Although intimate, the aesthetic experience escapes all inquiry of its nature. We had searched, in vain, for centuries. The history of aesthetics from Plato in the 5th century B.C.E to Hume in the 17th attempts to locate the beautiful in the object. During this time, the beautiful either unveils itself directly—e.g., in the work’s quality of mimesis, greek term signifying the imitation or impression of the real, or, beauty unveils itself indirectly—e.g., in taste, which is none other than the capacity of the rational subject to recognize the objectives conditions of beauty in the work. It’s not until the 18th century that Kant recognizes that beauty possesses a subjective element, a certain pleasure evoked in the subject. This seems evident now. To experience the beautiful is to experience a particular sentiment.
Thus reasons Kant in the Critique of the Faculty of Judgment in examining the deep tension between subject and object by way of four movements or conditions of the beautiful. This allows him not only to resolve problems of objectivity/subjectivity but also though concerning, for example, the difference between natural beauty and artistic beauty, the origin of the work, etc. Nonetheless, these conditions don’t suffice to formulate a complete aesthetic theory; they neglect certain artistic mediums, specifically conceptual art. It’s also not evident how these conditions are unified as a class, an absence inviting us to suspect them as an arbitrary medley.
I propose a thesis in which I hold that these four conditions or movements of beauty described by Kant should be interpreted as a necessity of the effect of the work on the powers of introspection. This introduces the possibility to introduce further conditions of the same type which would incorporate neglected art forms (e.g. much non-visual art). This will push beauty towards the subjective. Like Kant, I’ll work to balance a theory of beauty containing subjective and objective elements: the work unveils itself as an object providing a particular impact upon specific internal mental states of the subject; nevertheless, this relation between work and mind reflects an objective fact of nature.
Do you mean beauty has objective elements in that it is an object of experience or that it is independent of our experience?
ReplyDeleteI thought that because Kant wanted people to separate themselves from prior concepts of beauty, or indeed even from their feeling or state at the time (So a thirsty man wont find a painting of a glass of water beautiful), it would make beauty in art objective. I could be wrong here but I assumed that because Kant wished to separate these things and because he believed all rational being have the same mental processes it would have to be objective. I could be wrong though.
ReplyDeleteI haven't done alot of work on Kant recently, but I really like the ideas that you presented in class and on the blog. The balance between the subjective and the objective for art and individual taste provides us with a very interesting interpretation of Kant's work.
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