Danto's reviews appeared in a weekly magazine, always in time to influence museum-goers. Yet they never start with Kant's bottom line. In fact, they rarely start with the artist at all. A review of Robert Ryman begins with yet another Robert, Rauschenberg . And the book has hardly gotten off the ground.
Some connections seem obvious, at least in retrospect.
They give the outstanding issues in art history a moment to settle down before art unsettles them yet again. Others have the shock of a fable. The device suggests Danto's real strengths. Maybe he cannot reverse Kant's course, to proceed from ideas to lived experience. I often wished that he omitted a review's title, to challenge me further.