjects to which he had dedicated much of his life—namely, the survival of the Olympian gods in astrological tradition and of certain forms of expression: how they were internalized by individuals, transmitted through images, and why they reappeared at irregular intervals. There was, therefore, a guiding question that justified and unified the selection, and it is this question that must remain clear—whether preserved or reinterpreted—whenever the Atlas is reactivated.

As a third response to the longevity of certain forms, I would like to point to the formal sequences proposed by George Kubler in The Shape of Time, published in 1962. A student of Focillon, Kubler rejected biological sequences of continuous and uninterrupted duration. In their place, he proposed that objects should be grouped into intermittent and variable, non-linear sequences, using as an organizing principle the fact that they all represent formal responses to a common problem. For him, the comparison among these objects creates a “shape in time.”

 Indeed, Kubler asserts that every significant work of art represents “a difficult solution to a problem” (KUBLER, 1970, p. 33). Returning to what was said earlier about the particularity of the human sciences, Kubler is fully aware that the same problem must have received various solutions over time. However, he believes that the accumulation of solutions eventually forms a chain of responses that, in the end, will resolve the enigma. Naturally, this is not a definitive result, as Kubler’s sequences are always open—either to receive new solutions by future artists or because it is discovered that a previously overlooked past work also contributes a response to the problem

To conclude these very brief reflections, it is worth highlighting some of the many contributions made by our authors. Kubler focused on breaks and ruptures rather than continuities; he expanded the scope of art history to include all objects produced by humans, and without distinguishing between ideas and forms, he considered that there are original works and replicas, all awaiting interpretation. Focillon, transcending the limitations of time and space, grouped images and their makers according to formal and spiritual affinities. As for Warburg, his Atlas offered us a cartography of cultural memory—a repertoire of visual references toward a deeper understanding of the psychology of human expressions. The Atlas can thus be seen as a “theater of memory,” a device which, if used correctly, will provide its users with a multitude of associations and discoveries.

Through their examples, these three art historians have offered us means to understand art beyond linear chronologies or fixed territories. They have led us to the threshold of an art history integrated into an art geography, in which arbitrary chronological or stylistic frameworks give way to more complex, more permeable ways of thinking. These are possibilities. May we have the courage and wisdom to follow these paths.

Alexandre Ragazzi

Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro

June 16, 2025 

*Tradução de responsabilidade da equipe editorial, realizada com auxílio de IA.

FOCILLON. Henri. Vie des formes. Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1934.

GOMBRICH, Ernst H. Aby Warburg – Una biografia intellettuale. Milano: Le Comete/Feltrinelli, 2003.

KUBLER, George. The shape of time. Remarks on the history of things. New Haven/London: Yale University Press, 1970.

SAXL, Fritz. “Continuity and variation in the meaning of images”. In: A heritage of images. A selection of lectures by Fritz Saxl. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1970, pp. 13-26.

WARBURG, Aby. Atlas Mnemosyne. Madrid: Akal, 2010.

WARBURG, Aby. “Mnemosyne”, Arte & Ensaios, v. 19, n. 19, 2009, pp. 125-131.