On the Question of the European Landscape Origin (A Viev of the Scientist of Landscape Science)

In the context of landscape studies and from the standpoint of the “power” theory of fine art by Gilles Deleuze (the concepts of line-strength, color-strength, composition-strength), the process of the birth of the “landscape” genre in European fine art, starting from prehistoric times and ending with the first half of the 16th century, in which the formation of the genre can be considered complete. It is shown that the landscape genre (“landscape-as-such”) was born gradually, passing through the stages of “landscape-decor,” “landscape-background,” “landscape-condition,” “landscape-participant.” The essence and features of each stage are explained. The role of individual painters who made the greatest contribution to the formation of the genre in different periods of the development of European art, from the Proto-Renaissance to the High Renaissance, is revealed. The features of the methods of depiction, artistic interpretation and representation of landscape components (geocomponents) and the landscape as a whole at different stages of the genre’s formation are shown. Particular attention is paid to the work of such masters of the Early and Northern Renaissance as Masolino da Panicale, Albrecht Dürer, Leonardo da Vinci, Albrecht Altdorfer, Augustin Hirschvogel. The outstanding importance for the development of the landscape genre in European painting of the work of Albrecht Dürer, especially his watercolors of the 1480s–1490s, is emphasized. An attempt is made to reveal the ontological specifics of landscape images, based on the theory of the existential-topological representation of geocomponents, the landscape as a whole and the place of a person in it. For this, such concepts of the philosophy of poststructuralism as “ogiva,” “faciality,” “landscapity” are used.