About the Journal

Journal of the International Association of Research Institutes in the History of Art

The RIHA Journal was launched in 2010 by The International Association of Research Institutes in the History of Art (RIHA). It is a peer-reviewed and open access e-journal devoted to the full range of the history of art and visual culture. The RIHA Journal especially welcomes papers on topics relevant from a supra-local perspective, articles that explore artistic interconnections or cultural exchanges, or engage with important theoretical questions that are apt to animate the discipline. As a collective endeavor, the RIHA Journal seeks to share knowledge and materials issued by scholars of all nationalities, and by doing so, to make a significant contribution to dissolving the boundaries between scholarly communities. Languages of publication are English, French, German, Italian, or Spanish.

Just published:

RIHA Journal 0325
Maria Chernysheva: "Barbara Radziwiłł and Princess Tarakanova at the 1867 Exposition Universelle. Meanings Lost and Found in Cross-National Perceptions"
DOI: https://doi.org/10.11588/riha.2025.1.113264

Józef Simmler, The Death of Barbara Radziwiłł, 1860, oil on canvas, 2.05 × 2.34 m. National Museum, Warsaw

At the 1867 Exposition Universelle in Paris, a competition for public sympathy unfolded within the Russian section between two paintings – Józef Simmler’s The Death of Barbara Radziwiłł and Konstantin Flavitsky’s Princess Tarakanova. Flavitsky worked in Saint Petersburg, while Simmler was based in Warsaw, in the so-called Kingdom of Poland (commonly known as Congress Poland), then part of the Russian Empire. This paper examines how their depictions of beautiful, dying women reflected the collective memory and political concerns of the Polish and Russian nations. Additionally, by drawing on archival documents, it investigates the selection and censorship of paintings for the Russian section of the Exposition Universelle. It also analyzes French critics’ responses to Barbara Radziwiłł and Princess Tarakanova. In doing so, the paper traces how the reception of these works evolved across various national contexts.

Our latest special issue:

Architekt:innen-Monographien. Kanonisierung, Kontextualisierung, Kritik
A RIHA Journal special issue, guest-edited by Ruth Hanisch (Dortmund), Richard Kurdiovsky (Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna), Bernadette Reinhold (University of Applied Arts Vienna) and Antje Senarclens de Grancy (Graz University of Technology)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.11588/riha.2025.2

Monographs on architects are an established and rarely questioned format within architectural scholarship. This special issue explores the diverse motivations behind producing such publications, alongside the sources, media, and modes of presentation employed, focusing on case studies from Central Europe. Monographs on architects are shaped by their authors and created within specific socio-cultural, political, economic, and scholarly contexts. Who is chosen as the subject of a monograph? Who is privileged, and who remains marginalized? How do we confront the 'blind spots' increasingly central to contemporary academic discourse, such as questions of gender, anti-Semitism, or the Nazi past? Ultimately, these inquiries lead to a broader reflection on the processes through which the architectural canon is constructed.

15 YEARS RIHA JOURNAL!

On April 14, 2010, the International Association of Research Institutes in the History of Art, RIHA, launched its online journal

Today, looking back to over 300 essays from all periods, regions, and media of Western art history and contemporary art, we are grateful for the support and the recognition this art history journal has received. Back in 2010, starting an online journal besides the long-established and prestigious print journals seemed to be a rather risky undertaking. However, online publishing possesses undeniable advantages. First and foremost, there is its worldwide accessibility. Furthermore, it offers authors and editors the prospect of unlimited illustrations, the possibility of linking, the appending of research data, etc. Hence, e-journals in art history have moved from a marginal phenomenon to a recognized and sought-after medium.

It was important to RIHA as an international association of – back then – over 20 research institutes in Europe, the U.S., and Australia, to develop the RIHA Journal as a platform that – despite all the necessary specialization in our discipline – offers articles across the entire spectrum and invites readers to look into fields of art history other than their own. Thus, you can find work in the RIHA Journal on Armenian sacred architecture of the 11th century next to a study of the varied artistic circle of a minister to Charles V of Habsburg in Brussels, or an article that investigates the parallel methodologies and critical reception of Le Corbusier and Portuguese contemporary Almada Negreiros. RIHA Journal special issues, on the other hand, have focused on a common theme such as the enlightening "Gottfried Lindauer – Painting New Zealand," which broke new ground in the debate on cultural transfer processes of the 19th century.

Especially in times of growing nationalisms, a broad-ranging international journal like the RIHA Journal offers the opportunity to experience the breadth of visual cultures in their countless manifestations at the highest possible scholarly level.

We would like to thank you, dear readers, for your continued interest and openness!

To mark this 15th anniversary and to stimulate thoughts for the further development of art history in these times of simultaneous globalization and returns to nationalism, we are presenting a paper of the chair of the RIHA association, Éric de Chassey, who asks: „How to Write a More Global, More Inclusive History of Art?“

RIHA Journal 0323
Éric de Chassey: "How to Write a More Global, More Inclusive History of Art? An Ancient Egyptian Sculpture and Its Six Lessons"
DOI: https://doi.org/10.11588/riha.2025.1.110070

Unidentified sculptor, Male Head, c. 380–342 BCE (Egypt, 30th Dynasty), red and black granite, 24,1 × 14,6 × 20 cm. Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA (photo: author)

Since its beginnings, art history has been torn between a tendency to remain inside local or national boundaries and a more transnational orientation; it has also veered between addressing only the creations of well-recognized white European male solitary artists and assessing the importance of female, anonymous, or collective creators of less highly prized objects-images. The long overdue process of writing art histories that are more global (less European-centered) and more inclusive (less focused on overprized masterpieces) is underway. For professional art historians, the multiplicity of narratives thus offered can be a blessing. For a more general public, though, as well as students and maybe even many professionals it still clashes with an implied master narrative that has been left barely untouched. The necessity for a new master narrative that meets the standards of contemporary scholarly research leads to pressing questions: How do we write it? Who will write it? Is it worth trying?