Henri Focillon

Henri Focillon

Henri Focillon (Dijon, September 7, 1881 - New Haven, 1943) was a French art historian, specialist in the Middle Ages. He had a solid classical and humanistic training, soon manifesting a decided vocation for the History of Art.

His theoretical contributions are fundamental within artistic historiography, since together with the historian Wölfflin he is one of the main introducers of the formalist method of analysis. His works include Piranesi (1918), Hokusai (1924), The Art of Romanesque Sculptors (1931), The Life of Forms (1934), The Art of the West (1938) and The Year One Thousand (1942) .