La naissance d'une histoire française de la peinture espagnole Louis Viardot (1800-1883)

This article highlights the role of the Hispanist historian and art critic Louis Viardot (1800-1883) in the rediscovery of Spanish painting in early 19th-century France. Following a "civilizationist" ambition, Viardot became interested in Hispanic culture even before France plunged into an uncontrolled hispanomania around 1830. But the most unprecedented aspect of his contribution to the early Hispanic studies lies above all in his interest in Spanish painting and his major role in the construction of a historical and scientific discourse on the subject. In support of particular discursive methods, inherited from the Western historiographic tradition, Viardot paved the way for two centuries of Hispanic art history.