Josef Strzygowski

Born Mar. 7, 1862, in Biała, now Bielsko-Biała, Poland; died Jan. 2, 1941, in Vienna. Austrian art scholar.

Strzygowski taught at the University of Graz from 1892 and at the University of Vienna from 1909. Emphasizing the importance of the Oriental and Transcaucasian artistic cultures, he contributed to a broader understanding of the origins of European medieval art. However, with his doctrine that the conventional and symbolic language of art is of a primordial nature, he adhered to the idealist viewpoint on the history of art; in his later works he leaned toward racist cultural and historical ideas.