Neil McWilliam
Walter H. Annenberg Distinguished Professor of Art and Art History
Education
Ph.D., University of Oxford (United Kingdom) 1985
B.A., University of Oxford (United Kingdom) 1976
Overview
Neil McWilliam received his D.Phil. from the University of Oxford. His publications include Dreams of Happiness. Social Art & the French Left 1830-1850 (with a revised translation in French, 2007) and Monumental Intolerance, Jean Baffier, A Nationalist Sculptor in fin-de-siècle France and A Bibliography of Salon Criticism in Paris from the July Monarchy to the Second Republic 1831-1851 . His research focuses on the visual culture of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century France, and in particular, on public sculpture, the Academy, art criticism, and the inter- relationship between aesthetics and political ideologies during the period. In recent years, McWilliam has published widely on the relationship between conservative politics and the arts in France, exploring the impact of nationalist groupings on artistic production, critical writing and art history in the decades before the First World War. His ongoing interest in the career of Symbolist painter Emile Bernard involves a particular focus on this artist's turn in the 1890s towards a strongly traditionalist artistic practice, and its ramifications for understanding the relationship between tradition and innovation in fin-de-siècle French art.
Expertise
History of art criticism, historiography and history of aesthetics, history of sculpture, 19th century French cultural and intellectual historyContact Information
114 S Buchanan Avenue, Bay 9, Dept of Art and Art History, Durham, NC 27708
Box 90764, Dept. of Art and Art History, Durham, NC 27708-0764
(919) 684-6081
Links
Projects
McWilliam, N. F. “Lieux de mémoire, sites de contestation. Le Monument public comme enjeu politique, 1880-1914.” La Statuaire Publique Au XIXe Siècle, edited by S Le Men, Monum. Editions du Patrimoine, 2005, pp. 104–15.
McWilliam, N. Conflicting Manifestations: Parisian Commemoration of Joan of Arc and Etienne Dolet in the Early Third Republic. Vol. 27, 2004, pp. 381–418. Manual, doi:10.2307/40324393. Full Text
McWilliam, N. F. “Action française, Classicism, and the Dilemmas of Traditionalism in France 1900-1914.” Nationalism and French Visual Culture, 1870-1914, edited by J. Hargrove and N. McWilliam, Studies in the History of Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, 2004.
McWilliam, N. F. “Ordering the Past. Nineteenth-Century French History Painting in Retrospect.” History Painting in Nineteenth-Century France, edited by P. Cook and M. Ledbury, Manchester University Press, 2003.
McWilliam, N. F. “Entries on Jean Baffier, Hugues Lapaire, Maxime Réal del Sarte, and Félix Vallotton.” Dictionnaire Biographique et Géographique de l’Affaire Dreyfus, edited by P. Oriol, 2003.
McWilliam, N. F. “Von "Marat" bis "Thermidor": Die Interpretation der Revolution in der Dritten Republik in Frankreich.” Revolution, Republik Und Reaction: Der Umgang Mit Dem Erbe Der Französischen Revolution 1871-1914, edited by G. Gersmann and H. Kohle, Franz Steiner, Stuttgart, 2002, pp. 99–118.
McWilliam, N. F. “’Contre-révolution, contre-romantisme . . .’. Esthétique et politique dans l’Action fran¢aise.” L’Invention Du XIXe Siècle. 2. Le XIXe Siècle Au Miroir Du XXe’, edited by Alain Corbin et al, Klinckseick, Paris, 2002, pp. 109–22.
McWilliam, N. F. “Peripheral Visions: Class, Cultural Aspiration and the Artisan Community in Mid-Nineteenth-Century France.” Politics and Aesthetics in the Arts, edited by I. Gaskell and S. Kemal, Cambridge Studies in Philosophy and the Arts, Cambridge University Press, 2000, pp. 140–73.
McWilliam, N. F. “Commemoration and the Politics of Iconoclasm: The Battle over "les Statues dreyfusardes", 1908-1910.” Memory and Oblivion, edited by Adriaan Wessel Reinink and Jeroen Stumpel, Kluwer Academic Pub, 1999.
McWilliam, N. F. “Mythologising Millet.” Barbizon. Malerei Der Natur - Natur Der Malerei, edited by A. Burmester et al., Klinkhardt & Biermann, 1999.
Pages
CHAUDONNERET, M. .. C. “1848: 'La Republique des Arts'.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 10, no. 1, Oxford University Press (OUP), Jan. 1987, pp. 59–70. Crossref, doi:10.1093/oxartj/10.1.59. Full Text
McWILLIAM, N. “The Sculptor of Modern Life.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 10, no. 1, Oxford University Press (OUP), Jan. 1987, pp. 102–05. Crossref, doi:10.1093/oxartj/10.1.102. Full Text
McWILLIAM, N. “Country Life.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 9, no. 1, Oxford University Press (OUP), Jan. 1986, pp. 76–81. Crossref, doi:10.1093/oxartj/9.1.76. Full Text
McWilliam, N. F., and A. Potts. “Richard Wilson: Landscapes of Reaction.” History Workshop Journal, 1985.
McWilliam, N. F. “Making Faces.” Art History: Journal of the Association of Art Historians, vol. 7, no. 1, Wiley, Mar. 1984, pp. 115–19.
PARSONS, C., and N. MCWILLIAM. “"Le Paysan de Paris": Alfred Sensier and the Myth of Rural France.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 6, no. 2, Oxford University Press (OUP), Jan. 1983, pp. 38–58. Crossref, doi:10.1093/oxartj/6.2.38. Full Text
McWilliam, N., and A. Potts. “The Landscape of Reaction: Richard Wilson (1713?-1782) and His Critics.” History Workshop, no. 16, 1983, pp. 171–75. Manual, doi:10.2307/4288529. Full Text
McWilliam, N. F. “David d'Angers and the Panthéon Commission: Politics and Public Works under the July Monarchy'.” Art History: Journal of the Association of Art Historians, vol. 5, no. 4, Wiley, Dec. 1982, pp. 6–446.
McWilliam, N. F. “Look At Life.” Art History: Journal of the Association of Art Historians, vol. 4, no. 4, Wiley, Dec. 1981, pp. 466–70.
McWilliam, N. “Paris. David d'Angers, Maître d'Hébert.” The Burlington Magazine, vol. 122, no. 933, 1980, pp. 860–63. Manual, doi:10.2307/880184. Full Text