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Wie der Titel zu den Bildern kam
Die livrets des Pariser Salons
For a long time, works of art with traditional pictorial motifs were sufficiently comprehensible even without titles. Why, when and under what circumstances were titles nevertheless created? The livrets - the exhibition cata logues of the Paris Acaddmie roya le de peinture et de sculpture - provide an answer to this question. Due to their long, continuous series of publications, the catalogues of the respective exhibition objects form an excellent source for the diachronic examination of the creation of titles.
The genesis of the titles shows a gradual transition from descriptions of the works to concise short titles: The emergence of new, previously unknown pictorial motifs, the development of the art market and the beginning of art criticism demanded and favoured short, easy-to-read titles that facilitated rapid identification of the content of the work as well as art-theoretical discourse on the artist and the work.
