Aby Warburg: Metamorphosis and Memory

Aby Warburg, influential art historian, ranged widely from the Italian Renaissance to Hopi Indian rituals, from frescoes to postage stamps, combining art history, anthropology, and religion. He explored the nachleben (afterlife) of antiquity, the rational versus the irrational, and the tensions between the secular and the religious in Renaissance paintings of Italy, the Netherlands, Germany, and in festivities, rituals and costumes. This documentary traces the development of Warburg’s ideas in the context of his life and times and his personal struggle with depression and psychosis. The film includes the words of Warburg as well as interviews with a range of scholars from England, the US, and Germany.