Kant and Aesthetics

[DonAthos]

I've wanted to ask for a while, so I guess I'll just go ahead:

Is it really a point of contention for anyone whether an object of "utility" can also have artistic value? If The Fountainhead does not serve to demonstrate that architecture is an artistic discipline, then I'm not quite sure how I'd argue it further... But what of furniture? Or clothing? Or the decorations on pottery that serve as some of our earliest examples of extant "art"?

[Jonathan13]

I wrote:

In other words, the grounds on which you attempt to oppose the idea of "formlessness" being the stimuli of the Sublimity are actually inadvertently grounds to support ...

Speaking of inadvertently supporting Kantian Sublimity when intending to oppose it, I've mentioned the Objectivish artist Michael Newberry a few times in this discussion, and I thought that some of you might be interested in seeing an example of his inadvertently experiencing Kantian Sublimity while thinking that he was opposing it.

In this essay, in attempting to link Kant to the destruction and shock of the 9/11 attacks, and to postmodern art, Newberry claims -- falsely -- that Kant "elevates fear of experience and formlessness of means in his concepts of the Sublime and he condescendingly relegates form, theme, beauty, and sensory pleasure as elements of craftsmanship."

Newberry says of the 9/11 attack, "To witness the obliteration of those glowing, lithe twins was a shock beyond comprehension," and that there are "people in the world who can't stand to see that beauty and creativity exist."

He then says:

"On the other side of humanity, a vast majority of people felt universal shock. Waves of anger, sorrow, and sadness have followed. Though, personally, after I experienced the shock of the attack, I felt none of those other emotions. Instead a quiet calm spread over me and I knew it was a time for cold, calculating, and uncompromising action and thought. A time to expose evil and put it in its place. And a time to stand up proudly and defend the values of civilization against the onslaught of a species of human beings that romanticize destruction."

In other words, Newberry unknowingly experienced Kantian Sublimity in reaction to the attacks. He felt his will to resist this thing which was a "shock" and "beyond comprehension," and to regard his estate as exalted above it, and he did so while imagining that he was rejecting Kant.

J

Edited March 3, 2012 by Jonathan13

[Jonathan13]

I've wanted to ask for a while, so I guess I'll just go ahead:

Is it really a point of contention for anyone whether an object of "utility" can also have artistic value? If The Fountainhead does not serve to demonstrate that architecture is an artistic discipline, then I'm not quite sure how I'd argue it further... But what of furniture? Or clothing? Or the decorations on pottery that serve as some of our earliest examples of extant "art"?

I think that any utilitarian object could qualify as art, including by Rand's definition. If it contains a "selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value-judgments" in addition to the object's utilitarian function, then it should qualify as art.

J

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

In other words, Newberry unknowingly experienced Kantian Sublimity in reaction to the attacks. He felt his will to resist this thing which was a "shock" and "beyond comprehension," and to regard his estate as exalted above it, and he did so while imagining that he was rejecting Kant.

If experiencing something as destructive as 911 and rising above it in defense of civilization is what is required to experience Kantian sublimity, then I say may he and you be damned.

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

In a certain sense, this thread has been helpful to me in understanding something about The Fountainhead and how Ayn Rand describes the buildings of Howard Roark. She doesn't describe their shape, but rather their meaning -- their metaphysical value (of existence and man's place in it) placed in stone; and note that she doesn't describe them in terms of one's emotional reaction to them, but rather the meaning grasped by the viewer:

Metaphysical value descriptions of Howard Roark's buildings in The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

The Temple to the Human Spirit / Stoddard Temple built by Howard Roark

“The Temple was to be a Small building of gray limestone. Its lines were horizontal, not the lines reaching to heaven, but the lines of the earth. It seemed to spread over the ground like arms outstretched at shoulder-height, palms down, in great, silent acceptance. It did not cling to the soil and it did not crouch under the sky. It seemed to lift the earth, and its few vertical shafts pulled the sky down. It was scaled to human height in such a manner that it did not dwarf man, but stood as a setting that made his figure the only absolute, the gauge of perfection by which all dimensions were to be judged. When a man entered this temple, he would feel space molded around him, for him, as if it had waited for his entrance, to be completed. It was a joyous place, with the joy of exaltation that must be quiet. It was a place where one would come to feel sinless and strong, to find the peace of spirit never granted save by one's own glory.”

“There was no ornamentation inside, except the graded projections of the walls, and the vast windows. The place was not <tf_335> sealed under vaults, but thrown open to the earth around it, to the trees, the river, the sun—and to the skyline of the city in the distance, the skyscrapers, the shapes of man's achievement on earth. At the end of the room, facing the entrance, with the city as background, stood the figure of a naked human body.”

Monadnock Valley built by Howard Roark

“There were small houses on the ledges of the hill before him, flowing down to the bottom. He knew that the ledges had not been touched, that no artifice had altered the unplanned beauty of the graded steps. Yet some power had known how to build on these ledges in such a way that the houses became inevitable, and one could no longer imagine the hills as beautiful without them—as if the centuries and the series of chances that produced these ledges in the struggle of great blind forces had waited for their final expression, had been only a road to a goal—and the <tf_505> goal was these buildings, part of the hills, shaped by the hills, yet ruling them by giving them meaning.”

“The houses were plain field stone—like the rocks jutting from the green hillsides—and of glass, great sheets of glass used as if the sun were invited to complete the structures, sunlight becoming part of the masonry. There were many houses, they were small, they were cut off from one another, and no two of them were alike. But they were like variations of a single theme, like a symphony played by an inexhaustible imagination, and one could still hear the laughter of the force that had been let loose on them, as if that force had run, unrestrained, challenging itself to be spent, but had never reached its end. Music, he thought, the promise of the music he had invoked, the sense of it made real—there it was before his eyes—he did not see it—he heard it in chords—he thought that there was a common language of thought, sight and sound—was it mathematics?—the discipline of reason—music was mathematics—and architecture was music in stone—he knew he was dizzy because this place below him could not be real.”

[Ninth Doctor]

She spent decades of her life believing that architecture was art, and that it had very effectively and objectively communicated profound meaning to her. She called it "the most important of the arts," she wrote perhaps the world's most famous novel which portrayed its aesthetic value, and when writing about it in her philosophical works on aesthetics, she referred her readers to that novel as representing her philosophy's position on the subject in reality.

Even better is Hugo’s Hunchback of Notre Dame. I’m thinking particularly of the section where Hugo stops the action for an essay on architecture’s role in civilization. There’s more material integrated in the plot, but here he gives us a great stand-alone piece.

http://www.gutenberg...-h.htm#2HCH0023

Gotta love Gutenberg, this takes you right to the section!

If experiencing something as destructive as 911 and rising above it in defense of civilization is what is required to experience Kantian sublimity, then I say may he and you be damned.

Oh brother. Where’s Dante (Alighieri) when we need him? Someone needs to specify the rung. It’s probably the 6^th, which is cool, I’ve always wanted to meet Epicurus.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kW3LtmH5M_c

Edited March 4, 2012 by Ninth Doctor

[Grames]

I know that Kant's epistemology is pretty bad, but it doesn't necessarily follow that it's the case his aesthetic beliefs follow from that (sort of directed at Thomas). It would be a quite complex argument that Kant is responsible for things like Dadaism.

Kant's basic premise was followed by a more important idea that our perceptions were governed by logical forms that accounted for the apparent reasonableness of reality. There are still rationalists to this day that follow in his footsteps in arguing this such as Wittgenstein and even Mises who would argue similar ideas. Given that some people later disagreed with Kant that our inner subjective world was necessarily governed by logic, does not mean that Kant was responsible in any way for their disagreements with him.

The basic premise in itself for subjectivism has been around far longer than Kant. You can find the case for it made thoughout the play Hamlet by the title character.

1) Kant was not the originator of the idea of subjectivism.

2) Kant tried to make subjectivism rational.

How is he responsible for irrationalist art such as Dadaism?

It is actually a quite simple principle. Kant is very big on his nativism, his ideas of innate knowledge and a priori categories. To obtain any madness at all one need merely substitute alternate a priori categories and different innate knowledge, or retain his element of subjectivism while discarding all guidance by a prioris or innate knowledge.

It parallels the case made by Peikoff in ethical and political thought that the Categorical Imperative leads to Nazi-ism simply by switching out what Kant provided as the content of the Categorical Imperative with a new imperative to serve the collective benfit of the race and the nation. Hitler was no philosopher, he simply took advantage of the works and consequences of the a priori philosophers.

[Jonathan13]

If experiencing something as destructive as 911 and rising above it in defense of civilization is what is required to experience Kantian sublimity, then I say may he and you be damned.

I don't understand. Would you prefer that people cower in response to incomprehensibly destructive forces?

And why are you damning me when it is your intellectual twin Michael Newberry who experienced Kantian Sublimity from the 9/11 attacks?

J

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

I'm damning the necessity of having to have one's idealism and one's civilization destroyed in order to experience Kantian sublimity. Contrast this to Ayn Rand's view of the sublime as characterized in her Temple of the Human Spirit.

Yes, the irrational has to be overcome, but it was Kant who released the irrational onto our society by divorcing reason from the facts, thus morally disarming those who would defend rationality and civilization. It was Kant who made it possible for Bush et al to call Islam a religion of peace after the atrocities of 911, because they don't deal with this world (of the senses) they deal with a "higher" reality and Kant would claim we would have no grounds for questioning them on their beliefs, since real reality is not available via the facts of perception anyhow.

[Jonathan13]

I'm damning the necessity of having to have one's idealism...

Where did you get the idea that anyone's idealism was destroyed?!!!

...and one's civilization destroyed in order to experience Kantian sublimity. Contrast this to Ayn Rand's view of the sublime as characterized in her Temple of the Human Spirit.

Well, since there is no contrast between Kantian Sublimity and Ayn Rand's art, but rather her novels are powerful examples of it, then you're damning Ayn Rand and her art because it presents civilizations being destroyed in order for the reader to experience Kantian Sublimity.

J

[Jonathan13]

In a certain sense, this thread has been helpful to me in understanding something about The Fountainhead and how Ayn Rand describes the buildings of Howard Roark. She doesn't describe their shape, but rather their meaning -- their metaphysical value (of existence and man's place in it) placed in stone; and note that she doesn't describe them in terms of one's emotional reaction to them, but rather the meaning grasped by the viewer:

Metaphysical value descriptions of Howard Roark's buildings in The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

The Temple to the Human Spirit / Stoddard Temple built by Howard Roark

“The Temple was to be a Small building of gray limestone. Its lines were horizontal, not the lines reaching to heaven, but the lines of the earth. It seemed to spread over the ground like arms outstretched at shoulder-height, palms down, in great, silent acceptance. It did not cling to the soil and it did not crouch under the sky. It seemed to lift the earth, and its few vertical shafts pulled the sky down. It was scaled to human height in such a manner that it did not dwarf man, but stood as a setting that made his figure the only absolute, the gauge of perfection by which all dimensions were to be judged. When a man entered this temple, he would feel space molded around him, for him, as if it had waited for his entrance, to be completed. It was a joyous place, with the joy of exaltation that must be quiet. It was a place where one would come to feel sinless and strong, to find the peace of spirit never granted save by one's own glory.”

“There was no ornamentation inside, except the graded projections of the walls, and the vast windows. The place was not <tf_335> sealed under vaults, but thrown open to the earth around it, to the trees, the river, the sun—and to the skyline of the city in the distance, the skyscrapers, the shapes of man's achievement on earth. At the end of the room, facing the entrance, with the city as background, stood the figure of a naked human body.”

Monadnock Valley built by Howard Roark

“There were small houses on the ledges of the hill before him, flowing down to the bottom. He knew that the ledges had not been touched, that no artifice had altered the unplanned beauty of the graded steps. Yet some power had known how to build on these ledges in such a way that the houses became inevitable, and one could no longer imagine the hills as beautiful without them—as if the centuries and the series of chances that produced these ledges in the struggle of great blind forces had waited for their final expression, had been only a road to a goal—and the <tf_505> goal was these buildings, part of the hills, shaped by the hills, yet ruling them by giving them meaning.”

“The houses were plain field stone—like the rocks jutting from the green hillsides—and of glass, great sheets of glass used as if the sun were invited to complete the structures, sunlight becoming part of the masonry. There were many houses, they were small, they were cut off from one another, and no two of them were alike. But they were like variations of a single theme, like a symphony played by an inexhaustible imagination, and one could still hear the laughter of the force that had been let loose on them, as if that force had run, unrestrained, challenging itself to be spent, but had never reached its end. Music, he thought, the promise of the music he had invoked, the sense of it made real—there it was before his eyes—he did not see it—he heard it in chords—he thought that there was a common language of thought, sight and sound—was it mathematics?—the discipline of reason—music was mathematics—and architecture was music in stone—he knew he was dizzy because this place below him could not be real.”

Thanks, Thomas, for posting the quotes from Rand. They are beautful examples of her powerfully describing how people find meaning in abstract forms, abstract lines, abstract surfaces and textures, and abstract relationships of scale and proportion.

Rand's view, as I've pointed out many times during this discussion, was that architecture "does not re-create reality." What she meant was that it does not present identifiable likenesses of things from reality (it doesn't look like a man, or an apple, or an arrangement of flowers). Instead, it deals only with abstracted attributes, just as abstract art does. Notice that in the quotes you provided, Rand is describing how meaning can be derived from "lines" and "shafts" and from the "scale" in proportion to man. She claims that the "graded projections of the walls," and the "vast windows" could express openness.

Rand's descriptions of the effects and meaning of architecture remind me a lot of my examples, posted here, of the effects and meanings of two specific abstract paintings. I think the only differences between Rand's descriptions and mine are that I go into more objective detail in explaining precisely which attributes contribute to meaning, and how, and her examples are fictional and only verbal where mine refer to real art works and include a visual presentation.

J

Edited March 5, 2012 by Jonathan13

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

I apologize for my earlier outburst, and should have waited until I calmed down due to a family emergency that happened early this morning. However,I no longer care to discuss art of any nature with 13 and others like him, so I will be removing myself from following this thread any longer.

[DonAthos]

I apologize for my earlier outburst, and should have waited until I calmed down due to a family emergency that happened early this morning. However,I no longer care to discuss art of any nature with 13 and others like him, so I will be removing myself from following this thread any longer.

I hope all is well for Thomas and his family.

Since he's removing himself from this conversation, however, I'd like to take up a more active role personally, because I find these topics interesting and wish to see them developed and examined further.

As sort of an upfront caveat, I know next-to-nothing about Kant, nor do I have any plans on reading him in the near future.

Yes, the irrational has to be overcome, but it was Kant who released the irrational onto our society by divorcing reason from the facts, thus morally disarming those who would defend rationality and civilization. It was Kant who made it possible for Bush et al to call Islam a religion of peace after the atrocities of 911, because they don't deal with this world (of the senses) they deal with a "higher" reality and Kant would claim we would have no grounds for questioning them on their beliefs, since real reality is not available via the facts of perception anyhow.

Isn't this attributing far too much power to Kant? It seems to cast him almost into the role of Satan, or Pandora at least, though I'm fairly certain that "the irrational" was loosed upon society far before Kant drew breath.

Again, "next-to-nothing," but I'm pretty certain that Kant has been dead for a while. So as for Kant "making it possible" for Bush to call Islam a "religion of peace"...? Isn't Bush responsible for what he, himself, says/does? And if we're talking about Kant laying some sort of philosophical foundation or whatnot, 1) aren't there others who predate Kant who laid foundations which made Kant's work "possible," if we're accepting this "sins of the father" rationale? 2) Isn't Bush personally responsible for the philosophy that he accepts?

By attributing all future horrors to Kant, while they actually relied on scores of other people for implementation, in reality, aren't we implicitly removing the agency of all of these myriad actors from our calculations? To coin a (pompous, unearned, and quite possibly incorrect) phrase, this seems almost like a "philosophical determinism" to me. While the philosophy we accept governs our subsequent actions, we have the power to accept or reject philosophy, and alone in our individual capacities. So if we do something dumb in the here and now (in a philosophical sense), that is not Kant's fault. It is the fault of those of us who do that dumb thing. And to attribute our present day woes to Kant, who died in... fact checking... 1804? Seems misguided at least.

Rand's view, as I've pointed out many times during this discussion, was that architecture "does not re-create reality." What she meant was that it does not present identifiable likenesses of things from reality (it doesn't look like a man, or an apple, or an arrangement of flowers). Instead, it deals only with abstracted attributes, just as abstract art does.

I recognize the difference between "identifiable likenesses" and, say, a Jackson Pollock. But as these conversations have progressed (taking all of our aesthetic interactions together), I've wondered more and more about the idea of "re-creating reality." As I look at an image of the Mona Lisa on my computer screen, I don't know that reality has been re-created, exactly. Women tend not to be so small. Or segmented (most women that I've known have had legs, for instance). And they are usually three-dimensional. And alive. And etc.

It has occurred to me that even the Mona Lisa presents certain aspects of reality (in this case, various aspects of the image of a woman) which have been... well... abstracted, for our consideration. If other, more "modern" artists have chosen to abstract different aspects of reality for similar consideration, such as line, shape, and color, do I have any good reason for dismissing that out of hand?

Torres and Kahmi [in What Art Is: The Esthetic Theory of Ayn Rand] put forward the theory that Rand's definition can work for the traditional "fine arts" of painting, sculpture, literature, music, dance and drama. They get over "the problem of music" for Rand's definition by identifying that the concretizations that artists produce can belong to the class existents rather than entities. Entities are distinct intelligible units whereas existents includes events and relationships and attributes.

If "concretizations that artists produce can belong to the class existents rather than entities," as explained above, then doesn't that allow for "line, shape, and color" as the subject of artistic consideration?

[Grames]

If "concretizations that artists produce can belong to the class existents rather than entities," as explained above, then doesn't that allow for "line, shape, and color" as the subject of artistic consideration?

Yes, and that is the motivation for the broader interpretation of 'reality'.

"What art is" and "What art should be" are necessary questions leading to two definitions of art, and the answer to the second question must remain logically dependent on the answer to the first without repudiating or contradicting it. Whatever aesthetic standard is used to answer the second question cannot be used to deny that some things are art at all (that is the task of the first definition) but to discriminate between what is better or worse. Rand's preference that intelligible representations be presented when the medium permits it is part of a normative theory of what art should be not part of a definition of what qualifies as art. I think Rand failed to remain fully objective in her condemnations of some kinds of art as not art at all.

The general issue of needing two definitions for some subjects is discussed by Peikoff in lecture 3 of his course "Unity in Epistemology and Ethics" and my notes on his presentation of the problem is here.

[Hairnet]

It is actually a quite simple principle. Kant is very big on his nativism, his ideas of innate knowledge and a priori categories. To obtain any madness at all one need merely substitute alternate a priori categories and different innate knowledge, or retain his element of subjectivism while discarding all guidance by a prioris or innate knowledge.

It parallels the case made by Peikoff in ethical and political thought that the Categorical Imperative leads to Nazi-ism simply by switching out what Kant provided as the content of the Categorical Imperative with a new imperative to serve the collective benfit of the race and the nation. Hitler was no philosopher, he simply took advantage of the works and consequences of the a priori philosophers.

I think what you are talking about Polylogism though. Essentially, because Kant thought our inner subjective world was ruled by abstractions, different groups of people may have different abstractions " The idea that causality is for jews or rich people and that that poor people or whites or blacks have a leg up on a higher logic that they don't need to explain to you because they can't.

I would like to point out though, that Mises, someone who I consider to be very much like Kant, made many brilliant deductive arguments how polylogism is completely untennable. He operated on the same premise of apriori categories ruling an inner subjective world. Mises even made these arguements against Nazis and Communists before he was forced to leave Vienna.

[Grames]

I think what you are talking about Polylogism though. Essentially, because Kant thought our inner subjective world was ruled by abstractions, different groups of people may have different abstractions " The idea that causality is for jews or rich people and that that poor people or whites or blacks have a leg up on a higher logic that they don't need to explain to you because they can't.

I would like to point out though, that Mises, someone who I consider to be very much like Kant, made many brilliant deductive arguments how polylogism is completely untennable. He operated on the same premise of apriori categories ruling an inner subjective world. Mises even made these arguements against Nazis and Communists before he was forced to leave Vienna.

Which just goes to show that once the premise of subjectivism takes hold the damage is done. It is useless to argue with Nazis and Communists for they are Beyond Reason (ominous capitalization intentional). Brilliant deductive arguments count for nothing to someone who regards deduction as useless, worthless or even immoral.

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

Since a concern was brought up regarding my family emergency, looks like everything will be fine after a bought in the hospital for dad; and I guess it upset me more than I had thought after being woken up at 1am to call the ambulance. So, thanks for your concern. Thanks.

[Hairnet]

Which just goes to show that once the premise of subjectivism takes hold the damage is done. It is useless to argue with Nazis and Communists for they are Beyond Reason (ominous capitalization intentional). Brilliant deductive arguments count for nothing to someone who regards deduction as useless, worthless or even immoral.

"The damage is done"

You aren't holding people acountable for their own thoughts or actions. Subjectivism as an idea has existed a long time before Kant. So its not like he opened pandora's box of irrationalist philosophy. If the Nazis or Communists want to be irrational you can't blame a guy who lived more than a century before then before it. Its like "Catcher in the Rye" being an excuse for murder.

Kant wanted to argue logical subjectivism, other people wanted to argue for illogical subjectivism. That isn't the fault of Kant in anyway. Ayn Rand's metaphor of Kant being The West's abusive father is very talling in that in some way europe was a bunch of children. That is not the proper way to assess people or their ideas. Even if we offer some genetic analysis to the philosophies of europe at best we can argue that Hegel was a Kantian, but Marx was a Hegelian (and a weird inverted Hegelian at that). Kant had other "offspring" too such as Schopenhauer, who influenced Nietzche, who in some ways could be said to have influenced Rand.

We can't call Rand or Marx Kantians then, can we?

[Grames]

"The damage is done"

You aren't holding people acountable for their own thoughts or actions. Subjectivism as an idea has existed a long time before Kant. So its not like he opened pandora's box of irrationalist philosophy. If the Nazis or Communists want to be irrational you can't blame a guy who lived more than a century before then before it. Its like "Catcher in the Rye" being an excuse for murder.

Kant wanted to argue logical subjectivism, other people wanted to argue for illogical subjectivism. That isn't the fault of Kant in anyway. Ayn Rand's metaphor of Kant being The West's abusive father is very talling in that in some way europe was a bunch of children. That is not the proper way to assess people or their ideas. Even if we offer some genetic analysis to the philosophies of europe at best we can argue that Hegel was a Kantian, but Marx was a Hegelian (and a weird inverted Hegelian at that). Kant had other "offspring" too such as Schopenhauer, who influenced Nietzche, who in some ways could be said to have influenced Rand.

We can't call Rand or Marx Kantians then, can we?

There is plenty of blame to go around, an infinite well of it to draw upon. It is not the case that if we hold actual Nazis and Communists accountable for their own thoughts and actions that there is then nothing left to say about the original authors of their adopted thoughts.

edit: Kant is undeniably influential for Rand and Marx. Marx is Kantian while Rand is not because Marx uses and extends Kant's methods while Rand negates Kant's methods. Without Kant and Marx there would be no Rand.

Edited March 7, 2012 by Grames

[Jonathan13]

I recognize the difference between "identifiable likenesses" and, say, a Jackson Pollock. But as these conversations have progressed (taking all of our aesthetic interactions together), I've wondered more and more about the idea of "re-creating reality." As I look at an image of the Mona Lisa on my computer screen, I don't know that reality has been re-created, exactly. Women tend not to be so small. Or segmented (most women that I've known have had legs, for instance). And they are usually three-dimensional. And alive. And etc.

It has occurred to me that even the Mona Lisa presents certain aspects of reality (in this case, various aspects of the image of a woman) which have been... well... abstracted, for our consideration. If other, more "modern" artists have chosen to abstract different aspects of reality for similar consideration, such as line, shape, and color, do I have any good reason for dismissing that out of hand?

If "concretizations that artists produce can belong to the class existents rather than entities," as explained above, then doesn't that allow for "line, shape, and color" as the subject of artistic consideration?

Good point. I touched on the same issue here when I wrote,

"So, your theory is that visual art must mimic the "value", "color" and "shape" of objects in reality, and therefore abstract paintings are not art because, although they may mimic the color, motion or other attributes of objects in reality, they generally don't directly mimic objects' shapes? If that's your theory, then it would also logically follow that realistic, representational black and white drawings and monochromatic paintings don't qualify as art, since they also eliminate one of your prerequisites for visual art: color."

And here when I wrote,

"Now, if anyone is Platonic in their views on visual art, I would say that it is you (and those who share your opinions), what with your view that the single attribute of shape is the "essential characteristic" of any object, where any other attribute, or even all of the other attributes combined, are "divorced" from the object if shown without mimetic shape. If anything should be "dismissed" as being "arbitrary," it's your arbitrary, Platonic selection of shape as the only essential attribute of everything."

An additional issue which I think is relevant to this discussion and bears repeating is the fact that one cannot know for certain, just by looking at a painting, that it is what is commonly referred to as "abstract," "non-figurative," "non-objective" or "non-representational." As I demonstrated here, what may at first appear to be an abstract painting may in fact be a realistic painting. What might appear to be a random splatter of paint might actually be a romantically stylized symbol of heroism which easily qualifies as art by Objectivist standards:

In the past, here on OO, and elsewhere, I've posted this example of a work of art:

After looking at it, many Objectivists have told me that it does not qualify as art by Objectivist criteria, because, they say, it does not include identifiable likenesses of objects from reality. Some have said that it looks like kitchen floor tiles, that it has no meaning, and cannot possibly have meaning.

Well, what if the image is a realistic painting based on actual stone tiles that the artist had selectively cut and arranged like this:

Does it now suddenly qualify as art? Simply because of a technicality, Objectivists can now appreciate its compositional beauty and expressiveness, and can deem it to be no less valid as a work of art than any other still life which realistically depicts actual objects from reality?

Or, conversely, would you take the absurd position that certain things, like [paintings of] arrangements of flat, colorful, stone tiles, somehow don't count as being representations of things from reality?

Here's another image, one that I painted, that I've posted in O-forums:

Does it quality art?

As I've explained when I've posted it in the past:

J

Edited March 7, 2012 by Jonathan13

[Jonathan13]

Rand's preference that intelligible representations be presented when the medium permits it...

That wasn't Rand's view. The "when the medium permits it" part is wrong. Her position was that art must be intelligible, period. That which ceases to be intelligible "ceases to be art."

Also, all media permit intelligible likenesses of things from reality. There is no "when the medium permits it." For example, one can use musical instruments to make sounds which sound like things from reality. Alex VanHalen can make his drums sound like a motorcycle. Without using any vox effects, Eddie VanHalen can make a guitar sound like an elephant raging, a horse whinnying, or an ambulance passing, among hundreds of other identifiable sounds. I've heard trumpet players make their instruments "talk" using a plunger. I've seen them play characters. The most memorable line that I heard was a trumpet player making the sound of a baby screaming "I want my mamma!" Very realistic.

...is part of a normative theory of what art should be not part of a definition of what qualifies as art. I think Rand failed to remain fully objective in her condemnations of some kinds of art as not art at all.

The general issue of needing two definitions for some subjects is discussed by Peikoff in lecture 3 of his course "Unity in Epistemology and Ethics" and my notes on his presentation of the problem is here.

I don't see a need for two definitions. Art is what it is. Unless I'm misunderstanding you (and my apologies in advance if I am), the idea of proposing a second definition appears to have the sole purpose of saying, "But I want art to be something other than what it is, and I don't want certain things to be art which are!"

J

[Grames]

That wasn't Rand's view. The "when the medium permits it" part is wrong. Her position was that art must be intelligible, period. That which ceases to be intelligible "ceases to be art."

Counterexample: music.

Also, all media permit intelligible likenesses of things from reality. There is no "when the medium permits it." For example, one can use musical instruments to make sounds which sound like things from reality. Alex VanHalen can make his drums sound like a motorcycle. Without using any vox effects, Eddie VanHalen can make a guitar sound like an elephant raging, a horse whinnying, or an ambulance passing, among hundreds of other identifiable sounds. I've heard trumpet players make their instruments "talk" using a plunger. I've seen them play characters. The most memorable line that I heard was a trumpet player making the sound of a baby screaming "I want my mamma!" Very realistic.

No, because when sounds are representational they cease to be musical. When a sound is the sound of some identifiable naturally occurring thing then the thought of that thing gets in the way of the music. Music is intentionally comprised of abstract and relatively pure tones in order to avoid creating percepts of entities acting.

I don't see a need for two definitions. Art is what it is. Unless I'm misunderstanding you (and my apologies in advance if I am), the idea of proposing a second definition appears to have the sole purpose of saying, "But I want art to be something other than what it is, and I don't want certain things to be art which are!"

Objectivity mandates a need for two definitions. You are misunderstanding.

[Jonathan13]

Counterexample: music.

No, music's inability to be objectively intelligible is not a "counter example" but a contradiction to Rand's criteria.

No, because when sounds are representational they cease to be musical. When a sound is the sound of some identifiable naturally occurring thing then the thought of that thing gets in the way of the music. Music is intentionally comprised of abstract and relatively pure tones in order to avoid creating percepts of entities acting.

I agree that music is abstract. Its being abstract is the reason that it does not meet Rand's criterion of objective intelligibility.

I would also say that quite a lot in the visual arts is abstract, including many realistic paintings. Still lifes, for example, are generally not narratives containing symbolic content, but are expressive via their abstract qualities such as composition, color, texture, etc. (paintings of fruit and flowers aren't usually about presenting a heroic vision of the nature of fruit and flowers qua fruit and flowers, but are something closer to a symphonic visual presentation of shape, contrast, "color chords," etc.).

Objectivity mandates a need for two definitions. You are misunderstanding.

In the post that you linked to on the subject of "two definitions," you state:

Some philosophical concepts have two definitions: one broad and one a narrower subcategory of the first. Unlike typical category-subcategory relations, the same word must be used for both senses. Use of the same word is essential for preserving the unity of knowledge.

Definitions are contextual. As knowledge expands a definition may need to be altered when it no longer is adequate to specify the referents of the concept. In general any one context has one definition and new definitions supplant the old definition. EX: Rand's example of the concept 'man' defined by a child then progressing through adulthood.

What, precisely, is the second definition of "art" that you're proposing?

Are you saying that this second definition is broader than Rand's definition, or that it is a narrower subcategory of it?

J

[Grames]

No, music's inability to be objectively intelligible is not a "counter example" but a contradiction to Rand's criteria.

Yes, but notice how Rand's definition of art as "selective recreation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value judgments" does not require objective intelligibility as a criterion. If the world is mysterious, random and unintelligible to an artist and he produces a work embodying that attitude then that is an artwork.

And as an aside Rand does claim that music presents objectively intelligible products to the mind in the form of melodies.

What, precisely, is the second definition of "art" that you're proposing?

Are you saying that this second definition is broader than Rand's definition, or that it is a narrower subcategory of it?

I have not decided how to phrase it yet. It must be narrower and would support at least by implication the objective intelligibility requirement. Aesthetics will parallel the situation in ethics. In ethics any object whatsoever of an action to gain or keep it is a value, but in Objectivism a proper value is objectively pro-life (surviving and thriving). In aesthetics any work whatsoever which is a "selective recreation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value judgments" is art, but it would be inadequate to merely specify that the better artworks are the pro-life artworks. Aesthetics is not ethics and so "pro-life" is the wrong criterion for good art, and that is the point of Rand's theorizing about the epistemological functions of art. Rand writes "The different branches of art serve to unify man’s consciousness and offer him a coherent view of existence. Whether that view is true or false is not an esthetic matter. The crucially esthetic matter is psycho-epistemological: the integration of a conceptual consciousness."

[Avila]

"If other, more "modern" artists have chosen to abstract different aspects of reality for similar consideration, such as line, shape, and color, do I have any good reason for dismissing that out of hand?"

Well, here's one: if a four-year old can do it, it isn't in the same category as what was, for centuries, considered a demanding profession that required prodigious quantities of natural talent and ability, plus long and disciplined training. A four-year old could paint a Jackson Pollock, but only Velasquez could paint a Velasquez. If you look at a Velasquez and a Jackson Pollock and see them as equal but different examples of fine art, then you have already drunk the koolaid.

The emperor is wearing no clothes -- modern "art" is simply the visual expression of pure relativism: no standards, no skill or talent required, and a sad reliance on shock to get noticed.