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Saturday, March 04, 2006 

Aesthetics and art

There is a fundamental misunderstanding in judging artwork from the time of Aristotle. Since the Poetics art and the beautiful has been understood from the perspective of the observer. Tragedy is analyzed for what it does to us. Why don't we think of it another way? If we see art and artwork as the creation of the beautiful, and understand precisely this - it is a creative act. Should we then not think of it from the perspective of the creator? See that the plenitude of one man's soul overflows in the creation of some thing? If tragedy causes catharsis in the observer, what does it do to the Tragedian?

Disagreements

Do you know of someone who speaks insightfully regarding why (insofar as the question "why" can be asked in this case) God should have created anything outside of Himself? If so, maybe there would be some kind of answer in that... I dunno...

I mean, such as those reasons could be attributable to creator/creation simply speaking...

Mr. Achilles, I understand the qualification and there is some merit in what you say. To look at creator/creation from the aspect of creation is to misconstrue the issue (i.e., God needed to make the universe). I think the same has happened for 2000+ years in aesthetics.

But, to respond to Matt, I think you misunderstood me. I think aethetics IS objective, I only wanted to point out that it had been considered for millenia "upsidedown". I am not talking about some nebulous "creative process" so much as creation, objectively in itself.

"Kant, like all philosophers, instead of envisaging the aesthetic problem from the point of view of the artist (the creator), considered art and the beautiful purely from that of the 'spectator,' and unconsciously introduced the 'spectator' into the concept 'beautiful.'" - F. N. (Genealogy of Morals, trans. Kaufmann)

Well, anon, Nietzsche was wrong. It started with Aristotle.

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