Aesthetics and Art

Lecture 2 PHIL 2618/3681 Professor David Macarthur “Aesthetics” in C18 Germany • Baumgarten (1739): “Aesthetics… is the

science of sensitive cognition”.

• We might say it concerns interesting

perceptible properties. • “Sensitive cognition” sounds like an

oxymoron! • How could something sensory be a form of

cognition (knowledge, understanding, truth)?

Beauty and the Sublime • C18: great interest in the beautiful and the

sublime in nature; and in art & architecture.

• Q: What about other aesthetic terms e.g.

dainty, graceful, ugly, unbalanced… • Central idea: the freedom of the imagination

as represented by the artistic genius. Lecture 1 - Summary • Plato: “art” (craft) = an imitation of nature (often

human nature) or its “appearances”.

• Art concerns a non-cognitive (not-knowing)

emotional experience. • Plato recognizes that there are many ideas of

‘imitation’: imitating a look, or a sound;

impersonating human character or action, etc.

• Plato also speaks of ‘imitating’ the Forms by way

of imperfect instantiation. Note Forms, being

abstract, have no appearances. Aristotle’s “Yes, but…” Qualifications of

Plato • Art is imitative not of actual nature but of

possible nature (what it might become as

opposed to what it is). Art concerns the plausible.

• Art is not theoretical knowledge but involves

practical knowledge about character, how to act

and live well. •

Art is emotive but not dangerously so. Tragedy,

which arouses pity and fear, can also dissipate

these emotions through catharsis. Platonic Insights • Art as a from of inspired craftsmanship is an

artefact: something made by human intentional

activity for some purpose. • Q: What is the purpose of art? • It may have some representational content which

falls short of knowledge.

• Q: if art is not knowledge how can it seem to be

knowledge? • Art has great (perhaps dangerous) emotive power

which leads Plato into questions of censorship.

Plato’s Banishment of Poetry from the

Just City • Background: In ancient Greek life, epic and dramatic

poetry (which involved a chorus, actors and dancers)

was used for educational purposes. • Poetic presentations of heroic deeds of men and Gods

provided morally authoritative exemplars of noble

characters and action. • Plato only banishes poetry from the “just city” – not

painting or music or sculpture.

• This cannot be a matter of its imitative nature or its

emotional impact since all of these arts are imitative

and emotional. • Why is poetry, in particular, singled out?

Plato on Emotion in Art • Art has a powerful destablizing effects on us:

(1) It appeals to the non-rational part of us

and so is dangerous and must be controlled;

(2) Its content is not constrained by the state

or the political will. It is, according to the

Platonic myth, divinely inspired; that is, it is free

or autonomous in what it is about and the

means used.

Emotion & Politics • Art, through its emotive power, can suggest

alternative ways to be, alternative things to

value – again something dangerous from the

point of view of dictators and authoritarian

politics. • Recall how “degenerate” art was banished and

artists imprisioned by Hitler, Mao and the

Khmer Rouge.

Emotion: Two Visions • For Plato emotion is an affective non-cognitive state that

has ungovernable action tendencies. E.g. fear, anger,

elation, love. • For Aristotle emotion is affective and (partially) cognitive. It

can be sensitive, to some extent, to reason.

• Is emotion a non-rational disruptive force in our lives as

Plato, Hume, Freud (etc.) think or is it a quasi-rational state

that can be reasoned with and that is a form of cognition as

Aristotle, neo-Kantians (etc.) think?

• How is one to argue for a vision of human nature? One’s

basic way of seeing things is an unargued starting point in

discussion.

R.G. Collingwood § 1889–1943 § Maverick Oxford philosopher § A trained archeologist and historian. § Both of his parents were artists. Art vs Craft

• Since C18 we distinguish “art proper” (fine

art) from craft (the useful arts, mere craft). • Craft involves distinctions between

– Means and end – Planning and execution – Raw materials and finished product – Form and matter • Art need not involve any of these, and

certainly not all of them. Pseudo-Art • “Representation… is always means to an end… the re-evocation of certain

emotions.”

• So representation is a craft with a predetermined end in view.

• Collingwood distinguishes two forms of representational “pseudo-art”:

1. “Magic art” arouses specific emotions by way of representation for spiritual or

practical ends. e.g. cave painting.

2. “Entertainment art” arouses specific emotions by way of representation for

amusement.

• Because magic art and entertainment art are directed at a certain goal both are

forms of craft (not art) according to Collingwood. They are means to some pre- determined spiritual or practical end by way of representation – a device of

craftwork.

Art Proper • True art expresses the artist’s emotion through

a process of self-discovery. • Pseudo-art arouses the audience’s emotion as

a predetermined end. • The emotion expressed by an artwork is that

of the artist.

• Note the important link Collingwood sees

between art and self-knowledge.

What is Emotion? 1. Emotions are often thought to have “objects” e.g. the loved person,

the feared dog. Are these intentional objects? Or perhaps only

causal triggers? 2. Emotions may involve, or are related to, certain views about the

world e.g. pride typically involves a belief that one has done

something worthy, creditable. 3. Emotions are action tendencies: if one is afraid of the dog then one

will avoid it. 4. Emotions involve seeing-as: in anger I see another as offensive. 6. Distinguish complex emotions (e.g. pride, shame, pity) from simple

emotions (e.g. anger, joy).

Emotions are or include complex psychological states that it makes

sense to think we could be unclear or confused about (in contrast

to mere feelings like pain).

Art = Expression of Emotion • Art is the expression of emotion.

• But what does Collingwood mean by

“expression” here? • Not mere expression. Not just betraying or

exhibiting emotion. E.g. showing signs of

anger is not an artwork.

• Nor does it mean arousing emotion in an

audience. Representation and Expression • One can employ Collingwood’s theory to

representational art so long as one relaxes

Collingwood’s own view of representation as having a

predetermined goal. • Representational art can be understood in terms of the

expression of emotion.

• This inclusiveness is a strength of the expressive theory

of art. • So it is possible to read Plato as an expressivist about

poetry at least. That is, poetic ‘imitations’ of nature can

be thought of as expressing certain emotions since on

Plato’s own grounds poetry is not a genuine craft. Stages in the Artistic Process • At first the artist is merely

conscious of having

some inchoate emotion, which is oppressive. • Then they express the emotion in some physical

art medium, e.g., words, marble, sounds, paint.

• Through artistic expression the emotion becomes

conscious and determinate by being articulated,

symbolized etc. In this form one is no longer

oppressed by it. • Cp. Freudian psychoanalysis.

Collingwood vs Tolstoy • The physically realized expression leads oneself

and the audience to understand how one feels.

But it is not required that one feels exactly the

same emotion oneself. • Contrast this with Tolstoy’s “infection theory” of

art. • In Tolstoy’s view (in What is Art?) an artist

“infects” other people, through their art, with

the precise feeling that the artist experienced

themselves in reality or imagination.

Description & Two Kinds of Expression • Distinguish mere (non-deliberative) expressions

of anger (“Ouch!”) describing anger “I’m really

angry!” and conscious or deliberative expression. • Note these are not exclusive categories: one can

express anger by describing it! • Collingwood is interested in the difference

between the general description of emotion and

a particular form of deliberative expression of it.

Embodiment • Expression is essentially embodied or mediated.

• The emotion does not exist apart from its

embodiment. It is not something that exists, say,

in the head. • Works of art exist in the publically accessible

media of their various embodiments.

• To explore one’s emotions is to explore the

artistic medium through which they are

expressed.

Art is Deliberative • On Collingwood’s view the activity of art is a

conscious, intentional, directed activity of

expression by way of some art-specific

medium to some audience. • If the requisite deliberative activity does not

transpire, then there is no art. A Common Humanity • Collingwood’s master idea: whenever a person

has articulated their feeling (based on some

apprehension of the world) sufficiently to make it

accessible to others, then they have produced a

work of art.

• This idea relies on the idea of a common

humanity i.e. a sharable understanding of human

responsiveness to the world, including the modes

of expressivity employed by artworks. Art & Self-Knowledge • The artist’s self-discovery represents a

possible self-discovery on the part of the

audience with respect to their own (actual or

potential) feelings.

• The artist’s process of self-knowledge is tested

by its communicability to others; emotional

clarity is a matter of one’s objectified

expression being understandable to others. Art & Modern Skepticism

• Idea: An artwork is analogous to another mind.

• Suggestion: Art is a realm in which the issue of

our comprehensibility to one another is explored. • Our responsiveness to art emblematizes our

comprehensibility to one another; our lack of

responsiveness to art emblematizes our lack of

comprehensibility.

• Modern art often strikes its audience as

incomprehensible.

The Importance of Art • The importance of this depends upon a threat to

the very idea of our being comprehensible to one

another in modern philosophy.

• This is what philosophy calls skepticism about

other minds. • Art both engages with the skeptical stance of

incomprehensibility and the non-skeptical stance

of comprehensibility.

• The importance of art, then, concerns the

importance of overcoming skepticism of other

minds, our common need for love and fellowship.

Art & Intimacy • Agreement in our responses to art is a source of

intimacy which contrasts with factual agreements

about objective matters e.g. about the weather

or the price of petrol.

• It is not based on compelling evidence, nor is it

guaranteed.

• Art can be a source of intimacy between

strangers: the instant rapport you feel with

someone who shares your love of film, novel,

dance, opera, etc. or particular examples of these

or the artists who made them. 51作业君版权所有