Beauty has long been an essential term in the conversation about art. In all artistic media, beauty is used as a qualification of value; a musical composition can be beautiful, as can a shot in a film or the draping of fabric in a garment. Kandinsky’s essay, Concerning the Spiritual in Art, is no exception when it comes to using beauty as a term to qualify the value of art. His essay focuses on visual art and the way that colors and forms interact with the human soul to evoke emotional responses. However, in the essay, Kandinsky utilizes beauty in multiple ways to argue numerous different and contrary points in his argument about what defines good art, leaving the reader confused as to whether beauty is a positive quality of art or a superficial …show more content…
Kandinsky here states that pursuing beauty will make art fit only for meaningless decoration of commercial items. Aiming for beauty alone, Kandinsky says, restricts humanity from understanding the true purpose of color and form and from reaching point of harmony. In these two passages, beauty is both a superficial quality and a distracting and restrictive characteristic. This use of beauty, though so far consistent, still manages to perplex the reader. Outside the realm of Kandinsky’s essay, beauty is synonymous with goodness; it is a positive attribute, one to seek out in the world. It is therefore perplexing that Kandinsky here undermines the association of beauty and goodness. Furthermore, in the greater world, beauty has a multitude of definitions, each with subtle differences that distinguish them. Because of the fact that none of the many working definitions of beauty which exist outside of Kandinsky’s essay align with the way beauty is presented here, along with the lack of a definitive definition of the beauty which Kandinsky utilizes in these examples, he cannot use it to qualify art, even in the negative …show more content…
He says,
¶ 12Leave a comment on paragraph 120 “I am using the former to mean ‘outer need,’ which never goes beyond conventional limits, nor produces other than conventional beauty. The ‘inner need’ knows no such limits, and often produces results conventionally considered ‘ugly.’ But ‘ugly’ itself is a conventional term, and only means ‘spiritually unsympathetic,’ being applied to some expression of an inner need, either outgrown or not yet attained. But everything which adequately expresses the inner need is beautiful” (VI.42 footnote).
¶ 13Leave a comment on paragraph
Thus the illusion of beauty is still possible and even Gorgeous displays emotion despite knowing this “she adores her work from a distance for such a long time and it makes her cry”. Therefore, the irony in this story still exists for Gorgeous to end up being in a relationship with an artist. The personification of beauty continues as Wels’ remarks “Their relationship is the usual kind in which beauty and appreciation are dancing partners”. As she becomes a ‘model’, again ‘stillness’ is idealised as the trademark of beauty. As a result, the humour in Wels’ story also becomes tragic with Gorgeous’ realisation that beauty is fabricated and that the most beautiful are those that are
He clarifies his interpretation of aesthetic value, rejecting the traditionally narrow notions regarding beauty and composition, and expands his view to include insights and emotions expressed through the medium. Explaining that he views overall value as an all-things-considered judgement, he asserts the ethicist’s duty to contrast the aesthetic with the ethical and determine the extent to which one outweighs the other. Gaut calls on readers to defy the popular paradigm equating beauty with goodness and ugly with evil, allowing for great, yet flawed pieces of
For majority of people, cruising through a fine arts museum or gallery is nothing short of browsing through a textbook and failing to grasping knowledge of the content. A casual activity and check off ones list of to-dos, sometimes done just for the appearance it offers. Of that majority, one might look at a painting for a long while before connecting the uncommunicated dots from gallery label. But for the small remaining others, a trip to an art exhibition is a journey through emotions and feelings rendered by the artists of the particular works of art. Leo Tolstoy deems this to be the appropriate response to “true art” in his What is Art?, published in 1897. Tolstoy responds to the
The nature of aesthetics has puzzled many, where questions and reflections about art, beauty, and taste have intersected with our understanding of what a real art experience truly is. The notion of the aesthetic experience, an experience that differs from the everyday experiences, has been given great consideration by English art critic Clive Bell and American philosopher John Dewey since the beginning of the 20th century. Both have spent much deliberation on the distinctive character of aesthetic experience; yet have complete opposing ideas on how to go about understanding aesthetic experience’s ecosystem. Bell takes a formalist approach, as he thinks that to understand everything about a work of art, one has to only look at the work of art.
Who sets the standards for beauty? What must one do to truly look beautiful? What does feeling beautiful mean? When considering the concept of beauty one must differentiate between the universal and relative perception of beauty. Among the components of universal beauty are harmony, symmetry and utility. However, perception of beauty is also relative, when it is defined by the standards of the time that are subjective to the socio economic values of the era. One of the ways these values are communicated is through images portrayed in art and in modern times through the media. ‘Fashion’ is the carrier of theses values though physical appearance and self-image that define power, rank, acceptability and belonging. Having ‘fashion’ as the medium of these relative values bring advantages and disadvantages. Although there are benefits of matching the fashion of the time, positive self-image and satisfaction with a feeling of acceptance these are temporary because fashion is ever changing. On the other hand not conforming to the contemporary standards can have a detrimental impact on self-image that leads to feeling a sense negative self worth and marginalized. Eating disorders are a powerful manifestation that fashion has on the psyche. The underlying idea of what fashion ‘is’ is value. Amongst all the change of fashion, value remains ever present.
It appears to me that pictures have been over-valued; held up by a blind admiration as ideal things, and almost as standards by which nature is to be judged rather than the reverse; and this false estimate has been sanctioned by the extravagant epithets that have been applied to painters, and "the divine," "the inspired," and so forth. Yet in reality, what are the most sublime productions of the pencil but selections of some of the forms of nature, and copies of a few of her evanescent effects, and this is the result, not of inspiration, but of long and patient study, under the instruction of much good sense…
In this essay I will be discussing what, in my own opinion, makes good art. To justify what I consider to be a good standard of art, I will be analyzing the work of French symbolist Eugene Carriere and contrasting this with artwork I consider to not be 'good art'.
Unlike science, art is subjective. The artist leaves behind a part of himself in his work. Therefore, each piece has its own distinct perspective. Frida Kahlo’s self-portraits show her view on her life, on how she has faced so many struggles, yet managed to be a strong person. When we see or hear or read an artistic creation, it produces a mood such as calm or loud, fear or safety. For example, the Eiffel Tower gives Paris a majestic awe; everyone who passes by feels the strength of the 113-year-old grand structure. Art also has a texture. Photographs reveal much through their textures; grainy surfaces often make the picture more realistic while smooth ones seem softer. When we hear a piece of music or see a film, a rhythm carries us from one part to another. Not just true for these two genres, rhythm is present in any artistic work. These few properties are characteristic of everything we encounter in the world of art, the world of human expression. Most have other special features also. Most of the time, though, we do not think about these characteristics because we do not have enough time to pay attention to anything for more than a few seconds.
Introduction Upon my first encounter with Kandinsky's painting, my eyes and indeed my mind were overcome with a sense of puzzlement, as it seemed impossible to decipher what lay beneath his passionate use of colour and distorted forms. Kandinsky hoped by freeing colour from its representational restrictions, it, like music could conjure up a series of emotions in the soul of viewer, reinforced by corresponding forms. Throughout this essay, I will follow Kandinsky's quest for a pure, abstract art and attempt to determine whether his passionate belief in this spiritual art and his theories on its effects on the soul, can truly be felt and appreciated by the average viewer, who at first glance would most likely view Kandinsky's paintings as simply abstract. Kandinsky was indeed a visionary, an artist who through his theoretical ideas of creating a new pictorial language sought to revolutionize the art of the twentieth-century. Regarded as the founder of abstract painting, he broke free from arts traditional limitations and invented the first painting for paintings sake, whereby the dissolution of the object and subsequent promotion of colour and form became means of expression in their own right.
Just as other works that reflect art, pieces in the category of fine arts serve the important message of passing certain messages or portraying a special feeling towards a particular person, function or activity. At times due to the nature of a particular work, it can become so valuable that its viewers cannot place a price on it. It is not the nature or texture of an art that qualifies it, but the appreciation by those who look at it (Lewis & Lewis, 2008).
Philosophies of Art and Beauty Edited by Hofstadter and Kuhns, (Chicago: University of Chicago press, 1976) chapters one and two for an overview of the aesthetics of Plato and Aristotle.
In this paper, I investigate the overall Enlightenment role that Kant conceived for aesthetic experience, and especially, of the beautiful. (1) I argue for an interpretation of Kant's aesthetics whereby the experience of the beautiful may play the same functional role in the invisible church of natural religion as Scripture does for the visible churches of ecclesiastical religions. Although aesthetic experience, for Kant, is autonomous by virtue of its disinterestedness, seemingly paradoxically, this very autonomy enables the beautiful, potentially, to serve profound moral and Enlightenment aims within his system. For Kant, because we are both rational and animal, we require embodiments of moral ideas, and thus, the experience of the beautiful is necessary in order to f...
The definition of beauty is varying among different people in the world. Even though almost everyone knows the term beauty, many people are struggling in defining it and persuading others to agree with their opinions. Beauty is defined by a combination of qualities existent in a person or thing that fulfills the aesthetic feels or brings about profound gratification. Many people define beauty as a term to describe a person’s physical appearance; they often think that beauty comes from magazines, video girls, or even models. Although the term beauty can define a person’s physical appearance, true beauty lies in the way one acts and thinks rather than the way one look.
Art is one of the unique ways of communication which may be the reason why not everyone could understand why colors, shapes, sounds, movements, etc. can mean a lot if understood, and it’s incomprehensible with the use of words; not to mention, if people get the opportunity to judge creation of beauty like a test-paper, probably the history of art and facts we know these days would have been fabricated, sugar-coated, lies, and fraud. It may also seem that we have not achieved the beauty of creations of our fellow ancestors at
In A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Stephen Dedalus defines beauty and the artist's comprehension of his/her own art. Stephen uses his esthetic theory with theories borrowed from St. Thomas Aquinas and Plato. The discourse can be broken down into three main sections: 1) A definitions of beauty and art. 2) The apprehension and qualifications of beauty. 3) The artist's view of his/her own work. I will explain how the first two sections of his esthetic theory relate to Stephen. Furthermore, I will argue that in the last section, Joyce is speaking of Stephen Dedalus and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man as his art.