New Warburg Institute director outlines plan to stop ‘slide into obscurity’

Noted art historian David Freedberg is keen to shake up the Bloomsbury institute that has been described as the ‘world’s weirdest library’

Published on
October 15, 2015
Last updated
February 16, 2017
Jack Grove
The Astronomer, by Johannes Vermeer (1668)
Source: Alamy
World view: Freedberg fears that the standing of the Warburg – ‘the world’s first interdisciplinary institute’ – has fallen because of a focus on Renaissance studies
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Print headline: ‘Step change is needed to prevent slide into obscurity’

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Reader's comments (2)

#1 Submitted by Charles Hedges on October 15, 2015 - 1:20pm
For Freedberg to suggest that the Warburg declined under the exemplary and humane Directorship of Joe Trapp is profoundly unfair.
#2 Submitted by rens.bod_238573 on October 17, 2015 - 9:36am
I believe it's wrong to say that 'the days of scholarship for its own sake are over'. On the contrary, 'scholarship for its own sake' has led to applications that no-one could have foreseen, just like 'science for its own sake'. See http://blog.oup.com/2014/02/how-the-humanities-changed-the-world/.

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