H. W. Janson

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Horst Waldemar Janson or H. W. Janson (1913 – September 30, 1982) was an American scholar of art history. He is best known for his History of Art, which was first published in 1962 and has sold more than two million copies in fifteen languages. He wrote about Renaissance art and nineteenth-century sculpture, and authored two prize-winning books, Apes and Ape Lore in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance (1952) and Sculpture of Donatello (1957). In his later years he was concerned with East–West dialogue in the arts. Over his career, Janson consulted on the Time–Life Library of Art; was president of the College Art Association, editor of the Art Bulletin, and founding member and President of the Renaissance Society of America. He also wrote books on art for young people, some with his wife Dora Jane (1916–2002).

Janson was born in St. Petersburg in 1913. He graduated from Hamburg University and completed a PhD at Harvard in 1942. Beginning in 1949, he joined New York University, where he built the undergraduate arts department and taught at the graduate Institute of Fine Arts. He was recognized with an honorary degree in 1981. He died in Europe in 1982 at 68.