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- Aesthetics; avant-garde; pré-jugé; effective history; Gadamer; hermeneutics; Kant; Lyotard; Mallarmé; Newman (1)
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Articles 1 - 30 of 31
Full-Text Articles in Philosophy
Art And Embodiment: Biological And Phenomenological Contributions To Understanding Beauty And The Aesthetic, Adrienne Dengerink Chaplin
Art And Embodiment: Biological And Phenomenological Contributions To Understanding Beauty And The Aesthetic, Adrienne Dengerink Chaplin
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Increasing awareness of the crucial and complex role of the body in making and experiencing art has led to a diverse range of biological and phenomenological philosophies of art. The shared emphasis on the role of the body re-connects these contemporary theories of art to aesthetics' pre-Kantian origin as a science of sense-perception (aesthesis) and feeling. Tracing some of the current positions in such diverse thinkers as Dissanayake, Langer, and Merleau-Ponty, this paper will examine their shared interest in art as a pre-reflective, non-discursive mode of knowing, symbolizing, and being-in-the-world. This paper argues that while some biologically based theories have …
Living Art, Defining Value: Artworks And Mere Real Things, Serge Grigoriev
Living Art, Defining Value: Artworks And Mere Real Things, Serge Grigoriev
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
In this essay I examine the conceptual difficulties generated by drawing a distinction between artworks and mere real things. I argue that the distinction is an unfortunate one, requiring for its operation an assumption of possibility of an objective value judgment with regard to aesthetic productions, which, in reality cannot be defensible on purely philosophical grounds. The distinction, in fact, may be useful in describing the interactions between the artworld, qua a cultural institution, and the socio-economic environment in which it is situated; yet, it proves misleading when introduced into discussions about the nature of artworks and the nature of …
Does Sad Music Make One Sad? An Ethnographic Perspective, Peter Manuel
Does Sad Music Make One Sad? An Ethnographic Perspective, Peter Manuel
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
The question of the presence and role of negative emotions in the experience of music - Does sad music make one sad? - has been recognized as a key to understanding much musical experience, especially in terms of the apprehension and expressive power of specifically formal features of music. One set of scholars, sometimes loosely labeled "emotivists," has argued that negative emotional responses do play a central role in the apprehension of much music, that is, that actual sadness is a natural, intentional and essential response to sad music. Advocates of this view base their arguments in large part on …
Are Video Games Art?, Aaron Smuts
Are Video Games Art?, Aaron Smuts
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
In this paper I argue that by any major definition of art many modern video games should be considered art. Rather than defining art and defending video games based on a single contentious definition, I offer reasons for thinking that video games can be art according to historical, aesthetic, institutional, representational and expressive theories of art. Overall, I argue that while many video games probably should not be considered art, there are good reasons to think that some video games should be classified as art, and that the debates concerning the artistic status of chess and sports offer some insights …
Avant-Garde Or Pré-Jugé?, Sinead Murphy
Avant-Garde Or Pré-Jugé?, Sinead Murphy
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
This paper receives its impetus from Gadamer's account of effective history (Wirkungsgeschichte) and his corresponding challenge to the 'problem of purity' that he locates in Kant's critique of aesthetic judgment and that derives from the attempt to establish universal founding principles for thought and action. This is a deep and wide-ranging issue, and so I focus on a very specific aspect of it: the division between intuition and understanding, between history as a given flux and enlightenment as a unifying synthesis, that motivates Kant's search for pure reflective grounds to reconcile them, and on the challenge posed to this division …
The Aesthetic Dissonance Of Industrial Wind Machines, Jon Boone
The Aesthetic Dissonance Of Industrial Wind Machines, Jon Boone
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Yuriko Saito recently published an essay in this journal, "Machines in the Ocean: The Aesthetics of Wind Farms" (Contemporary Aesthetics, 2 (2004)). The bulk of her essay is a search for the right aesthetic justification for wind plants sited in the ocean as well as for those onshore. Because wind power does not emit toxins into the air and its source of energy is recurrent, it offers the promise of a clean, renewable alternative to fossil fuels. The central problem with harnessing any form of energy is that enormous energies are wasted in the process of producing and channeling a …
Carrying The Jade Tablet: A Consideration Of Confucian Artistry, Eric C. Mullis
Carrying The Jade Tablet: A Consideration Of Confucian Artistry, Eric C. Mullis
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
In this paper I discuss the aesthetic dimension of ritual action. In order to demonstrate how the rites render action aesthetically expressive, I draw on the notion of an "art of context" and further detail the Confucian understanding of artistic practice as an essential component for moral cultivation. In turn, I use John Dewey's account of aesthetic form in order to support and further demonstrate the ability of the rituals and arts to organize action and to thereby render it aesthetically significant. However, Dewey's account entails that we question either conceptual or institutional limitations of aesthetic form as such limitations …
Immersive Contemplation In Video Art Environments, Tiffany Sutton
Immersive Contemplation In Video Art Environments, Tiffany Sutton
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
This essay examines a form of video art -- what is called a "video environment" -- that calls upon as much as it departs from familiar conventions that are bound up in museum display. I argue that the way that works in this genre are housed in museums enables them to give rise to a form of contemplation, one involving immersion, that is, if not unique to this genre, then certainly demonstrated by it. My examples of video environments make a case for the coherence of this rarely experienced immersive form of contemplation, the value of which, in turn, makes …
Symposium: The Body (Concluded From Vol. 2)
Symposium: The Body (Concluded From Vol. 2)
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
No abstract provided.
The Eye And The Hand: Professional Sensitivity And The Idea Of An Aesthetics Of Work On The Land, Justin Winkler
The Eye And The Hand: Professional Sensitivity And The Idea Of An Aesthetics Of Work On The Land, Justin Winkler
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Academic aesthetics is guided by the visual and notions of distance. In this article I want to study how an aesthetics of work, of process and proximity, could function. I am asking why the peasant population has been always been supposed not to have an aesthetic appreciation of their land. I contend that they had some kind of appreciation, but that this was conceived expressed in terms fundamentally different from the academic and pictorial landscape aesthetics. With the term 'professional' sensitivity and examples from the Swiss Alps and Southern France, I discuss the question of how an archaeology of an …
Production Theories And Artistic Value, David E.W. Fenner
Production Theories And Artistic Value, David E.W. Fenner
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
In this paper, I want to argue that what I call "production theories" - theories that purport to account for the value of a work of art instrumentally and in terms of something experienced by audience members in attending to the work - are insufficient to account for artistic value. The production theories I will discuss include those of Monroe Beardsley, Nelson Goodman, Leo Tolstoy (for lack of a more current pure affective theory), and Alan Goldman (whose account may be seen as an amalgam of the first three). The first three of these theorists represent the most popular and …
Moving Pictures - Advertising, Traffic And Cityscape, Pasi Kolhonen
Moving Pictures - Advertising, Traffic And Cityscape, Pasi Kolhonen
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
There are two major factors responsible for the way contemporary cities look the way they do. One is the ever-increasing volume of traffic, and the other is the present commercial culture which manifests itself most visibly through advertising. This paper deals with the effects of advertising in a city environment; the main focus is on advertising linked to traffic. Nowadays we have become so accustomed to advertising that it sometimes is actually hard to recognize just how much is around. Spaces without some form of advertisements are becoming progressively fewer in today's Western cities. The city-dweller's field of vision is …
The Aesthetics Of The Road, Road Art, And Road Traffic, Yrjš Sepänmaa
The Aesthetics Of The Road, Road Art, And Road Traffic, Yrjš Sepänmaa
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Three things are required for a good road: economy, safety and beauty. A key concept of this trinity is fitting: how to fit the road into the landscape. Together, the road and the landscape form a work of road art. Art attached to the road environment - in this case the other meaning of road art - is at its simplest art works placed beside a road. Art in a more demanding form gives the landscape new dimensions of meaning. Road and art in unison are more than the sum of their parts. Furthermore, travelling is a way to get …
Aesthetic Functionalism, Sven Ove Hansson
Aesthetic Functionalism, Sven Ove Hansson
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
According to the strongest version of aesthetic functionalism, aesthetic value is completely determined by and therefore reducible to practical function. According to the opposite view, function and aesthetic value are completely independent of each other. Both these views are shown to be untenable, and instead aesthetic dualism is defended. By this, I mean that some aesthetic judgments that can legitimately be made about an object refer to it under descriptions of its practical function, whereas others refer to it, for instance, under descriptions of its physical appearance. Since valuations of the former type are in most cases positively correlated with …
Response To Jon Boone's Critique, Yuriko Saito
Response To Jon Boone's Critique, Yuriko Saito
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
No abstract provided.
Natural And Empty Desires: An Epicurean View Of Musical Experience, Daniel Putnam
Natural And Empty Desires: An Epicurean View Of Musical Experience, Daniel Putnam
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Epicureans distinguish natural desires, which have their origin in the body itself, from empty desires which are imposed by society. Natural desires allow a person to enjoy pleasures free from anxiety and worry. Empty desires such as those for status or luxury are endless and lead to a life of frustration, resentment and anxiety. In this paper I apply this distinction to musical experience and differentiate between the genuine enjoyment of music and musical experience tainted by empty desires.
Are Supertasters Good Candidates For Being Human Ideal Critics?, Francis Raven
Are Supertasters Good Candidates For Being Human Ideal Critics?, Francis Raven
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
This paper asks whether supertasters possess the criteria for ideal critics that David Hume outlines in his essay "Of the Standard of Taste." This might seem like a straightforward question, but there is a paradox involving supertasters: They possess more tastebuds than normal tasters, making it reasonable to assume they fulfill the requirements for Humean ideal critics with respect to taste. However, because they have more tastebuds, supertasters find certain foods bitter that normal tasters do not and thus negatively evaluate them. This might indicate that supertasters actually make poor candidates for being Humean ideal critics with respect to taste. …
The Evolution And Revolutions Of The Networked Art Aesthetic, Jeanne Marie Kusina
The Evolution And Revolutions Of The Networked Art Aesthetic, Jeanne Marie Kusina
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Mail art, artist books, artist amps, assemblings, experimental and visual poetry, Email art, video, and performance art have all, at various times, been considered members of the loosely configured classification known as "Networked art". Yet the common thread associating these diverse media is not the manner of their production, but rather the dynamic way in which they are distributed throughout artist networks. Emphasizing communication and generosity, Networked artists attempt to subvert conventional systems of exchange while also maintaining an intimacy of expression. I will discuss these qualities and how they often evolve from subtle attempts to undermine an allegedly flawed …
Anchorage To The World, Ken-Ichi Sasaki
Anchorage To The World, Ken-Ichi Sasaki
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
We are anchored to the world because we are bodies. For us, the world means human society based upon nature. Nature is an essential constituent. For human being is bodily existence: social relationships are basically formed through the contact between these bodily existences, one with another, and the cultural space, that is, the city, is based on matter and surrounded by nature. Hence the possibility and the necessity of anchorage. An inanimate object is simply thrown into the sea of matter. Human bodies, on the contrary, do not only belong to this material texture in a passive way but can …
'Man Has Always Danced': Forays Into The Origins Of An Art Largely Forgotten By Philosophers, Maxine Sheets-Johnstone
'Man Has Always Danced': Forays Into The Origins Of An Art Largely Forgotten By Philosophers, Maxine Sheets-Johnstone
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Philosophers have had comparatively little to say of the art of dance, a surprising fact given the range of people both inside and outside of dance who have claimed that 'man has always danced.' This essay attempts to substantiate this claim by an inquiry into the origins of dance, its focal attention being on the word always and any linkage to males deriving from that focal point of attention. It begins with evolutionary considerations in the form of courtship displays, behaviors finely and extensively described by Darwin, and goes on to consider displays by chimpanzees in particular. These considerations point …
Foreword, Ossi Naukkarinen, Arto Haappala
Foreword, Ossi Naukkarinen, Arto Haappala
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
No abstract provided.
Aesthetics And Mobility - A Short Introduction Into A Moving Field, Ossi Naukkarinen
Aesthetics And Mobility - A Short Introduction Into A Moving Field, Ossi Naukkarinen
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Aesthetics cannot by any means be defined only as philosophy of art. Everything can be approached from an aesthetic standpoint. Aesthetically interesting ways to move about can be found in most everyday situations. Our everyday mobility consists of various ways of getting about, and sometimes our approach to them is aesthetically colored. That we move in different ways and link them with aesthetic considerations of some sort is deeply rooted in our thinking. Our bodily experiences of the world are typically movement experiences, and our conceptual thinking is also built on them: We simply cannot make sense of the world …
From Mobile Ontologies To Mobile Aesthetics, Jos De Mul
From Mobile Ontologies To Mobile Aesthetics, Jos De Mul
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
We are living in a globalizing world, characterized by constant and rapid innovation. As we are inclined to go with this flow and its accompanying discourse of mobility, there is a danger that we overlook the persistence of cultural traditions. However, this paper argues that important differences exist between pre-modern, modern and post-modern traditions with regard to the form mobility takes. After a short discussion of the role information and communication technologies play in post-modern traditions, it is argued that these technologies transform our world, and not only our electronic files, into a global database and, as a consequence, generate …
Aesthetics Of Movement And Everyday Aesthetics, Pentti Määttänen
Aesthetics Of Movement And Everyday Aesthetics, Pentti Määttänen
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
How the general notion of experience is understood determines to some extent what one thinks about art and aesthetic experience. Pragmatism widens the concept of experience from that of sense experience. Action, practice and movement are epistemologically significant elements of experience. The environment is not just perceived, it is experienced also by acting, moving around and participating in different practices, as can be spelled out in terms of Peircean semiotics. From the pragmatist point of view, aesthetic experience is not characterized only as disinterested contemplation of art works and other elements of our environment as objects of perception. Aesthetic experience …
Learning From Venice, Max Ryynänen
Learning From Venice, Max Ryynänen
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
What role does arrival play in our aesthetic interaction with a city? Traveling to Venice drastically changed following the building of the railway. The way the city was perceived was wholly altered. The facade of Venice moved from the harbor to the railway station, without any changes being made to the city itself or its architecture. How did this change Venice and how did it change visiting it, and what can we learn from this case?
Mobility: The Fourth Dimension In The Fine Arts And Architecture, Gerd-Helge Vogel
Mobility: The Fourth Dimension In The Fine Arts And Architecture, Gerd-Helge Vogel
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Mobility is a basic behavioural pattern of human beings that has been accelerating in the course of its social development. Especially since the beginnings of the industrial revolution, mobility has caused a fundamental change in human relationships that continues today. This becomes visible when we look at the aesthetic and spiritual impact on architecture and the fine arts. It is my intention to present significant examples in order to give an idea of the different stages of its development today.