The search for a definition of Art has been subject of a complex philosophical reflection incorporated; however, within different thematics because the very idea of Art is changeable as it relies on the culture and the tradition of a particular epoch.
Etymologically, the word Aesthetics derives from the Greek àisthesis, which means perception by the senses. It used to refer as the study of the world of perceptions as the doctrine aimed to discover the complexity of perceptive knowledge.
In ancient times, the concept of Art was closely related to the practice with the technique which Plato argued were, certainly, not positive.
According to the philosopher, Art and Tragedy are copies of copies, the copies of the sensible world. He argues that there is a crisis on moral grounds: Art encourages and stimulates passions inducing human beings' to approach them.
For Aristotle on the contrary, the creation of an Artwork allows for the materialization of an idea and then its manifestation. According to the philosopher, beauty is order and symmetry and Art represents its imitation, not limited just to the reproduction of the sensible world.
There then came a complete revaluation of the concept of Art that Plato despised, with new ideas explaining Art as not representing the imitation of the sensible world, but of ideas themselves. In other words, Art mimics the universal.
Furthermore, Aristotle introduces the term “catharsis” or purification, showing how Art allowed for the rationalization of passions and the consequent control of them.
Only during the eighteen century, the independent philosophical discipline that relates to the beauty of Art, namely Aesthetics, became an effective method of study.
The German philosopher Baumgarten,...
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Beardsley, M., An Aesthetic Definition of Art, in H. Curtler, ed., What Is Art? (New York: Haven Publications, 1983) Reprinted in Lamarque and Olsen, eds. Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Art (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004), pp.55-62.
Dickie, G., What Is Art?: An Institutional Analysis, in his Art and the Aesthetic (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1974), ch.1.
Gaut, B., Art as a Cluster Concept, in N. Carroll, ed., Theories of Art Today (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 2000), pp.25-44.
Levinson, J., Defining Art Historically, British Journal of Aesthetics, 19 (1979): 232-50.Reprinted in Lamarque and Olsen, eds. Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Art (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004), pp.35-46.
My goal for this paper is to give a practical critique and defense of what I have learned in my time as a Studio Art Major. During my time here I have learned that Pensacola Christian college’s definition of art “art is the organized visual expression of ideas or feelings” and the four parts of Biblosophy: cannon, communication, client, and creativity. Along with Biblosophy I have studied Dr. Frances Schaeffer 's criteria for art, seeing how the technical, and the major and minor messages in artwork. All of these principles are great but they do need to be refined.
Goldwater, Robert and Marco Treves (eds.). Artists on Art: from the XIV to the XX Century. New York: Pantheon Books, 1945.
“Aesthetics. Also called philosophy of art. Roughly, that branch of philosophy concerned with the creation, value and experience of art and the analysis and solution of problems relating to these. The primary topic is the appreciation of art, and major problems centre on what makes something a work of art” (A.R. Lacey, 1976 p.5).
1. Hunter, Sam and Jacobs, John. Modern Art, 3rd Edition. The Vendome Press, New York, 1992.
Varnedoe, Kirk. A Fine Disregard: What Makes Modern Art Modern. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1990. 152. Print.
Art can mean many different things to many different people and was one of the earliest ways in which man has expressed him or herself to others, whether it was through cave drawings or hieroglyphics. It does not begin or end with just drawing or painting, items typically considered art, or the many other recognized facets of art including architecture, drama, literature, sculpting, and music. My research is based on Vincent van Gogh art, and two art paintings that I choose to study is The Starry Night, 1889, and the second art is The Sower 1888. Vincent van Gogh’s is known for Impressionism, that occurs to us in these times, much more to affirm close links with tradition, and to represent
Janson, Harry W. History of Art. 5th Ed. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1995. Print.
Stone, W. F. (1897). Questions on the philosophy of art;. London: Printed by William Clowes and Sons.
For over two thousand years, various philosophers have questioned the influence of art in our society. They have used abstract reasoning, human emotions, and logic to go beyond this world in the search for answers about arts' existence. For philosophers, art was not viewed for its own beauty, but rather for the question of how art and artists can help make our society more stable for the next generation. Plato, a Greek philosopher who lived during 420-348 B.C. in Athens, and Aristotle, Plato’s student who argued against his beliefs, have no exceptions to the steps they had to take in order to understand the purpose of art and artists. Though these two philosophers made marvelous discoveries about the existence of art, artists, and aesthetic experience, Plato has made his works more controversial than Aristotle.
Aesthetics is the theoretical study of the arts and related types of behavior and experience. It is traditionally regarded as a branch of philosophy, concerned with the understanding of beauty and its manifestations in art and nature. However, in the latter 20th century there developed a tendency to treat it as an independent science, concerned with investigating the phenomena of art and its place in human life. Yet, what in a field with a hazy line in between being classified as a science or study of beliefs is considered data for determining what can be studied? It can simply be drawn to the only three things involved in the process of art : The creator, the person experiencing, and the art itself.
The relationship between art and society: Mimesis as discussed in the works of Aristotle, Plato, Horace and Longinus The relationship between art and society in the works of Plato are based upon his idea of the world of eternal Forms. He believed that there is a world of eternal, absolute and immutable Forms (the world of the Ideal) and thought that this is proven by when man is faced with the appearance of anything in the material world, his mind is moved to a remembrance of the Idea or an absolute and immutable version of the thing he sees. It is this moment of recollection that he wonders about the contrast between the world of shadows and the world of the Ideal. It is in this moment of wondering that man struggles to reach the world of Forms through the use of reason. Anything then that does not serve reason is the enemy of man. Given this, it is only but logical that poetry should be eradicated from society. Poetry shifts man’s focus away from reason by presenting man with imitations of objects from the concrete world. Poetry, with its focus on mimesis or imitation, has no moral value. While Plato sees reality as a shadow of a realm of pure Ideas (which in turn is copied by art), Aristotle sees reality as a process of partially realized forms moving towards their ideal realizations. Given this idea by Aristotle, the mimetic quality of art is redefined as the duplication of the living process of nature and its need to reach its potential form.
Goldblatt, and Brown. Aesthetics: A Reader in Philosophy of the Arts, Upper Saddle Ridge, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1997.
From ancient to more modern critics, art is defined, vilified, or redeemed by its ability to imitate. Aristotle values imitation as a natural process of humanity. Tragedy is simply a manifestation of the human desire to imitate. He asserts that every person "learns his lesson through imitation and we observe that all men find pleasure in imitations" (44). Unlike Plato's world of Forms, knowledge of truth and goodness are rooted in the observable universe to Aristotle. Because imitation strives to create accurate particularized images of the real world, it is a source for potential discovery and delight. Neoclassical criticism accepts as givens Aristotle's statements about the nature of art and reality. Art is valuable precisely because it is imitative. As Sir Philip Sydney states, "Poesy is an art of imitation...with this end, to teach and delight" (137). Imitation not only entertains, but gains a moral/ethical purpose: to teach virtue. Artists must, in addition to possessing great creative skills, also bear moral responsibility for shaping their imitations. Samuel Johnson seems to revisit Plato's attack upon art with his admission that an accurate imitation of morally questionable subject matter is not only unacceptable, but potentially harmful to those who encounter it. In order to accommodate a strong moral sense, Johnson describes imitation as a process of interpretation. "The business of a poet... is to examine, not the individual, but the species.
First, Plato believed that ideas are the realist things in the world. What we see in our daily life is not reality; sense perceptions are only appearances. And appearances are unreliable material copies of the immaterial pure ideas. Thus to him the world of the ideas is reasonable and fixed and holds the truth. While the world of physical appearances is variable and irrational, and it only bears reality to the extent that it succeeds in capturing the idea. To live the best life that you can and to be happy and do good, as a person you have to strive to understand and imitate the ideas as best as you can. So, with this philosophy in mind we can understand why Plato considered art as just a mindless pleasure. He viewed art as just an imitation.
Thus, it seems, the processes of appreciation and evaluation which lead to the conclusion that an object, whether a work of art or otherwise, is beautiful, are the same in all cases, and the paradigm for those processes must be that which is furnished by the appreciation and estimation of a natural beauty free of all intervention by concepts, whether the concept of art or any more specific concept.