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Articles 241 - 270 of 472
Full-Text Articles in Aesthetics
Aesthetic Engagement: Art Into Politics, Jale Erzen
Aesthetic Engagement: Art Into Politics, Jale Erzen
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
No abstract provided.
Influence Of Global Aesthetics On Chinese Aesthetics: The Adaptation Of Moxie And The Case Of Dafen Cun, Eva Kit Wah Man
Influence Of Global Aesthetics On Chinese Aesthetics: The Adaptation Of Moxie And The Case Of Dafen Cun, Eva Kit Wah Man
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
This article examines the practice of moxie or imitation in art in Chinese aesthetics, compares it with the Platonic notion of mimesis, and explicates its original meaning. I then trace its development from traditional painting to the late Qing export paintings in which traditional Chinese aesthetics was combined with Western perspectives to satisfy Western tastes. The discussion extends to the contemporary development of moxie in China by considering the case of Dafen Cun, an art village in Shenzhen that is famous for its copycat art practices. It explores how Dafen Cun has become a major exporter of copies of Western …
Experiencing Photographs Qua Photographs: What's So Special About Them?, Jiri Benovsky
Experiencing Photographs Qua Photographs: What's So Special About Them?, Jiri Benovsky
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
No abstract provided.
Public Aquariums And Marine Aesthetics, Nola Semczyszyn
Public Aquariums And Marine Aesthetics, Nola Semczyszyn
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Given the inaccessibility of the marine environment, the closest many of us come to viewing it is at public aquariums. Aquariums also provide us with rich aesthetic experiences, but it is not clear whether we appreciate the marine environment at aquariums. I present the dilemma of aquarium appreciation as an inconsistent triad: 1) we treat aquariums as places to appreciate marine environments, 2) aquariums are artifacts, not natural objects, and 3) nature and art should be appreciated differently. I argue that aquarium displays are scientific models of marine environments with aesthetic, educational, and scientific aims. My solution to the dilemma …
Atopia & Aesthetics. A Modal Perspective, Yves Millet
Atopia & Aesthetics. A Modal Perspective, Yves Millet
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Living in an era where global exchanges of forms and ideas are the norm raises some questions about the status of artistic practices. To explore these questions, we use Roland Barthes’ notion of atopia and the complementary yet related notion of Neutral on which Barthes commented in his later years. Atopia highlights the fact that rather than viewing current artistic activities as searches for homogenous identity, we need to view them as belonging to plural communities of practices offering modal and qualitative distinctions. We suggest that adopting this perspective sheds light on the capacity of any individual to act creatively …
Perspectives East And West, Ken-Ichi Sasaki
Perspectives East And West, Ken-Ichi Sasaki
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
No abstract provided.
In Praise Of Ambiguity: Musical Subtlety And Merleau-Ponty, Tiger C. Roholt
In Praise Of Ambiguity: Musical Subtlety And Merleau-Ponty, Tiger C. Roholt
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
When a jazz, rock, or hip-hop drummer strikes certain notes in each measure slightly late, instead of hearing the degree to which those notes are late, we typically hear the effects of those variations; namely, a groove, the "feel" of a rhythm. Slight variations of pitch function similarly. In this essay, I argue that certain analytic theorists go astray due to their preoccupation with the variations themselves. By invoking Maurice Merleau-Ponty's insights into subtle visual perceptions, and his notion of perceptual indeterminacy, I avoid an account of musical subtlety suggested by Daniel Dennett that is too coarse-grained, as well as …
The Definition Of Everyday Aesthetics, Kevin Melchionne
The Definition Of Everyday Aesthetics, Kevin Melchionne
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
This article responds to recent controversy in the aesthetics of everyday life with a succinct definition designed to clarify the domain of study. The article is intentionally designed for brevity and accessibility in order to facilitate usage.
The Aesthetics Of Resistance, Giuseppe Patella
The Aesthetics Of Resistance, Giuseppe Patella
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Talking about resistance means raising the question of opposition, of denying all attempts at neutralizing opposites, which would be typical of ideological construction, either political or aesthetic. This essay investigates the meaning and the reasons of resistance according to a theoretical, aesthetic, and cultural point of view. The thesis is that resistance has to be considered as an articulation of difference, and that means following a different logic of thought, no longer rigid or monolithic but plural, like a new grammar, syntax, and practice of creativity, challenge, provocation, multiplicity, and pluralism. In this sense the aesthetics of resistance is an …
Hegel's Symbolic Stage: An Old Perspective On Contemporary Art, Laura T. Disumma-Koop
Hegel's Symbolic Stage: An Old Perspective On Contemporary Art, Laura T. Disumma-Koop
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
This paper proposes an evaluation of contemporary art works in light of some of the concepts embedded in Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel’s symbolic stage. My belief is that an analysis of Hegel’s conditions for the affirmation of art opens the door to a discussion of contemporary artistic trends, a discussion that also takes distance from the (perhaps) abused question of what defines art. Art does more than question itself; art questions, and challenges, the nature of our perception.
The World Achieved: Film And The Enacted Mind, John M. Carvalho
The World Achieved: Film And The Enacted Mind, John M. Carvalho
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Stanley Cavell taught us that films give us a view of a world that differs from the world in which we view films only by not being that world. Films, that is, screen a world for us and screen us from a world that is not our own. Cavell’s view is based on a photographic conception of film images. A film is composed of photographic images collected on reels and put in motion at twenty-four frames per second. In “More of the World Viewed,” Cavell dares us to come up with a theory of perception that challenges the assumption that …
The Violence Of Post-Racial Memory And The Political Sense Of Mourning, Alfred Frankowski
The Violence Of Post-Racial Memory And The Political Sense Of Mourning, Alfred Frankowski
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
In this paper I argue that “post-raciality” entails a way of remembering that depoliticizes the social meaning of memory and thus of history. Through aesthetic critique, I attempt to show how the hyper-production of memory obscures the very real forms of violence directed toward non-whites. By developing the aesthetic critiques of W.E.B. Du Bois and Walter Benjamin, I argue that representing former violence as social memory fails to adequately address subtle forms of cultural and residual violence. Furthermore, I argue that post-racial memory produces sites and representations of the past only to enact a type of social forgetting in the …
Report On The Xixth International Congress Of Aesthetics, Michael Ranta, Jale N. Erzen
Report On The Xixth International Congress Of Aesthetics, Michael Ranta, Jale N. Erzen
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
No abstract provided.
Pornography And Disgust, Laurent Stern
Pornography And Disgust, Laurent Stern
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Disgust about material objects and moral behavior are both at issue in understanding pornography. Previous debates were fueled primarily by moral disgust. Erotic art may elicit moral disgust, but only hard-core pornography elicits material disgust. I discuss the role of attraction and aversion in labeling artworks pornographic. Since we always have a choice between acknowledging and ignoring a disgust elicitor, aversion may be a necessary, but not a sufficient condition for such a label. In submitting our choice to rational critique, we must ask: what do we accept as a consequence of the claim that that x is disgusting? Relying …
The Aesthetics Of City Strolling, Heinz Paetzold
The Aesthetics Of City Strolling, Heinz Paetzold
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
No abstract provided.
Hot Emotions: Dissolving The Paradox Of Fiction, Katherine Tullman
Hot Emotions: Dissolving The Paradox Of Fiction, Katherine Tullman
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
This essay critiques two of the main theories in the philosophy of emotions, the pure-cognitive theory and the neo-Jamesian theory, through the paradox of fiction. After explaining the different kinds of emotions we experience when engaging with fictions, I argue that a middle-ground, hybrid theory more adequately accounts for current scientific research and the paradox of fiction than either of the previous two. I propose a “HOT” theory of emotions (higher-order thought) specifically to explain complex emotions about fictions.
On 'Shock:' The Artistic Imagination Of Benjamin And Brecht, Mara Polgovsky Ezcurra
On 'Shock:' The Artistic Imagination Of Benjamin And Brecht, Mara Polgovsky Ezcurra
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
“Shock” is perhaps the central concept of modernist aesthetics and Walter Benjamin its best known theorist. It has been well documented that Benjamin’s long-lasting friendship with Bertolt Brecht and the latter’s dramatic theory had a profound influence on his thinking about this notion. Brecht's techniques of interruption and juxtaposition in the practice of epic theater were in close relationship with Benjamin’s use of montage as a mechanism to “liberate” meaning. Despite Theodor Adorno’s and Gershom Scholem’s attempt to situate Benjamin’s thought in a different aesthetic tradition, Brecht’s understanding of Verfremdung (estrangement) and Benjamin’s idea of “shock” are often deemed identical. …
A Cognitive Theory Of The Aesthetic Experience, Gianluca Consoli
A Cognitive Theory Of The Aesthetic Experience, Gianluca Consoli
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
This paper aims at naturalizing the aesthetic experience on the basis of cognitive sciences. In traditional philosophical aesthetics, the aesthetic experience requires a specific attitude and a characteristic work of imagination. Today, cognitive sciences offer a rich set of empirically corroborated concepts useful in explaining these notions in naturalistic terms. This paper extends these concepts to explain how the aesthetic experience is integrated and how it affords knowledge.
Artification And The Aesthetic Regime Of Art, Aleš Erjavec
Artification And The Aesthetic Regime Of Art, Aleš Erjavec
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
The author discusses “artification” and attempts to ascertain whether some common features can be found between artification and Jacques Rancière’s aesthetics, especially his notion of the “aesthetic regime of art.” The author argues that Rancière’s project of “art become life” can be employed as a common denominator of both theoretical frameworks, that of artification and that of the aesthetic regime of art. Nonetheless, the art to which Rancière’s notion primarily applies is different from art in the traditional sense, which seems to form the empirical basis of the notion of artification.
When Is Artification?, Roberta Shapiro, Nathalie Heinich
When Is Artification?, Roberta Shapiro, Nathalie Heinich
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
How do people do or make things that come to be seen as works of art? In other words, when is there artification? The answer to this question is simultaneously symbolic, material, and contextual. It has to do with meanings, objects, interaction, and institutions. We seek to define not what art is nor how it should be considered, but how and under what circumstances it comes about by way of methodical observation and inquiry in a variety of fields. Circus acrobats, break-dancers, fashion designers, chefs, graffiti artists, printers, photographers, and jazz musicians are some of the examples we explore. This …
"... And I'D Look At My Hands And Think Of Lady Macbeth ...", Yrjänä Levanto
"... And I'D Look At My Hands And Think Of Lady Macbeth ...", Yrjänä Levanto
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
After resigning from the service of Sotheby's Auction House, Bruce Chatwin changed his views on art, the art world, and art history. He developed an approach that differed from established art-historical writing; he began to contextualize differently. He saw and understood the use of artistic means more widely than in traditional art-historical writing. From Chatwin's viewpoint, one possibility was to "smuggle" new material into the existing system. In this study, I take as my material Bruce Chatwin's enthusiasm and loyalty to Andre Malraux and his ideas about Le Musee Imaginaire. I also make use of Chatwin's interest in Heinrich Wolfflin's …
Judgment, Justice, And Art Criticism, Jolanta Nowak
Judgment, Justice, And Art Criticism, Jolanta Nowak
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
The purpose of this article is to expose a gap in the current academic discussion of visual art criticism: the lack of serious attention to the role of ethical judgment. Critics tend either to avoid discussing the judgment of art or they dismiss it as a contemporary impossibility. However, ethical criticism is nonetheless practiced, albeit only occasionally and in an under-theorized manner. This paper calls for a reconceptualization of ethical judgment in art criticism, a reconceptualization that brings art into explicit relation with ethics.
From Environmental Aesthetics To Narratives Of Change, Nathalie Blanc
From Environmental Aesthetics To Narratives Of Change, Nathalie Blanc
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
Environmental aesthetics is a branch of philosophy that originated in the English-speaking world and is developing in France. It aims to take a new look at how relationships with the environment are constructed. Often addressed from a landscaping, technical or scientific angle, such relationships have remained largely unaddressed from a cultural perspective, i.e., one that includes a series of practices and values that represent a human group. In this article, I will address environmental aesthetics and how they point up tensions between fixed and static visual representations of the environment in the future and representations that can accommodate ordinary encounters, …
Flesh As Communication -- Body Art And Body Theory, Falk Heinrich
Flesh As Communication -- Body Art And Body Theory, Falk Heinrich
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
On the last pages of The Visible and the Invisible, Merleau-Ponty investigates “the bond between flesh and idea, and the internal armature which [it] manifests and which it conceals.” Flesh and idea are intertwined in that the body reflects on itself in the act of perception and, one could add, action. A correlative bond lies in communication theory as the operational difference between ego and alter-ego. This article investigates the non-semiotic intertwinement of ‘flesh’ in art perception and theory based on communication theory in performance art (body art). The thesis is that ‘flesh’ in performance art is presented as absolute …
Fragments In Libeskind And Wittgenstein, Rossen Ventzislavov
Fragments In Libeskind And Wittgenstein, Rossen Ventzislavov
Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)
My paper explores the similar role that fragments play in Wittgenstein’s later philosophy and in Libeskind’s architecture. The fragment is an infraction of traditional linear approaches to architecture and philosophy and thus affords an alternative critical glimpse into the fabric of each respective field. The fact that some philosophy and architecture use this device and its critical stance bodes well not only for the futures of the two disciplines but also for the embattled connection between them. In my paper I try to show that the break with linearity Wittgenstein and Libeskind engage in effectively replaces the ivory towers of …