The Greeks were concerned with many things philosophically; the concept of "beauty" was one of them. At first glance, this subject can seem a bit trivial. Compared to contemplating what exists, or the concept of good and evil, 'what is beauty?' seems to lack a little weight, but there are some very interesting and important questions loaded in the concept of beauty. In this post 'beauty' should be considered that which is aesthetically or visually pleasing.
I had prepared some research on the subject over a month ago but a couple things this past week re-sparked my motivation to tackle the intro course to this subject. The first was a movie The Art of the Steal and the second a show I saw this morning, This is Civilization titled "Uncertainty." "Uncertainty" provided a comprehensive look at the history of 20th century art and the very best description of abstract/abstract expressionist art I have heard.
The movie was about the art collection of Alfred C Barnes. It follows the control of the foundation that is in charge of it, and the legal battle of where and how it should be displayed. It is an interesting documentary about something I didn't know anything about. What sparked my interest specifically was not the magnitude of the collection itself, estimated to be worth between 25 billion and priceless (the Barnes Foundation has the largest collection of post-impressionist art in America and, to some, the most impressive collection in the world) but specifically was how Mr. Barnes acquired this art.
He became a millionaire around the turn of the 20th century and soon after fostered an interest in collecting art. He traveled to France and around Europe and started meeting with artists and buying paintings that he liked. When he brought these paintings back to Philadelphia and showed them to the public he was ridiculed for showing ugly, uninteresting paintings. Lo and behold some 15 years later the art Alfred had begun collecting grew exponentially in value as post-impressionist art swept the world. Mr. Barnes would tell you that he was just collecting paintings that he enjoyed, but in effect what he did was predict the next large movement in the global art culture.
Aesthetics as a philosophical subject is concerned with which objects are considered visually pleasing whether they are art or not. Artists create art objects as representations (of the human experience, etc...) in doing so they are commenting directly on their personal aesthetic philosophy. The very creation of art is a philosophical statement. Because of this a large chunk of the philosophy of aesthetics concerns itself with art, however it is also concerned with the beauty in non-art objects.
Art creates an interesting aesthetic dilemma: should the standard for beauty be the same for art objects and non-art objects?
Until next week...
GREAT to have you back Tim, and a thought-provokin' post too. Far from being trivial, the notion of beauty seems one of the most enigmatic and confounding concepts born of our modern minds. The "aesthetic universals" in the Wikipedia article seem woefully inadequate. The concept of wabi-sabi comes to mind. Aesthetic judgement sits like queen bee in the middle of our hive, driving a great deal of our actions, and how little we question it really.
ReplyDeleteWhen you've figured out beauty, would you mind explaining integrity (without dragging morals into it)? Thanks. The two intersect somewhere I think. - beth
Without getting too in depth, my stance on beauty reckons to that of my stance on ethics. In ethics one must ask, is there even a "right" or "wrong" to discuss; in aesthetics i think there is an unasked question: does "beauty" exist? This question aids in the complication of art as far as the philosophy of aesthetics is concerned.
ReplyDeleteIntegrity is a very heavy word. "Integrity" in art assumes there is "beauty" in the world and i think there is one sentence in particular in this post that speaks to the concept of integrity: "Artists create art objects as representations (of the human experience, etc...) in doing so they are commenting directly on their personal aesthetic philosophy." When someone creates an "art object" it is a personal account of an aesthetic philosophy." The motivation behind such a philosophy can be many things: motivated by artistic intent, motivated by money, motivated by mind altering substances, etc...). An artists integrity is measured by artistic intent.
Questions: Does "integrity" effect "beauty" (and vice versa)? Can someone create a sublimely beautiful artistic piece with the most base, reprehensible, intent?