Erwin Panofsky

Born in Germany in 1892, Panofsky made his name decoding the intellectual scaffolding beneath Renaissance art, arguing that images and ideas moved in tandem, each interpreting the other. The Nazi rise sent him to the United States, where he continued the work that would define modern iconography. His studies on Albrecht Dürer, early Netherlandish painting, and humanist themes in Renaissance art became foundational texts, still assigned decades later. He died in 1968, having transformed how scholars approach the visual artifact—not as decoration, but as argument.