Society President, Professor Emeritus Richard Wollheim dies.
Professor Emeritus Richard Wollheim was the Society's President from 1992 until his death this year.
Graham McFee, current Vice-President and former doctoral student of Wollheim's, offers some personal recollections below. The Society is also collecting links to obituaries (below). Please notify the Secretary (
kathleen@british-aesthetics.org) of any omissions.
Obituaries for Richard Wollheim
From Modern Painters, by Edward Winters
It was whilst studying painting at the Slade that I met Richard Wollheim. An essay I had written concerning the linguistic character of painting had found its way to the Philosophy Department and Richard kindly invited me for corrective tutorials.
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From the Guardian, November 5th, by Arthur Danto.
Brilliant philosopher engaged with the interaction of art and psychoanalysis
The philosopher Richard Wollheim, who has died aged 80, belonged in the top echelon of thinkers who redefined the practice of his subject in Britain and the United States after the second world war. In terms both of the clarity of his writing and the acuity and ingenuity of his arguments, he embodied the intellectual virtues of analytical philosophy. But in terms of what engaged him as a philosopher, he stood far closer than any of his peers to continental thought.
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From the Times, November 8th.
Richard Wollheim Philosopher who used psychoanalytical concepts to explore how the mind and the emotions react to works of art Richard Wollheim was one of the most distinguished and productive philosophers of his generation. He made a significant contribution to the postwar flourishing of British philosophy; and as his career continued long past the normal age of retirement his work grew steadily more individual, rich and expressive. So his reputation continued to increase, and his publications were eagerly awaited into his eightieth year.
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From The Daily Telegraph, 11th November.
Richard Wollheim.
Richard Wollheim, who has died aged 80, was a philosopher whose best-known work concentrated on the relationship between art and psychology.
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From the Independent, November 17th
Professor Richard Wollheim
Philosopher preoccupied with aesthetics and psychoanalysis.
Richard Wollheim was one of the most original and courageous philosophers of his time. At a period when most of his colleagues considered aesthetics and psychoanalysis marginal or suspect, he made them central to his analytical investigations.
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From the New York Times, November 8th, by Douglas Martin.
Richard Wollheim, Philosopher, Dies at 80
Richard Wollheim, a philosopher who synthesized analytic philosophy, psychoanalysis and the study of painting to develop aesthetic insights that are considered among the most profound of the postwar era, died on Tuesday at his home in London. He was 80.
The cause was heart failure, said a statement released by the philosophy department of the University of California at Berkeley; Professor Wollheim was the department's chairman from 1998 to 2002.
His intellectual dexterity, at times almost playfulness, was suggested by works ranging from a widely respected biography of Freud to a well-received novel to an examination of human emotions that some reviewers saw as the basis for a general theory of a subject largely ignored by philosophers.
But his greatest impact, also unusual for an analytic philosopher, was on art. He coined the term Minimalism in his 1965 essay "Minimal Art."
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From the San Francisco Chronicle, November 8th, by Patricia Yollin.
Richard Arthur Wollheim, former chair of the philosophy department at UC Berkeley and a prominent expert on both psychoanalysis and art, has died. Although friends described Professor Wollheim as someone who managed to skip old age completely, he was, in fact, 80 years old.
read more about From the San Francisco Chronicle, November 8th, by Patricia Yollin....
From the Washington Post, November 9th.
Richard Wollheim Dies; Philosopher Saw Art in New Light.
LONDON -- Richard Arthur Wollheim, 80, a philosophy professor whose writing on visual art and psychoanalysis made him one of the field's most innovative thinkers, died Nov. 4 at his home in London.
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From the Philosophy Department web site, University College, London.
The department is deeply saddened to report the death of Professor Emeritus Richard Wollheim. He taught philosophy in this department from 1949 to 1982, and was Grote Professor of Mind and Logic from 1963 until 1982. His impact on the Department and on philosophy in London will long be felt, and he is sorely missed.
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From the Philosophy Department web site, University of California, Berkeley.
With great sadness we report the passing of our beloved friend and colleague, Richard Wollheim. He died of heart failure on November 4 at his home in London.
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Philosophy Now
Richard Wollheim, a philosopher whose aesthetic insights are considered among the more profound of the postwar era, has died at his home in London at the age of 80.
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