LOEWY, EMANUEL

LOEWY, EMANUEL (1857–1938), Austrian classical archaeologist. Loewy was born in Vienna and then traveled extensively in Greece and Asia Minor. In 1882 he took part in the excavations of a Lycian burial site, the "Heroon" of Gjölbaşi-Trysa, in which important Greek reliefs from the late fifth century b.c.e. were found. In 1887 he began his academic career as a lecturer in Vienna, becoming a professor in Rome in 1889. He returned to Vienna after World War i and was a professor of classical archaeology. His early writings on the history of ancient Greek artists were influenced by the philology-oriented Seminary in Vienna. His later activity was influenced by contemporary art historiographers of the Vienna School such as F. Wickhoff and A. Riegl; in place of philologico-antiquarian interpretation of ancient works of art, this school put form and style analysis, together with a reevalution of pre- and post-classical style periods. Loewy contributed essentially to the comprehension of the then underestimated archaic art of Greece with his Naturwiedergabe and Typenwanderung. Loewy considered the archaic style not as a preliminary to the classical period, but as an artistic creation, complete in itself. Apart from numerous scholarly works, Loewy reached a wide general public with his popular scientific works Die Griechische Plastik (2 vols., 1911, 1924⁴) and Polygnot, ein Buch von griechischer Malerei (2 vols., 1929). His works include Inschriften griechischer Bildhauer (1885); Naturwiedergabe in der aelteren griechischen Kunst (1900; Eng., 1907); Typenwanderung (Yearbook of the Austrian Archeological Institute, 12 (1909), 14 (1911)); and Neuattische Kunst (1922).

add. bibliography:

ndb, 15 (1987), 114f.

[Penuel P. Kahane]