Possibility of the Aesthetic Experience

MARTINUS NIJHOFF PHILOSOPHY LIBRARY

VOLUME 14

For a complete list of volumes in this series see final page of the volume.
 Possibility of the
Aesthetic Experience

edited by

Michael H. Mitias
(Millsaps College)

MARTINUS NIJHOFF PUBLISHERS

1986
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Main entry under title:

Possibility of the sesthetic experience.

(Martinus Nijhoff philosophy library; v. 14)

Includes index.
1. Aestheties--Addresses, essays, lectures.
2. Experience--Addresses, essays, lectures.
I. MItias. Michael H. II. Series.
BH30l.E8P67 1986 111'.85 85-29825

ISBN-13:978-94-010-8443-7 e-ISBN-13 :978-94-009-4372-8

DOI:I0.I007/978-94-009-4372-8

Copyright

1986 by Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht.

Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1986
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For Herman and Martha Hines
 VII

CONTENTS

Preface ix

I. Aporetic Character oj the Aesthetic Experience

One: The Idea of Aesthetic Experience 3

T.J. Diffey

Two: A Critique of Aesthetics 13

Carla Cordua

Three: The Actualities of Non-Aesthetic Experience 27

Jerome Stolnitz

Four: Can We Speak of 'Aesthetic Experience'? 47

Michael H. Mitias

II. Having an Aesthetic Experience 59

Five: Experiencing Aesthetically, Aesthetic Experience, and 61

Experience in Aesthetics
Robert Ginsberg

Six: The Deweyan View of Experience 79

Lawrence Haworth

Seven: Experience and Theory in Aesthetics 91

Arnold Berleant

Eight: The Aesthetic Experience: An Exploration 107

Warren E. Steinkraus

III. Nature oj the Aesthetic Experience 115

Nine: What Makes an Experience Aesthetic? 117

Harold Osborne

Ten: Controversy About Aesthetic Attitude: Does Aesthetic l39

Attitude Condition Aesthetic Experience?
Bohdan Dziemidok
VIII

Eleven: Mode of Existence of Aesthetic Qualities 159

Michael H. Mitias

Index 169
 IX

PREFACE

The majority of aestheticians have focused their attention during the past three
decades on the identity, or essential nature, of art: can 'art' be defined? What makes
an object a work of art? Under what conditions can we characterize in a
classificatory sense an object as an art work? The debate, and at times controversy,
over these questions proved to be constructive, intellectually stimulating, and in
many cases suggestive of new ideas. I hope this debate continues in its momentum
and creative outcome. The time is, however, ripe to direct our attention to another
important, yet neglected, concept - viz., 'aesthetic experience' - which occupies a
prominent place in the philosohpy of art. We do not only create art; we also enjoy,
i.e., experience, and evaluate it. How can we theorize about the nature of art in
general and the art work in particular, and about what makes an object a good work
of art, if we do not experience it? For example, how can we identify an object as
an art work and distinguish it from other types of objects unless we first perceive
it, that is in a critical, educated manner? Again, how can we judge a work as good,
elegant, melodramatic, or beautiful unless we first perceive it and recognize its
artistic aspect? It seems to me that experiencing art works is a necessary condition
for any reasonable theory on the nature of art and artistic criticism.
We should then ask: what does it mean to experience a work of art? Is this sort
of experience special or is it different from other types of experience? Next, what
is the structure of the aesthetic experience? Is it an experience? We have been in the
habit of calling it an 'aesthetic experience'; we should accordingly ask: what makes
it aesthetic? In this context, what does 'make' mean? Can we have 'an experience'
simpliciter? Finally, what do we mean by 'aesthetic'? What is the principle of
aesthetic distinction? Under what conditions can something called 'an experience'
undergo a change in which it 'becomes' or acquires the character of aesthetic-ness?
I raise this train of questions only to stress their difficulty and consequently the
need to explore their import thoughtfully and systematically. To meet this need, I
have invited a number of distinguished aestheticians to make substantial
contributions towards the clarification and analysis of the very possibility of the
aesthetic experience. The questions with which they have dealt are: what problems
are involved in talking about 'aesthetic experience'? What does it mean to have an
aesthetic experience? What is the structure of the aesthetic experience?
In preparing this volume I received financial assistance and encouragement from
Dr. Robert King, Vice President and Dean of Millsaps College. To him lowe a great
debt of gratitude.

M.H. Mitias
Jackson, Mississippi
 PART I

APORETIC CHARACTER OF THE AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE

 3

ESSAY ONE

THE IDEA OF AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE

T.J. Diffey

There is a well-established literature in philosophy on aesthetic experience and prima

jacie it seems that aesthetic experience is a topic about which we can theorize and
make significant statements. Yet what are we talking about when we talk about
aesthetic experience? It is a shocking admission to have to make, but I have to
confess that I do not know. At the very least I find that the notion of aesthetic
experience is unclear. I, or perhaps we, since I do not believe that I am alone in this
matter, have no clear grasp of the notion. To ask what aesthetic experience refers
to, or what it is experience of is liable to propel us into perplexity, unless perhaps
we have already made the resolve to define the term in a certain way for theoretical
purposes. But if one has no theoretical ambitions which require any idea of aesthetic
experience and yet is armed with a philosophical curiosity about what aesthetic
experience may be, then perplexity is the fate that is liable to await one.
Matters remain clear (well, tolerably clear) while we remain as it were internally
within any particular account of aesthetic experience offered by a philosopher.
Perplexities begin to beset us when we feel uneasy about accepting anyone such
account. This reluctance to accept the view of anyone philosopher on the subject
is not owing to perversity on our part but arises from the feeling that aesthetic
experience suggests more possibilities than those captured by anyone proffered
account. We have been here before of course, for exactly similar things have been
said from time to time about answers to another question in aesthetics, namely how
to define a work of art.
Perplexities are multiplied about aesthetic experience when we try to fit into some
one coherent view those various features of aesthetic experience which we have
picked up from perhaps too eclectic, wide and undisciplined a reading in
philosophy.
Suppose for example that we start from certain familiar accounts of aesthetic
experience, such as Schopenhauer's, and, making a common assumption about
aesthetic experience, assume that Schopenhauer's account of aesthetic experience
must therefore be an account of what it is to experience a work of art. Then we shall

Mitias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility of the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht
4

get into difficulties, as has been well shown by George Dickie. 1 The fact is that such
accounts, however interesting they may be as accounts of aesthetic experience, are
simply not plausible as accounts of what it is to experience a work of art. They miss
too much out of the reckoning.
Or suppose we assume, in a similar vein, what is admittedly not self-evident,
namely that Kant's account of beauty, because it is an account of aesthetic
experience is therefore an account of what it is to experience a work of art. Then,
as a colleague teaching English literature recently remarked at a seminar we jointly
conducted on Kanes aesthetics, Kant's account of beauty seems rather thin; thin if
we would urge it as an account of what it is to experience a work of art. Plainly
it would be unsatisfactory to seek to reduce our experience of a work of art
(particularly works of literature but not only these) to whatever it is that is captured
in and only in Kant's four moments of beauty. To express pleasure for x, to demand
agreement from others in this pleasure and to represent it as necessary, disinterested
and universal, does not seem to approach adequacy as an account of what it is to
experience (whether in reading or performance), say, the plays of Shakespeare. Of
course it may be replied that nobody would seek explicitly to make any given
account of aesthetic experience an account of the experience of art. My point is
rather that we are always in danger of having this kind of identification exert a tacit
influence over our thinking unless we are willing to face and confront the question
explicitly and openly: what does aesthetic experience have to do with the experience
of art. I therefore have a good deal of sympathy with Dickie's proposal, if our
interest is really in works of art, to drop talk about aesthetic experience, and to talk
instead about our experience of works of art. We can then examine in an open way
what it is to experience works of art without being confused or prejudiced by the
body of work in philosophy which is devoted to the subject of aesthetic experience.
Rather we should be ready to bring in insights from that body of work, if and as
they are needed, for any account of art which we may seek to develop or unfold.
If Dickie is right that we should keep an open mind on the question of what
pertains to the experience of a work of art, and not close that issue by making it
true by definition that the experience of a work of art is an aesthetic experience (and
only an aesthetic experience?), we should also in my view keep open the question
of what aesthetic experience is. We should not close that question on the grounds
that because traditional accounts of the aesthetic experience tell us nothing very
cogent or convincing about the experience of art, and I do not believe that they do,
we should therefore lose all interest forthwith in the question of what the nature of
aesthetic experience is. It is wrong to suppose because accounts of aesthetic
experience are not cogent accounts of the experience of art, not cogent because the
standard accounts of aesthetic experience are too thin, one-sided or distorted to
serve as accounts of art, that therefore they are not cogent accounts of aesthetic
experience. It is possible that such accounts are seeking after something wider than

1. "Evaluating Works of Art," British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 25, No.1 (Winter 1985).
 5

art, such that not all aspects of art are to be caught within the aesthetic and the
aesthetic implies a wider field of reference than art.
Some of the perplexity about aesthetic experience, however, arises from the fact
that if we seek to divorce it from art there seems to be no other place for it to go
or context for it to occupy, so that it is left dangling in mid-air as it were. I have
to confess that this is indeed the situation in which, when teaching aesthetics, I have
tended to place the notion of aesthetic experience. And one of the reasons for this
is that in the English-speaking world the notion of the aesthetic has been
monopolized by art. Thus tacitly under the influence of the idefl that aesthetics is
the philosophy of art, and the aesthetic is what pertains to art (I note the slide I
make here from "aesthetics" to "aesthetic," a slide commonly made but not
therefore excusable), one can as it were work through various standard accounts of
aesthetic experience in the literature of aesthetics without knowing why one should
be doing so; the only reason for doing so, and it is a philosophically ignoble reason,
seems to be that the accounts are there.
It is odd then that we should be able to theorize about aesthetic experience
without knowing what if anything that theory applies to; and thus the strategy I
propose we should follow in seeking to understand aesthetic experience is twofold.
First, we should follow Dickie in regarding as an open question the question what
is it to experience a work of art, and so we should not assume that aesthetic
experience and the experience of a work of art are identical. Concerning the
experience of art, I am prepared to allow that there may well be no single category,
the experience of art, which will permit philosophical exploration, that is, it may
be that nothing philosophical can usefully be said about the experience of art as
such. But we don't yet know. If we accept the question that Dickie has opened up
we have to pursue it carefully and thoroughly before we can know whether there
is a philosophical theory of the experience of works of art and what such a theory
would look like. Secondly, I propose that we should take seriously those accounts
of aesthetic experience that our philosophical tradition has made available to us,
and emphasis on this rather than on the question of what it is to experience a work
of art will be the main focus of this paper, though I do not undertake in this paper
a detailed analysis of theories of aesthetic experience either. In other words in this
paper I propose a twofold strategy for tackling the question of aesthetic experience
but do not go very far towards implementing it. For apart from anything else the
ground to be covered is immense.
Aesthetic experience is a perfectly familiar idea, then, even if we don't know
what, if anything, the analysis of it will apply to, or what the outcome of a further
analysis of aesthetic experience will be. On the one hand, then, we are familiar with
works of art; on the other, we can think about aesthetic experience. In the literature
on aesthetic experience philosophers have discussed and analyzed its various
aspects, in particular such features as its intransitivity and non-detachability.
Negatively, aesthetic experience cannot be understood in terms of cause and effect
but in terms rather of its being focused upon an object or objects, but where we do
6

want to speak of effect in connection with aesthetic experience such effect is internal
to the experience. These ideas are important and deserve the analysis they have
received in the literature, but in my view, interesting as they are, we can find
ourselves discussing them without entirely knowing what we are thinking about
(other than trivially that what we are thinking about is aesthetic experience. The
claim of this paper is that we don't clearly know what we are thinking about when
we are thinking about that.) Nor do we know what the connections between art on
the one hand and aesthetic experience on the other may be. Is it for example wrong
(in what sense?) to treat a work of art as a causal source of gratification or stimulus,
or is it merely that to do so is to fail to experience the work aesthetically? Then what
sort of failure is this? Under what obligation am I to avoid it? This line of
questioning presents the aesthetic experience as if it were a hypothetical or
conditional good, seek it if you want it, rather than as a categorical or unconditional
good, something which you ought to seek.
In the literature of aesthetics hitherto there seem to be two main views of the
connection between art and aesthetic experience. One is to make it true by definition
that a work of art is an object of aesthetic experience; the other is to assume a
connection but to leave its nature unexplained, an unresolved perplexity. If we do
refuse to define art and aesthetic experience mutually in terms of one another, and
ask, with minds unprejudiced by any view Of the possible connections with art, what
aesthetic experience is, we may begin by noticing that the aesthetic may be assigned
a number of philosophical tasks which in fact have nothing to do with art. For
example philosophers of religion require the notion of aesthetic experience and a
notion of it as that which has no especial connection with art, but which, rather,
is closer to perception, the original root meaning of aesthetic. For example Herbert
V. Guenther says in his Buddhist Philosophy in Theory and Practice: "It is the
aesthetic, intuitive factor that is declared to be ultimately real, while the
theoretically designated factor in our experience is only relatively SO.,,2 It is not my
concern here to discuss this kind of claim but merely to call attention to it. In recent
years we have become accustomed to the idea that certain works of art, such as
readymades, do not lend themselves to aesthetic appreciation. Therefore there is a
tendency on the part of some philosophers to seek to free art from the aesthetic as
it were. 3 We now need to remind ourselves of the inverse possibility, namely that
aesthetic experience does not require for its object works of art.
It may be as a result of the secularization of philosophy in the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries that we are liable to overlook the idea that aesthetic experience
is important in religions. Though equally it has to be admitted that we have been

2.. Herbert V. Guenther, Buddhist Philosophy in Theory and Practice (1971, Penguin Books, 1972),
p. 19.
3. See for example Timothy Binkley's "Piece: Contra Aesthetics," Journal of Aesthetics and Art
Criticism, XXXV (1977) and reprinted in J. Margolis, Philosophy Looks at the Arts (2nd edition,
Temple University Press, 1978).
 7

becoming increasingly self-conscious about the notion of the aesthetic (philosophers

locate the beginning of our tendency to distinguish aesthetic from other aspects of
experience in the eighteenth century) during the very period when the Enlightenment
secularization of philosophy has been proceeding apace; so to speak of the aesthetic
aspects of religion may already be to make an irreligious or profane remark, to
speak from outside religion in the spirit of a visiting, friendly but unbelieving,
anthropologist. In an age such as ours then, when the dominant climate of opinion
is secular, it may seem that aesthetic experience, if it is anywhere to have a place,
must become tied to art or be declared redundant (a myth) or indeed (bearing in
mind the readymades just mentioned) both. Because aesthetic experience is thought
to be tied to art and because some art at least seems to have no aesthetic interest,
the idea of aesthetic experience has thus come to seem to the avant-garde mind
incurably outmoded.
Another example of the aesthetic requiring or having no connection with art is
to be found in moral philosophy. Consider for instance this:

Virtue is indeed more sublime than intellectual and aesthetic advantages, not only in its
intrinsic value but also in its power to bring about happiness. Fully developed virtue is related
to our joy in exercising it. Anyone who doubts the sweetness of virtue should make a try at
devoting himself to its service. He will enjoy the most sublime happiness that can be imparted
to any man here on earth.4

And there is Kant's more famous attachment to the sublimity of duty. Again I am
not concerned to analyze or discuss this sort of claim here but merely wish to call
attention to a case where the aesthetic does not seem to pertain to art. The aesthetic
advantages Brentano refers to as being less sublime than those of virtue seem to have
no special connection with art. Or if that is disputable, note in the same passage
from Brentano the use of the term "sublime," a term which is often thought of as
an aesthetic term. Note too the reference to "sweetness" in the exercise of virtue.
Is this sweetness aesthetic? In the passage from Brentano, however, "sublime"
seems not to be used aesthetically but in contrast to the aesthetic. The question thus
arises, when is the sublime an aesthetic notion and when is it not? It seems to me
for example that aesthetic theory after Kant loses interest quite suddenly in the
sublime, whereas the term continues to be of religious and theological importance.
Such complications need not detain us now, providing the point is accepted that
there is sufficient scope for an investigation into the aesthetic that does not require
prior attachment to works of art or commitment to the philosophy of art. That this
is so is already suggested by the point just made, namely that if we are going to
investigate the connections and distinctions between a theological and an aesthetic
use of the notion of the sublime we don't seem obliged to call in art (though we may
wish to do so) in order to make this investigation.

4. Franz Brentano, The Foundation and Construction of Ethics (Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1973), p.
345.
8

I begin then by supposing that the two questions, what is art, and what is aesthetic
experience, are independent of one another. Of course I do not deny that if we
consider both questions we should find a good deal of the same material occurring
in answers to both and I am equally aware that many philosophers define one in
terms of the other. Nor do I insist, before we know what is at stake, on keeping
the two questions distinct for ever more. My idea is, rather, to keep the questions
separate for as long as possible, to keep open the issue as long as we can for the
sake of what we may thereby learn. Eventually we may find connections, overlaps,
or indeed identity between the two, but we should not set out with this as our a priori
or definitional assumption.
Let us see how far we can get then by considering as it were in its own terms the
question, what is aesthetic experience. 5 Given the typical literature in Britain and
America on contemporary aesthetics and the common identification of aesthetics
with the philosophy of art, 6 it may be wondered how one can speak of aesthetic
experIence without considering works of art. But this is in fact, though
unfashionable, quite easy. Moore for example included under aesthetic experience
the beauty of nature and personal affection as well as the beauty of works of art.
It is easy to find beauty without having to go to works of art and this is an
excessively familiar point even now when the identification of aesthetics with the
philosophy of art is all but total. The question is whether we have the motive or
support to look for beauty elsewhere. But we can go further. Not only should we
refuse to identify aesthetic experience with art but also we might hesitate before
identifying it with beauty. Of course this suggestion must seem preposterous since
it is generally recognized that the aesthetic can mean only one of one and/or two
things: namely (1), that which pertains to art, the dominant modern meaning; and
(2) that pertaining to the beautiful, historically the dominant meaning of the
aesthetic. So the issue in aesthetics seems to be which of these should command our
allegiance. Should we be modernists or traditionalists?
We can show that the aesthetic is not identical with the beautiful by means of this
example: the beauty of holiness. The beauty of holiness is not an aesthetic beauty.
If this is intelligible, the aesthetic cannot be identified with the beautiful. All this
shows so far, however, it could be countered, is that the example does not show
anything positive as it were about the aesthetic. If not all beauty is aesthetic then
some beauty is non-aesthetic. Agreed but so what? If not all human beings are

5. Since only so much can be done in one paper I am not interested here in the question what is art,
having written extensively on that elsewhere. See my "The Republic of Art," British Journal of
Aesthetics, Vol. 9, No.2 (1969); "Essentialism and the Definition of 'Art' ," British Journal of
Aesthetics, Vol. 13, No.2, (1973); "The Idea of Art," British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 17, No.
2 (1977); "A Place for Works of Art," Ratio, Vol. XIX, No.1 (1977); "On Defining Art," British
Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 19, No.1 (1979); and Tolstoy's 'What is Art?': (Croom Helm, 1985).
6. There are some exceptions to this, e.g., Mary Mothersill's recent book Beauty Restored (Clarendon
Press, 1984), and I suspect that we shall see more to come.
 9

intelligent then some human beings are "non-intelligent." But this does not tell us
that there is a species of intelligent beings other than human beings; it does not
license us to conclude that there are at least two species of intelligent beings of which
human beings are but one of the two species. Similarly from the fact that not all
beauty is aesthetic we cannot infer that therefore there is a species of the aesthetic
which does not pertain to beauty.
We can say, however, without committing any fault in logic, that there are at least
two species of beauty. We conjecture this because we are made uneasy by our
example of the beauty of holiness in calling some beauty aesthetic but are not uneasy
about calling other beauties aesthetic. (Take the stock example here of the sunset.)
But what does this tell us about the aesthetic? Still no more it seems, for if sunsets
are beautiful and holiness is beautiful (compare if men are mortal and cats are
mortal) then indeed there are (at least) two species of the beautiful (two species of
mortal beings) but we cannot infer from this anything about the nature of the
aesthetic (of mortality). We cannot infer that there are other species of the aesthetic
(of mortality) beyond the ones implied in the premises. So we cannot infer from the
beauty of holiness to a species of the aesthetic which comprises neither art nor
beauty. We cannot infer it but we may legitimately ask whether there is such a
species. My suspicion is that the answer to the question is yes.
We have then the following terms to consider and the possible logical
relationships between them: the beautiful, the artistic (meaning here pertaining to
art), and the aesthetic. The question is whether the aesthetic is exhausted in meaning
by the disjunct: beauty or art. My suggestion is that in the example, the beauty of
holiness, we cannot mean an artistic beauty. But what do we mean by saying that
the beauty of holiness is not an aesthetic beauty? For this to be an intelligible
question, it must be the case that, having ruled out the case in which the beauty of
holiness is not an aesthetic beauty because it is not art, the aesthetic and the
beautiful are nevertheless not synonymous. The other possibility of course is that
the proposition "The beauty of holiness is not an aesthetic beauty" is not
intelligible; not intelligible because the term "aesthetic" simply pleonastically
repeats the term "beauty.' "Aesthetic beauty" it may be insisted is a pleonasm and
"non-aesthetic beauty" a self-contradiction.
But if "aesthetic beauty" is a pleonasm so too is "aesthetic art." There are signs
in current ordinary usage, however, as well as self-conscious attempts in the
philosophy of art and in art circles, to distinguish art and the aesthetic, signs of a
desire to mark some difference between the two concepts, art and the aesthetic.
"Until now that tool [the computer] has been regarded with a certain amount of
suspicion by artists who, by nature, are aesthetic rather than scientific.',7 Obviously
the speaker, in saying that the artist is aesthetic by nature, intends more than the
tautology that the artist is artistic by nature. Putting it in Moore's terminology, the

7. Speech by Mr. John Baxter at the launch of the Commodore International Computer Art Challenge
at the Hippodrome, London (March I, 1984).
10

terminology of his account of value judgements in Principia Ethica, the speaker's

presupposition is that "art (or the arts) is aesthetic" is a synthetic proposition, not
an analytic one. It is this possibility (rather than here what the particular speaker
quoted meant by his remarks) which interests me. Nor do I think the instance I have
quoted is a stray example.
Some sort of distinction between art and the aesthetic is implied too in what Tim
Hilton says of Matisse:

These are aesthetic objects, and not merely because they are works of art. They turn away
from nineteenth-century demands that sculpture should engage with the world of reality.
Their disavowal of public effect becomes an insistence on their own nature. 8

I wish to suggest, then, that the term "aesthetic" has taken on meanings and
resonances that cannot be exhausted by identifying it with art or beauty.
"Aesthetic" can (not must) mean something which comprises neither art nor
beauty. I am not sure that I know what in these cases it does mean, but will have
achieved something if I can carry the reader in the conviction that when we speak
of aesthetic experience we are not necessarily (though commonly we may be)
speaking of the experience of art or beauty. Some of the meanings not exhausted
by either of these are to be found for example in Dostoevsky's works.
In my first example Dostoevsky stays with the terms I've already named and so
does not, it would seem, support my attempt to widen our sensitivity to the
possibilities within the notion of the aesthetic, but even here relationships and other
elements are hinted at which have so far been included in our discussion of the
aesthetic.

When at three o'clock we were taken out for a walk, passers-by would stop as though in
amazement as soon as they saw her, and often an exclamation of admiration followed the
fortunate child. She was born to be happy, she must be born to be happy - that was one's
first impression on meeting her. Perhaps my aesthetic sense, my sense of the artistic, was for
the first time excited; it took shape for the first time, awakened by beauty, and that was the
source from which my love arose. 9
While this does not reject the aesthetic as meaning the artistic or the beautiful and
thus so far, it would seem, does not support my case, it does encourage us when
exploring the aesthetic to look for connections and relationships between art and
beauty. This is important in any adequate analysis of the aesthetic and is a timely
warning against the (Humean) inclination I've exhibited above to suppose that
wherever there is a distinction there is separation. My next example, however, takes
us beyond the aesthetic as the artistic and/or the beautiful to a sense closer to

8. Tim Hilton, Review of Matisse Sculptures and Drawings at the Hayward Gallery, Times Literary
Supplement (November 23, 1984), p. 1344.
9. Fyodor Dostoevsky, Nyetochka Nyezvanov in The Friend oj the Family, trans. Constance Garnett
(Heinemann, 1920, 1949), p. 286.
 11

"perception" (which as I said earlier is the original Greek root meaning of

"aesthetic"). Dostoevsky writes:

The first untried, unformed feeling had been so coarsely handled in me, a child. The first
fragrant, virginal modesty had been so soon exposed and insulted, and the first and perhaps
very real and aesthetic impression had been so outraged. 10

This sense of aesthetic, suggesting some kind of uninterpreted Humean sense

impression or sensation (or, as in this case, an internal impression) enjoyed for its
own sake, was popular in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Writers such
as Walter Pater and John Cowper Powys share it with Dostoevsky. Powys writes:

It was not only a blow to her love, to her pride, to her happiness. It was a blow to something
deeper than these, to that innate respect for life as a thing of quite definite aesthetic values,
which made up the very illusion of her soul. II

To understand the aesthetic therefore is not merely to isolate certain elements such
as "pertaining to art," "pertaining to beauty," nor even to ask how the various
elements identified in the notion are to be reconnected, though this is important,
but even more it is to work for some understanding of why such things as "an
awareness of an impression" is good and valuable. The thinness of aesthetics I
suspect resides here, not so much in a lack of understanding of the concepts involved
but in a failure to think through the value carried by those concepts or to understand
the value that those concepts could carry. I do not think for example that the
common idea that aesthetic perception or experience is perception or experience for
its own sake is wrong or unclear intellectually. The problem rather is to explain why
such experience should matter or is important to human beings. (We might then
know, incidentally, to what nouns the epithet "aesthetic" should properly be
attached. My somewhat rudderless use of the phrase "the aesthetic" will alarm any
ordinary language philosophers who may remain; something, they will think, is
going wrong.)
My idea is that we should regard the term "aesthetic" as a term that extends
thought, stretches the mind, and leads us into new and uncharted territory. The idea
here is that our language is leading us by means of as yet such inadequately
understood expressions as aesthetic experience to new possibilities of experience of
which philosophy has not yet become self-conscious, is not yet cognizant. I assume
in other words that there is more in our language than there is at anyone time in
philosophy, and that philosophy should accordingly seek to discover what it is that
our language is trying to tell us. My proposition is that in the case of such
expressions as "aesthetic experience" language has already, but only implicitly,

10. Fyodor Dostoevsky, "A Little Hero," White Nights and Other Stories, trans. Constance Garnett
(Heinemann, 1918), p. 271.
11. John Cowper Powys, After My Fashion (1919, first published in 1980 by Pan Picador), p. 137.1111 It
12

indicated or inchoately discovered that which it is the task of philosophy to clarify

and to explicate. The idea is that language tells us more than we know by having
hit upon new continents of experience when it was not necessarily engaged in such
a search but was busy about other tasks. Language does not go in search of new
experience but makes it possible. It is the task of philosophy to formulate what has
thus been implicitly and often for other reasons discovered or anticipated in our
language. A historical example of this is the word "imagination" and the manner
in which that came to extend human experience in directions inconceivable before
the Romantic poets took the word from rationalist philosophers for whom
imagination was the lowest grade of knowledge or illusion. My reason for supposing
that the idea of aesthetic experience deserves systematic clarification at the hands
of philosophy and not rejection as something empty or nonsensical is that the
examples I have given above seem interesting and suggestive of further meaning.
This is said in the full post-Wittgensteinian knowledge that substantive terms don't
entail substances denoted. Indeed they don't but the moral is that we should look
and see what aesthetic experience does entail. This paper is an attempt to say why
I think that in the case of aesthetic experience it is worth looking.
 13

ESSAY TWO

A CRITIQUE OF ESTHETICS

Carla Cordua

In the 19th century, when Europeans already used the word 'esthetics' as the name
of a philosophical discipline dedicated to art and beauty, three powerful thinkers
criticized either this philosophical discipline, or the notion of the esthetic, or the
peculiar esthetic conception of art. Hegel, Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, the critics of
esthetics and the esthetic, still understood the new expression in connection with its
origin in the Greek word for 'sensation'. Their critiques, though quite different
from one another, are all dependent upon this understanding of 'esthetic'. In what
is most essential to them, beauty and art do not belong to the sphere of sensations
and the objects of sense experience, thought Hegel. Therefore, they should not be
considered by philosophy from an "esthetic" point of view which presupposes that
they have an all-important and exclusive connection with sense experience in
general. Kierkegaard's critique of the esthetic form of existence also builds on the
derivation of the word from the Greek: to live esthetically or sensually, as Mozart's
Don Juan or as Faust, is to live for desire and passion, forever in search of the new
and exciting. It represents the lowest of possibilities open to man. Art in general,
and especially music, are correctly ascribed, according to Kierkegaard, to this area
of the senses and of passionate desire; artists and art lovers experience the
discontinuity, the ennui and the final desperation characteristic of this mode of
existence. Nietzsche, on the other hand, was, as Hegel before him, an enemy of the
philosophical discipline of esthetics. Philosophers, he believed, have been unable to
make sense of art because they have always looked at it not from the point of view
of creative, active artists, but from that of the passive reception of their work. This
perspective has been introduced by modern decadence esthetics, in particular by
Kant's conception of the esthetic as the passive experience of the onlooker (der
Zuschauer, der empfiingliche fur Kunst). The real artist is not one who merely looks
or feels or understands, but one who does and gives.
The expression Aesthetica was first introduced by Baumgarten in 1735 (in
Meditationes philosophicae de nonnullis ad poema pertinentibus) as the name of a
necessary but still to be developed philosophical discipline. There is a field,
Baumgarten thought, which philosophy has failed to explore: it is that of our
feelings and sensations and of the peculiar kind of knowledge they yield. Aesthetica

Milias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility of the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht
14

as Wissenschaft der sinnlichen Erkenntnis (Ritter, I, 556-7) would be a gnoseologia

inferior that would connect two separate kinds of truth, that of philosophy and that
of sense and imaginative experience. If philosophy establishes a canon of sense
knowledge and adds this logic of common and artistic experience to the logic that
directs the use of intellect in science and philosophy, it would mend our divided
experience of the world. This meaning of esthetics depends upon the old
philosophical distinction of two levels of knowledge and experience, a superior or
intellectual, and an inferior or sensual one. The new word was soon adopted in
German, especially, it seems, through the influence of Schiller. Kant employs it in
both an older, general sense, comparable to Baumgarten's and in the new romantic
acceptance. His science of all the a priori principles of sensibility is called
transcendental esthetics but later he opposes the logical and cognitive to the esthetic
in the Kritik der Urteilskraft. Propositions about matters of taste
(Geschmacksurteile) are called esthetic and have no epistemic value at all. In this
later Kantian usage the esthetic pertains to art and taste alone; it yields no
knowledge by itself and it constitutes an autonomous form of experience. This is
an important step towards the use of esthetics as a name of a philosophical discipline
dedicated exclusively to beauty and art.
This name was well established among writers, critics and academics when Hegel
began (1818) to offer his Heidelberg and Berlin lectures on beauty and fine art. In
spite of having used the name before and of intending to continue to do so in these
lectures, he stated clearly in them that the word 'esthetics' was inadequate as a name
for the discipline he planned to develop. "Aesthetics means, more precisely, the
science of sensation, of feeling" (Es, I, 1). He will be talking about philosophy of
art, Hegel says, which is an altogether different thing. "But the proper expression
for our science is Philosophy of Art and, more definitely, Philosophy of Fine Art"
(ibid.). The name 'esthetics' was invented, Hegel goes on, "at the period in
Germany when works of art were treated with regard to the feelings they were
supposed to produce, as, for instance, the feeling of pleasure, admiration, fear,
pity, and so on" (ibid.). "Reflection on these lines dates especially from Moses
Mendelssohn's times [... ] Yet such investigation did not get far, because feeling is
the indefinite dull region of spirit; what is felt remains enveloped in the form of the
most abstract individual subjectivity [.... ]For reflection on feeling is satisfied with
observing subjective emotional reaction in its particular character, instead of
immersing itself in the thing at issue i.e. in the work of art, plumbing its depths".
(Es, I, 32-3).
The esthetic point of view on art is inadequate for philosophy of art on many
counts; one of the most important for Hegel is directly related to his conception of
philosophy as Wissenschaft. "Whatever ideas others may have about philosophy
and philosophizing, my view is that philosophizing is throughout inseparable from
scientific procedure" (Es, I, 11). If works of art were essentially just particular
material things given to sensation or provoking feelings, the scepticism often held
about the possibility of knowing them philosophically would be entirely justified.
 15

There is, in the first place, no science of isolated and diverse sense objects lacking
in necessity, but only of true universality (Es, I, 225; cf. I, 143-4; WW, VIII,
213-4). Art and beauty are accessible to philosophical knowledge only to the
extent that they are necessary universals. Hegel separates, in the second place,
natural from artistic beauty because only works of art are due to reason and men's
highest powers. Hegel holds the works of artists to be appropriate objects of
thought because they are spiritual and not merely natural, produced and not just
given, significant and not only existent. Therefore esthetics strictly could not even
pretend to establish itself as a scientific discipline. It associates the works of the fine
arts first and foremost with the objects of sense perception which are given in our
sensations andappreciated by taste. The object of scientific thought, the universal
(Idee, Begriff), though active in every experience, according to Hegel, is not
sufficiently developed and clarified at this elemental stage of the senses to be
appropriate for theorethical consideration. It follows that if works of art were really
as estheticians think of them, no philosophy of art in Hegel's sense would be
possible.
Beauty and works of art are always, on the other hand, immediately present to
our senses and felt by us. Art in general is inseparable from sensations and
sentiments, and each work is an individual configuration of some material or other.
Hegel never denies this necessary connection between art and matter, art and
sensibility. But because he recognizes it and intends, nonetheless, to develop a
philosophy of art, he must show that the sensibilia in art are not an overwhelming
obstacle to knowledge. His Aesthetics will contain, therefore, a careful and diverse
critique of the esthetic aspect of art.

It is still more likely to seem that even if fine art in general is a proper object of philosophical
reflection, it is yet no appropriate topic for strictly scientific treatment. For the beauty of art
presents itself to sense, feeling, intuition, imagination; it has a different sphere from thought,
and the apprehension of its activity and its products demands an organ other than scientific
thinking. Further, it is precisely the freedom of production and configurations that we enjoy
in the beauty of art. In the production as well as in the perception of works of art, it seems
as if we escape from every fetter of rule and regularity. In place of the strictness of
conformity to law, and the dark inwardness of thought, we seek peace and enlivenment in
the forms of art; we exchange the shadow realm of the Idea for bright and vigorous reality.
Finally, the source of works of art is the free activity of fancy which in its imaginations is
itself more free than nature is. Art has at its command not only the whole wealth of natural
formations in their manifold and variegated appearance; but in addition the creative
imagination has power to launch out beyond them inexhaustibly in productions of its own.
In face of this immesurable fullness of fancy and its free products, it looks as if thought must
lose courage to bring them completely before itself, to criticize them, and arrange them under
its universal formulae. (Es, I, 5.)

The role of matter and sensibility for art and beauty has to be defined by philosophy
not only according to its importance but also according to its character, or
16

qualitatively. In every work of art we find, Hegel thinks, the unity of some meaning,
some sense, with an actually perceived material presence. The artist conceives both
things together and experience keeps them that way too. But analysis may consider
these elements separately either for critical or for theoretical purposes. Defining the
importance of matter and sensibility for beauty would be stating their relationship
to meaning. The complementary task consists in describing the peculiar quality of
matter and its perception when it is part of a work of art. In his lectures Hegel
accomplishes these two tasks only indirectly. His definition of beauty as "das
sinnliche Scheinen der Idee" ("the pure appearance of the Idea to sense" -Es, I,
111) stresses the fact that meaning and formed matter are both necessary ingredients
of the beautiful. His whole philosophy of fine art faithfully develops this insight.
Hegel explains through the process of configuration of the materials of art, how
meaning and matter, so neatly distinguished elsewhere, become intimately fused in
art. On the other hand, the definition of the qualitative peculiarity of matter and
the senses in art consists of many and quite different occasional statements made
by Hegel along his lectures. In spite of the fact that he is mostly talking about other
subjects his views on the issue are quite consistent. We have to bring these pieces
together if we wish to understand his critique of esthetics.

Of course the work of art presents itself to sensuous apprehension. It is there for sensuous
feeling, external or internal, for sensuous intuition and ideas, just as nature is, whether the
external nature that surrounds us, or our own sensitive nature within. After all, a speech, for
example, may be adressed to sensuous ideas and feelings. (Es, I, 35).

That the work of art has been deliberately prepared by the artist as a material object
to be perceived by someone who is both intelligent and spiritual, sets such works
apart from natural objects. Art will never rouse the sense exclusively, or apart from
thought or ideal aspirations. From the beginning it is the artist's intention to address
whole persons, not isolated sensibilities (Es, I, 36). Hegel shows that there are
several different ways in which matter makes itself felt and be taken account of by
people. He examines these relationships to objects of sensuous apprehension in
order, beginning with the poorest and ending with the best, or most complete (Es,
I, 35-9).
"Purely sensuous apprehension" is simple sensation in a state of general
distraction. When this seeing and hearing changes, say, into appetite or desire for
the seen and heard, we already have a more complicated case than the former. Mere
reception of sense data is different fromthe adoption of a practical attitude towards
material objects. Practical interests are directed not towards the mere presence
("sinnliche Gegenwart" -Ae, I, 48) of things but towards their whole existence in
space and time. In order to be able to use or to consume something, I must be
assured that it is not merely a colored, fragrant surface, but a real flower or apple.
Works of art are neither directed to distracted feeling not used or destroyed by
appetites. Nor are they destined to be the object of theoretical intelligence, which
 17

is another mode of taking in material things. Theory is dedicated to establishing

universality and law and to think particular objects according to their concepts.
Science proceeds, therefore, by abstraction, which is a method of transforming
particular things into instances or cases of some conceived generality. This is, of
course, quite different, both in purpose and procedure, from the perception of a
work of art; the whole interest we have in beautiful things resides in the particular
felt presence of something unique.
After this discussion Hegel concludes that our perception of works of art depends
upon a peculiar kind of interest for a new type of material objects. It is an interest
in pure surfaces - as against one in real existences; an interest in the sole appearance
of there being so meting perceivable - as against one in whole reality.

Thereby the sensuous aspect of a work of art, in comparison with the immediate existence
of things in nature, is elevated to a pure appearance, and the work of art stands in the middle
between immediate sensuousness and ideal thought [... ) If spirit leaves the objects free [... )
this pure appearance of the sensuous presents itself to spirit from without as the shape, the
appearance or the sonority of things. Consequently the sensuous aspect of art is related only
to the two theoretical senses of sight and hearing, while smell, taste and touch remain
excluded from the enjoyment of art [... ) What is agreeable to these senses is not the beauty
of art. Thus art on its sensuous side deliberately produces only a shadow-world of shapes,
sounds and sights. (Es, I, 38-9).

The artist's work comes from imagination, a natural gift for producing concrete
pictures. "But the productive fancy of an artist is the fancy of a great spirit and
heart, the apprehension and creation of ideas and shapes, and indeed the exhibition
of the profoundest and most universal human interests in pictorial and completely
definite sensuous form" (Es, I, 40). This unity of the universal and the individual
configuration of the material object in art makes Hegel think about the ambiguity
of the word 'sense' ('Sinn').

'Sense' is this wonderful word which is used in two opposite meanings. On the one hand it
means the organ of immediate apprehension, but on the other hand we mean by it the sense,
the significance, the thought, the universal underlying the thing. And so sense is connected
on the one hand with the immediate external aspect of existence, and on the other hand with
its inner essence. Now a sensuous consideration does not cut the two sides apart at all; in one
direction it contains the opposite one too, and in sensuous immediate perception it at the
same time apprehends in a still unseperated unity, it does not bring the Concept as such into
consciousness but stops at foreshadowing it. (Es, I. 128-9).

A work of art, according to Hegel, will function in experience as an open duct that
communicates these two meanings of 'sense'. "The object should neither float
before our eyes as a thought, nor create, in the interest of thought, a difference from
and an opposition to perception" (Es, I, 128). What the artist produces, then, has
its origin in matter and sensibility, but has, at the same time, left this origin behind.
"But precisely for this reason an art product is only there so far as it has taken its
18

passage through the spirit and has arisen from spiritual productive activity" (Es, I,
39). The title of the section from which these words come is "Das Kunstwerk als
fUr den Sinn des Menschen dem Sinnlichen entnommen" ("The Work of Art, as
being for Apprehension by Man's Senses, is drawn from the sensuous Sphere" -
Es, I, 32-41). This sentence contains a similar type of ambiguity to the one found
in 'sense'. In fact, 'entnommen' ('drawn', but also 'withdrawn') means both that
the work of art proceeds from sensuous matter and that the materials used by the
artist have already been taken away from their original place and transformed by
his labors. They are now in the work something altogether different from what they
were in nature. The paradoxical aspect of Hegel's position on the status of the
esthetic in the work is made clear by this phrase when it states that the artist's spirit
transforms matter into something new precisely with the intention of addressing
man's sense (in the singular in the German text). What is meant here, I surmise, is
that the sensuous presence produced by art is so intimately related to something
thought and even cunningly planned, that it will push the spectator beyond an
exclusively sensuous apprehension of it. Isolated matter and sensibility is what is
made impossible by art. The actual experience of this impossibility - the work of
art demands to be understood, interpreted, - will be viewed by philosophy as a
proof of the unsubstantial condition of matter, an important truth of idealism in
general.
The pure appearance into which the artist's efforts have changed the materials
used for the work, is not one of the kind that hides, confuses or lies, as appearances
may, but one that exhibits or shows. Appearances should not be indiscriminately
rejected, Hegel contends. Appearances in a positive sense are, among other things,
indispensable for truth. "Appearance itself is essential to essence. Truth would not
be truth if it did not appear, if it were not truth for someone and for itself" (Es,
I, 8). Hegel, who denies that art has anything to do with instruction, purification,
moral betterment, financial gain, struggling for fame and honor, claims nevertheless
that art has a mission: "to unveil the truth in the form of sensuous artistic
configuration" (Es, I, 55; cf. 73-4, 83, 91, 111, 155,282, 539; II, 533-4). The truth
that artistic appearance reveals is not truth in its final form, but this form would
not be possible without the manifestation of that something which still cannot be
said or conceived with clarity and precision. Truth in the guise of an image, a tale
or a musical composition is, of course, rather primitive, incomplete, unsystematic
and lacking in definition, from the point of view of philosophical activity.
Imagination and sensuous configurations in general are quite unfavorable media for
truth proper, but they are, nonetheless, precisely what generates truth's first
historical form. This content, which in its artistic form has to be half felt, half
guessed, will, when fully developed, come to be thought out and formulated in
science and philosophy.
Nowhere else but in art does Hegel assign to sensuous matter and sensibility such
a decisive role for truth. In his philosophy of knowledge he values the evidence of
the senses as the lowest rank of our consciousness of reality. Reason and thought,
 19

knowledge proper leave the particular sense experiences and their pretended
certitude far behind. We find a similar evaluation in Hegel's ethical teachings. Real
freedom awaits us beyond desire and appetite in dedication to reasonable tasks and
participation in social, political, religious and scientific activities. Only artistic
beauty is able to bring matter and sensibility into direct connection with the highest
human aims. It is important for our subject to take notice that this connection
between sensibility and truth that Hegel establishes in his lectures on esthetics makes
art into an antecedent of philosophy. His whole polemic against the esthetic
interpretation of art depends on his interest in the theoretical relevance of the arts.
His critique of the esthetic aspect of art is not inspired by religious or moral
considerations or by some search for purification and otherworldliness, but only by
his theoretical interests. If the arts are considered first and foremost as agreeable
and a matter of taste it will be impossible to assign them their real role in human
life. Historically and culturally their function has consisted, Hegel thinks, in
preparing men for modernity, the age of science and philosophy, the epoch of truth
formulated as a philosophical system. There is no denying that the arts are agreeable
and entertaining too, Hegel concedes. In this they are similar to learning and
thought, which can also be applied to several uses.

It is of course the case that art can be used as a fleeting play, affording recreation and
entertainment, decorating our surroundings, giving pleasantness to the externals of our life,
and making other objects stand out by artistic adornment. Thus regarded, art is indeed not
independent, not free, but ancillary. But what we want to consider is art which is free alike
in its end and its means. The fact that art in general can serve other ends and be in that case
a mere passing amusement is something which it shares equally with thought. For, on the one
hand, science may indeed be used as an intellectual servant for finite ends and accidental
means, and it then acquires its character not from itself but from other objects and
circumstances. Yet, on the other hand, it also cuts itself free from this servitude in order to
raise itself, in free independence, to the truth in which it fulfils itself independently and
conformably with its own ends alone. (Es, J,7).

What makes art free and, at the same tine, functional and fertile for human life,
is its relationship to truth, Hegel thought. Critics of Hegel's philosophy of art look
at this relationship from the point of view that it makes art subordinate and inferior
to philosophy, i.e. unfree and dependent. They seem mostly to share Kant's
interpretation of art as a peculiar, autonomous form of experience that is
completely devoid of value for truth and knowledge. But this is precisely what Hegel
is criticizing and trying to refute; from the very beginning of his lectures, when he
discusses the possibility of making art the subject of a philosophical science, he
presupposes an internal connection between art and philosophy. As spiritual
activities both of them are made free and not dependent by truth. They both have
truth as their real content, and philosophy, which is the more advanced form of this
shared content, has to be able to put forth a theory of art because of this coincidence
between them. In the knowledge of art, philosophy, which is highly self-conscious,
20

only contemplates its own past.

But Hegel would not only deny that truth may destroy freedom; he would also
most emphatically refuse the notion that philosophical thought violates the true
nature of its objects. Art is adequate as an object of theory not solely because
philosophy will try to embrace all subjects. But also because art moves as of itself
in the direction of thought. This internal "development" of the arts towards
philosophy is once again presented by Hegel in his lectures as progress away from
material nature and natural sensibility. Because of this, the advancement of art
towards thought and theory belongs to Hegel's critique of esthetics.
The philosophical concept of art in Hegel's lectures organizes a series of historical
and material differences. 'Art' coordinates and unifies several periods and cultural
roles of art, on the one hand, and the various arts or types of art, on the other.
Hegel deals with variety, an essential part of this or any concept, from the point of
view of his distinction between meaning and configuration in the single work of art.
The development of meaning generates the three forms of art: symbolic, classic,
romantic. The external realization of the concept in diverse material media produces
the system of the arts: architecture, sculpture, painting, music, poetry. We shall
examine the latter kind of articulation of the concept with a special interest in the
several artistic materials.
Hegel considers the particular arts to form a system. But systematic order is never
a simple natural trait of a group or multiplicity; it is always the product of
reasonable activity. "Art advances to the sensuous realization of its creations and
rounds itself off in a system of single arts and their genera and species" (Es, I, 73;
cf. Ae, II, 8). The exposition of this system, the third and last section of the lectures,
is the longest and most varied part of them. We shall not consider the
characterization of the several arts by Hegel, but only their different materials or
sensuous media. Works of art are apprehended by two bodily senses - sight and
hearing - and by what Hegel calls "sinnliche Vorstellung", sensuous representation,
which includes memory of images (Bilder). Representation is involved in the
creation and reception of poetry, just as sight is in that of architecture, sculpture
and painting, and hearing in music. Art produces an adjustment, Hegel contends,
between the diverse material media and the senses to which the works of the
differing arts are directed. Material media of art are, therefore, not simply
equivalent to natural matter in general, but are from the beginning a select few
forms of matter, precisely those which can serve the aim of giving individual
sensuous existences to the artist's ideas. Of the senses involved in the apprehension
of works of art says Hegel: "This threefold mode of apprehension provides for art
the familiar division into (i) the visual arts which work out their content for our sight
into an objective external shape and color, (ii) the art of sound, i.e. music, and (iii)
poetry which, as the art of speech, uses sound purely as a sign in order by its means
to address our inner being, namely the contemplation, feelings, and ideas belonging
to our spiritual life" (Es, II, 622-3).
The system of the different arts progresses from one material to another; in each
 21

case the passage to a new material medium represents a step forward in the
idealization of matter. 'Idealization' is here the name of the increasing aptness of
matter for the adequate manifestation of the idea. From architecture to poetry,
Hegel thinks, we observe a radical transformation of the material media of the arts:
each one of these differs from the one that "precedes" it because it has stepped out
of the coarser matter of the "previous" one in the direction of matter more refined
and adequate to fulfil beauty's true end. The system of arts is, therefore, a
hierarchy. Thinking about this gradual order and its last rank. in poetry and
sonorous language, we take in something like a progressive movement of
development of art as such. Every aspect is here changing from nature into idea:
arts are defined by the difference of their material media, but "better" materials
offer improved possibilities for manifestation of the content of art. This content is
exhibited by each of the arts but it will be shown only within the limits peculiar to
that medium and not further. Before asking whose reasonable activity generates
progress within the system of the arts, we will examine some of Hegel's descriptions
in order to make the issue clearer.
Strictly speaking, architecture has no peculiar materials of its own, but has to
work directly on wild nature and what it offers. Matter is, at the beginning, an
unexplored group of possibilities; space lacks directions and fixed points of
reference: architecture will remedy these forms of indeterminacy by its treatment of
space and matter. "The material of this first art is the inherently non-spiritual, i.e.
heavy matter, shapeable only according to the laws of gravity" (Es, II, 624).
Because these materials are unable to express a meaning even if adequately treated
and well placed in space, architectural works need something to complement them:
the statue of a god, human lives, venerable dead. "In the case of a house and a
temple and other buildings the essential feature which interests us here is that such
erections are mere means, presupposing a purpose external to them. A hut and the
house of god presuppose inhabitants" (Es, II, 631). The vocation of architecture
"lies precisely in fashioning external nature as an enclosure shaped into beauty by
art out of the resources of the spirit itself, and fashioning it for the spirit already
explicitly present, for man" (Es, II, 633). It may be said, therefore, that architecture
is an inorganic form of SCUlpture because it shows itself unable to incorporate
meaning into its works. The meaning never shows in this case directly through the
sensuous material configured by the artist.
Sculpture will successfully produce such a result; its works need only themselves
to make sense. It differs from architecture in several ways: it presupposes an
established, civilized form of life and the existence of architecture that goes with it.
It chooses its materials in view of specific ends; it never permits the sensuous
presence of the work to be separated from its meaning. Sculpture, Hegel says,
"gives to spirit itself, purposive as it is and independent in itself, a corporeal shape
[. J and it brings both -body and spirit- before our vision as one and the same
indivisible whole" (Es, II, 702). The step from architecture to sculpture is described
by Hegel as a negative one; what is eliminated is inexpressive natural matter. It is
22

suppressed by the choice of a particular piece of matter (Es, II, 706), and by the
artist's labors upon it until it is completely shaped according to his ideas. "Art
therefore withdraws out of the inorganic" (Es, II, 701). But even though organic
forms are the foremost inspiration of sculpture (Es, I, 45), this art does not simply
reproduce natural organisms. The artist's work acts negatively, reductively, towards
the natural. "Art [... ] proceeds gradually, and separates what is separated in
thought, in the real nature of the thing, but not in its existence" (Es, II, 704).
Sculpture is only interested in general organic forms, and "gets no further [... ] than
[... ] pure visibility and what is in general illumined" (Es, II, 704); but it is not
interested in color and the detailed animal presence of organisms. This reduction of
matter operated by art Hegel calls an idealization and spiritualization.
In painting art loses two of the dimensions of bodily existence, a giant step in the
progressive reduction of the sensuous element. For art, Hegel says, "it is essential
that the meaning to which it undertakes to give shape shall not only [... ] emerge
from the first immediate unity with its external existence, [... ] but shall also become
explicitly free from the immediate sensuous shape. This liberation can only take
place in so far as the sensuous and natural is apprehended and envisaged in itself
as negative, as what is to be, and has been, superseded" (Es, I, 347). Music and
poetry are, because they abandon space altogether, superior to the plastic arts.
Sound is, from this particular point of view, matter less material than three- or two-
dimensional plastic matter. Meaning is present in a diminished corporeal way in
sound, compared with the organic forms of sculpture or the colored surfaces of
painting, and it is more on its own still in language, where we normally tend to
ignore matter altogether in favor of sense.

But in so far as the meaning is independent, it must in art produce its shape out of itself and
have the principle of its externality in itself. It must therefore revert to the natural, but as
dominant over the external which, as one side of the totality of the inner itself, exists no
longer as purely natural objectivity but, without independence of its own, is only the
expression of spirit, Thus in this interpenetration the natural shape and externality as a
whole, transformed by spirit, directly acquires its meaning in itself and points no longer to
the meaning as if that were something separated and different from the corporeal
appearance. This is that identification of the spiritual and the natural which is adequate to
the spirit and which does not rest in the neutralization of the two opposed sides but lifts the
spiritual to the higher totality where it maintains itself in its opposite, posits the natural as
ideal, end expresses itself in and on the natural. (Es, J, 431-2).

Only classical art and poetry are, each one for different but complementary reasons,
entirely satisfactory historical examples of Hegel's concept of artistic beauty. We
shall briefly consider only the superiority of poetry among the arts. This superiority
depends upon the greater complexity and generality of poetry, and these in turn are
conditioned by the fact that the sensuous medium of poets is language, "this most
malleable material" (Es, II, 972). "For with the increasing ideality and more varied
particularization of the external material, the variety of the subject-matter and the
 23

forms it assumes is increased. Now poetry cuts itself free from this importance of
the material, in the general sense that the specific character of its mode of sensuous
expression affords no reason any longer for restriction to a specific subject-matter
and a confined sphere of treatment and presentation." (Es, II, 966-7). "The
subject-matter of the art of speech is the entire world of ideas developed with a
wealth of imagination" (Es, II, 963).
Sound, the medium of music, is really the last external material of the arts. Poetry
keeps sound but no longer in the form of a feeling of it but only as a sign, by itself
without significance, value or content. Sound as part of words is there only to
indicate ideas and thoughts (Es, I, 88-9). Poetry is so successful in reducing the
external element of the arts that Hegel says: "Therefore the proper element of
poetical representation is the poetical imagination and the illustration of spirit
itself" (Es, I, 89).
The specific aim of the whole process of conformation and negation of matter
within the system of the arts is clearly brought out by Hegel's insistence on the
proximity of literature and thought, of poetry and theoretical discourse. The Old
Testament, for example, is at the same time, Hegel says, poetry and prose. In some
respects, though not in others, the works of speculative philosophy are comparable
to those of poetry (Es, II, 984). "Yet, precisely, at this highest stage Of poetry: art
now transcends itself, in that it forsakes the element of a reconciled embodiment
of the spirit in sensuous form and passes over from the poetry of the imagination
to the prose of thought" (Es, I, 89). The aim of progress reveals itself to have been
thought capable of manifesting and communicating itself in such manner that the
natural and sensuous conditions of its communication are completely subservient to
the activities of thinking. This subservience is well exemplified by the phonetic
aspect of speech and also by the invisibility of the parts of a living face and the way
in which they produce the expression we perceive. All of nature disappears along
this development that carries us unto independent thought. Its independence, as it
manifests itself in experience, has been generated along the transformation of
matter into pure appearance, and of the latter into an occasion of thinking that
which appears apart from its phenomenon.
The emergence of independent thought is the end of art in at least three senses:
it is its goal, its definition and its termination. What may be conceived without
reference to sensuous configuration is on its own and belongs to a realm apart from
matter and sensibility. Nature, the natural materials, the configurations that result
from work, the images and verbal compositions are all objects of free thought,
which measures them inside and out and defines them through their peculiar limits.
To define means in general for Hegel to establish the limits of something within the
whole to which it belongs, or to give it its rightful place. Now, things only find their
rightful places through thought, in the theory that states what they are in truth. Art,
once known, reveals itself to be limited in several ways, one of which is that it has
been successfully objectified or defined by thought. To affirm that art is an
adequate object of philosophy and to establish its limits is one and the same thing
24

in Hegel's work. But this is too unspecific and formal to be the whole truth.
Philosophy has not only to find the limits of objects in general but, for everyone
of them, the limits which are peculiar and belong exclusively to it.
The essential limitation af art, philosophy discovers, is to be only a preparation
of the possibility of free thought. The most important single factor responsible for
this position of art, according to Hegel's lectures, is its necessary association with
the sensuous in general: Heine Entfremdung zum Sinn lichen hin" (Ae, I, 24). That
is why the definition of art by philosophy depends upon the critique of the esthetic
element in art. The decisive limits of art are established through the discussion of
the relationship of the developing content of art to the progressively disappearing
sensuous element. Current discussions of Hegel's doctrine of the limited character
of art are generally dedicated to only one particular side of the issue, the historical
one, or the so called thesis of the end of art. Students of Hegel are unduly
impressed, it seems to me, by his teaching that art cannot have, in the modern world
of science and philosophy, the same decisive role it once had in less intellectual
times. The anguish for the very existence of art inclines readers to confuse Hegel's
idea with an announcement that we will have to live in the future without art at all
- something Hegel expressly denied (Es, I, 90, 103, 195, 607). The changing role of
art in history, a symptom, no doubt, of its limited character, is but one among the
several ways in which philosophy defines the finite place that art occupies among
the different forms of truth.
As the preparation of something that is finally to be different from itself, art is
seen by Hegel as a productive activity which first successfully negates its natural
materials and then proceeds to successfully transform itself. Art's results are not
only individual works but also the transformations of the activity as such: the
establishment of the diverse arts and of the different ways in which it promotes
human life. Through the transformation of chunks of matter artistic activity negates
the overwhelming power of nature, the appearance of its independence from active
man, and its seemingly substantial character or the permanence of natural forms.
But this is only one aspect of art's reduction of mature to human interests. There
is also the diversification of the activity itself into individual forms or arts. This
development occurs through the labors of traditional groups. The established
system of the arts is a set of habitual ways of negating nature in favor of the human
element, in particular, of reason and thought. Finally the career of art in human
history passes through the three periods of symbolism, classicism and romanticism.
This development has its culmination in the middle, in Greek sculpture. Symbolic
and romantic art are fierce struggles of this activity first to establish itself as a
peculiar sphere of realities, and then to get out of it because of its limitations.
Romantic poetry, the combination of an historically late content and an extremely
idealized material, is already out of bounds. "Poetry cuts itself free from this
importance of the material, in the general sense that the specific character of its
mode of sensuous expression affords no reason any longer for restriction to a
specific subject-matter and a confined sphere of treatment and presentation" (Es,
II, 966-7).
 25

Hegel's critique of the esthetic element in art concludes in a critique of the entire
sphere of art. The overall results of art as an activity and an established group of
realities are internally limited in the first place by their association with sensuous
matter. Hegel insists on the relatively primitive character of artistic experience, the
unsystematic nature of the products of imagination. The many works, styles and
periods cannot enter into one perfectly ordered whole (Es, I, 5, 12-14, II, 640, 988).
There is no real progress in the activity of artists, and so on. "When art advances
in its works to the wide field of actual historical views of life and religious pictorial
ideas, it loses itself there in what is accidental andcontingent" (Es, II, 640). Not even
philosophy masters this variety in an entirely satisfactory way.
The peculiar traits of Hegel's theory of art are those found in other parts of his
work: for the sake of philosophy he will take the current theory of art, criticize it
and transform it into something else. The traditional way of looking at art is the
esthetic one. Hegel states that this conception is partially but not altogether true.
There is no art without sensuous appearance but art as an activity is first trying to
liberate itself from dependence upon matter, and, when it succeeds, trying to go
beyond its particular ways of transforming materials. Philosophy as contemplation
of what things are never works against the internal tendencies of its objects but
respects them. That is why it presents art as an activity that gets itself out of nature
and gives itself a determined, limited existence. Only such a theory considers art as
a spiritual activity that, because it produces merely finite works, goes finally beyond
itself. In the process of the emergence, progress and definition of art, philosophy
contemplates its own origin.

REFERENCES

Ae Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Aesthetik, hrsg. von Friedrich

Bassenge, Frankfurt am Main. Europaische Verlagsanstalt, 1955. 2
vols.
Es G.W.F. Hegel, Aesthetics, Lectures on Fine Art, transl. by T. M.
Knox, Oxford. Clarendon Press, 1975. 2 vols.
Ritter Historisches W6rterbuch der Philosophie, Bd. I, hrsg. von Joachim
Ritter, Darmstadt. Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1971.
ww George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Siimtliche Werke
Jubilaumsausgabe in zwanzig Banden. Stuttgart. Fr. Frommanns
Verlag.
 27

ESSAY THREE

THE ACTUALITIES OF NON-AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE

Jerome Stolnitz

Since it will be unhesitatingly agreed that some encounters with works of art in fact
appreciate their worth only inchoately or not at all, the truth of the above (quasi-)
statement can be readily demonstrated. Then, since whatever is actual is,
necessarily, possible, the truth of the "possibility of aesthetic experience" is
demonstrable, by implication. But meaning, not truth, has always been the
philosopher's game, his professions to the contrary notwithstanding, their outcomes
sufficiently telltale. Because there is no agreement, least of all unhesitating, upon
the meanings of the philosophical and therefore conceptually volatile terms,
"aesthetic" and "non-aesthetic," it will take some fair share of argument to show
that all of us ought to believe that the concept, aesthetic disinterestedness, is the
fundamentum divisionis. This is what we are here for. Analysis of this concept
requires a further distinction, however. Since "disinterested" is often properly
predicated of modes of experience into which art does not enter at all, the de-fining
must also set boundaries between those experiences and aesthetic disinterestedness.
We begin with several kinds of encounters with art that apparently appreciate it
only inchoately or not at all. It is thought that they do not by the historian of the
arts, the literary critic, and the music theorist, each of considerable eminence in
these fields, who describe the experiences for us. I shall argue that their judgments,
and the subsequent categorial decision to exclude the experiences as non-aesthetic,
are most firmly grounded by showing that and how these approaches to art fail of
disinterestedness.
First, however, the charge of petitio must be voiced and met. One of these
authors, Denis Donoghue, explicitly invokes the concept, aesthetic
disinterestedness. The others, Arnold Hauser and Leonard Meyer, do not. Yet it is
not at all unlikely that they too have been influenced by the same idea. From its
inception in 18th-century aesthetics, this pervasive concept has filtered down into
and underlies, however tacitly, a great deal of thinking about the particular arts.
Hence the rejection by these writers, particularly Donoghue, of the kinds of
experience they describe might be thought to follow, even if indirectly, from
aesthetic disinterestedness. If so, their judgments need not convince those who do
not share the antecedent commitment to the concept. A fortiori, my philosopher's

Mitias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility oj the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhojj Publishers, Dordrecht
28

decision to categorize these experiences as actualities of non-aesthetic experience

may be thought to beg the question.
But I answer: None of the passages now to be quoted refers to disinterestedness.
As I have indicated, each describes a certain address to works of art. Just so can
they be taken by any reader. Then any reader can put to himself and answer the
questions: Does the passage describe a way of attempting to appreciate art that is
actual, rather than merely a theorist's notion? If it does, does the author rightly
condemn the audience of which he speaks? If either answer is No, then cadit
quaestio. I would regret losing these readers; I especially regret my inability to hear
their reasons. It is much more probable that both answers will be Yes. Then let the
reader consider, on whatever merits they may prove to possess, my arguments that
the authors' judgments are most persuasively justified by showing that these
approaches to art fail to achieve aesthetic disinterestedness. The reader who has
antecedently rejected the concept will have other grounds for the authors'
judgments. Then he, like those readers who are neutral concerning the mooted
concept, will come to some decision on the cogency of my arguments. Thus the issue
is, as usual, the relative strength of arguments, not petitio. The antecedently
dissenting reader will entertain the concept he does not believe in to see what fruits,
if any, it bears. Should my arguments fail to persuade, he will be confirmed in his
views. If, perchance, he gives the nod to my arguments, he is free to alter his views,
so far forth. He is not entitled to either freedom once he rules against the arguments
before ever following them to see where they lead. Ours is not, surely, the only
philosophic inquiry that calls for this dialectical courtesy, or, more accurately, this
dialectical necessity.

Neither the public of folk art nor that of popular art is able or willing to treat
art as art.. .. Their attitude to art rests upon relationships quite extraneous to it,
is connected with the common interests, hopes, and fears of the group .... 1

Arnold Hauser distinguishes folk art, "which is often hardly more than play," and
popular art, "which is never more than entertainment," from "authentic art"
(281). We can usefully develop his distinctions. The ideas of play and entertainment
move away from the object - the folk dance, the boulevard theater play or, later,
the moving picture (332) - to the purposes of the audience. Play is surcease from
work. It affords relaxation, at best joy, and is engaged in toward these ends. The
folk dance, among its other functions, is a generally infrequent but therefore all the
more welcome diversion from workaday living, the harvest, say, which has been
brought in. Thus the practice of folk art is prized largely because of the participants'

1. Arnold Hauser, The Philosophy of Art History (New York, 1959), p. 285.
 29

previous experience, now gladly abandoned for a time. Much the same is true of
popular entertainment, though its audiences are considerably more passive. They
bring with them some lively or painful sense of what they have done or undergone
("Thank God it's Friday") and demands proportionately urgent. Walter Benjamin,
who was an astute student of the mass audience and also a vigorous cultural
spokesman on their behalf, has it that they seek, above all, "distraction.,,2
Hauser's examples of "authentic" art, Michelangelo, Bach, Flaubert (281-282),
are taken from ,supremely great art. They are, for this reason, unsurprising, almost
predictable. Why is desire for relaxation or distraction so ludicrously inappropriate
to these works? Of course, their extensive and intensive magnitude, and their "high
seriousness," make it unlikely they will satisfy anny such desire. But Hauser passes
a much deeper judgment on folk and popular audiences. He contends that they fail
to "treat art as art." Let me now attempt to develop and ground the historian's
judgment.
Anyone of the supreme works by the artists whom Hauser cites constitutes an
extraordinary individuality. An individual, evidently, not a particular, since there
is no universal that it significantly instantiates. To call the work a cantata, a
sculpture, or a sculpted Pieta, or a Pieta sculpted in marble, leaves almost
everything still to be said, supposing it can be said. It is an individual that generates,
from within itself, the impulses - the torsion of one' part of the body, the first
voicing of a fugal theme, Emma Bovary's frustration - that begin to shape its being.
The concrete character of these impulses, their vitality, the lines of force they set
up toward future developments, are, generated from within the work, peculiar to
it. This is not less but the more true when the artist has drawn upon established
forms and techniques, which are still more universals. Bach is the happiest possible
example. Then the elaboration of these forces and their interaction with other
drives, cutting across or parallel to them, are also generated out of the work's own
resources. They are not induced ab extra. Hence its integrity in the ethical sense.
Its integrity in the literal sense is achieved when all of these many intricacies, and
when all of these rampant energies, exercised and now fulfilled, pass into a simple,
placid unity, like that of a sphere.
So extraordinary an individuality is, not at all trivially, unique. It has not been
and cannot be replaced. If it could have a surrogate, the likeliest possibility would
be one of the other Michelangelo Pietas, another cantata. But these class terms are,
as before, gross and not to the point, and the possibility collapses instantaneously.
These works have endured across the centuries, through the flux of time and taste,
because of their obdurate individuality. They define themselves so distinctively,
from within themselves, that they are independent of genesis or cause or context.
Created and integrated by their own energies, they are self-contained, free-standing.
The work's plenitude and its unity have no counterpart elsewhere, so that bringing

2, Walter Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction," in Illuminations,
ed, Arendt, trans. Zohn (New York, 1968), pp. 240 ff.;cf., similarly, Hauser, op. cit., p. 342.
30

it under universals is idle. Self-sustaining, these works are, like no other man-made
things, impervious to external forces. Hence, unlike all other man-made things, they
do not wither or become anachronistic or perish. They are autonomous, i.e., subject
to no laws other than their own. Each of these works is a unique, self-defining,
sensory whole, a world, identical only with itself.
If, therefore, we are to appreciate such a work justly, we must treat it as a world.
But more, since it is unique, as the world. To appreciate such a work justly, we must
apprehend the creation and unfolding of this world. We must (ollow its course,
abide by its laws, com-prehend its unity. It can now be seen that the desire for play
or entertainment is ludicrously inappropriate not only because the works cited by
Hauser are, to put it mildly, not well suited to gratify it. These desires are general,
not directed to any specific object. They seek whatever object or activity will gratify
them. One's desires, enforced by his memory of the workaday, are no longer
constrained or overridden. They can now dictate to things and activities,
abandoning them at will, if one chooses. The fairgoer can give up one dance for
another or some other attraction; the dial may be turned impatiently. The object
must serve the desire.
I generalize my conclusion. An approach to the work which, under the guise of
aesthetic appreciation, uses it toward the gratification of any ulterior purpose
whatever, must fail of appreciation. Consider a listener or reader whose desires are
less obviously impertinent than those just discussed. Consider one who seeks insight
into, perhaps communion with, the personality or, as would have been said
formerly, the soul of the artist - Bach's fervent religious nature, Flaubert's
understanding of the secrets of the human heart. Perhaps he has read that "The
deep inwardness, the brooding spirituality, which breathe in the church cantatas and
Passions, were the outcome of that Protestant piety which lay at the root of Bach's
nature." 3 His approach to the art is now respectful, even reverential. Even so. As
before, his purpose obstructs or renders impossible appreciation of the work, which
is to say, appreciation of its individuality.
Let us suppose there is a universal, "that Protestant piety which lay at the root
of Bach's nature," which was instantiated in Bach's churchgoing, the upbringing
of his children, some of his musical compositions, and other things and events. Then
the sacred cantatas would instance this universal. Anyone of these cantatas is, more
clearly, an instance of the universal, the musical setting by Bach of a religious text.
But though the universal-particular relation is, in the latter case, straightforward,
it is, aesthetically, utterly trivial, precisely because the individuality of each work
is disregarded. (This conclusion is unaffected if the relation is taken to be that of
class-membership.) Still, there is no doubt that the work is a musical setting by Bach
of a religious text. On the present supposition, the relation promises to be
informative of one of the components of the setting, viz., the composer's personal

3. Rosa Newmarch, The Concert-Goer's Library of Descriptive Notes (London, 1948), vol. VI, p. 67.
 31

religious convictions. Now, however, the relation of the work to the assumed
universal is considerably less straightforward.
Bach's "Protestant piety," a state of belief and feeling directing behavior, can
be made out, without untoward difficulty, in his churchgoing or the instruction of
his children. The Lutheran teachings were formalized and institutionalized. Thus
were they taken over by Bach. So they were duplicated in one of his prayers or
another, imparted to one child or another. The contingent properties of the
particular, e.g., spatio-temporal location, are readily set aside in discerning the
universal. They make no difference to the instantiation, which can therefore be
recognized as an instantiation. The individuality of the cantata will not abide such
abstraction.
The keen listener will doubtless encounter "the deep inwardness, the brooding
spirituality, which breathe in the church cantatas." At least, he will do so a great
deal of the time, for there are other terms that more aptly describe some of the arias
and instrumental passages, but let that go. The composer's "Protestant piety" is
something else again. Our listener, intent on finding instances of this universal in
each of the cantatas, will fall into a quite vicious abstraction in one of several
directions. He may single out those passages, almost certainly verbal, 4 which can
with some plausibility be related to 18th-century Lutheranism. Doing so, his
attention will elide and thereby lose those far more frequent passages which can with
no plausibility be so related. Otherwise, he would have to establish significant
connections between the multifarious details of the music and 18th-century
Lutheranism, an impossible undertaking.
But consider further his appreciation of even those passages most congenial to his
purpose. To discern the universal, contingent properties must be ignored. So they
can be, as in the prosaic cases above. The music which plausibly instantiates its
composer's "Protestant piety" has, however, to just appreciation, no such
properties. Here nothing is contingent. Everything is necessary. In this world which,
unlike the great world, is thoroughly integrated, because the matter came into being
at the same time as the form, there are no excrescences, no blind spots or excesses.
Here nothing is accidental; everything is essential. Hence, to just appreciation, the
elements of the music, each and all of them, are the be-all and end-all of listening.
The sought after "Protestant piety" must therefore be found within a given
cantata's unique embodiment of the ascent to heaven, or the humility or abasement
of the Christian. It must be found within the rise and fall of this line, this
harmonization, this instrumentation, this phrasing of the words. This individuation
of Lutheran doctrine and feeling exists nowhere else. Least of all does it exist in
some other cantata, which sets similar texts, but, again, uniquely so. Whence a
dilemma. Our listener may concentrate on the words, marginally attended by a
feeling-tone that is relatively persistent and uninflected because the intricate,
changing details of the musical embodiment are treated as contingent properties. By

4. Cf. below, D. 6.
32

such abstraction, the cantata can be made to instantiate Bach's religous convictions
as much as do his prayers or child-rearing. The alternative is to focus attention on
the variegated entirety of the embodiment. But then the passage, when it is thus
listened to, takes on a wholly different nature. The religious character of the words
is now concretized and made determinate by the music, inflected by its incessant
changes, nuanced by its rhythm and phrasing, so given its very own "meaning".
The piety of the passage is inseparable from the music. It exists nowhere else. Its
properties are not those of the composer's piety. It is not an instance of the
recurrent, life-long state of belief and feeling which directed Bach's upbringing of
first one child and then another. It is not, and cannot be, an instance of that
universal, because its properties, which cannot be divorced from it in such listening,
are not, and cannot be, those of the universal. It is an individual.
Our listener cannot ex hypothesi choose this second alternative. Our listener - our
hearer, we might now better call him - imaginary in this discussion but doubtless
often enough real, may, finally, maintain a diffuse sense of the cantata's religious
character, while failing to attend to the continuously changing details of the work
and their beauties. (Such floating in unmodulated global qualities is found in a great
deal of imperfect hearing and looking.) At this point, Bach's "Protestant piety" has
turned out to be an omnium-gatherum for the diffused expressive properties of the
cantatas. Our hearer's purpose has been achieved, speciously, the goodness of the
music almost wholly foregone.
One way or another, he will constrict the music, falsify and trivialize it, by his
insistence that the work must instantiate that which is, unarguably and not at all
figuratively, outside the work. He will sacrifice the work's unique plenitude by
likening it to some other state of being, a fortiori, a non-musical state of being.
These fatalities result from bringing to the experience an ulterior purpose,
demanding that the work must serve the viewer's desire, however respectful and
humble, certainly not frivolous, like the desire for entertainment.
I have spoken of Bach's "Protestant piety" as a universal in order to bring out
the contrast between a particular and the individual. The music commentator from
whom I have quoted speaks of it, however, as a cause: "The deep inwardness, the
brooding spirituality, which breathe in the church cantatas and Passions, were the
outcome of that Protestant piety which lay at the root of Bach's nature." This may
well be a more credible rendering of the relation between the artist's personality
traits and his art, but see how odd the cause is. It is not a sufficient condition of
the effect. Moreover, no-one is prepared to gauge the relative weight of this cause
and of others, such as musical genius, or the workings of their interaction. Hence
no-one, given these joint causes, can spell out the intermediate steps of the causation
without fudging them. One who approaches the music with the ulterior purpose of
hearing it in relation to this process will sacrifice its concrete individuality to
preoccupation with a causation which is not only external to the work but also
unknowable.
But finally, if the cantatas and Passions were, veritably, "the outcome of that
 33

Protestant piety which lay at the root of Bach's nature," then one would expect his
misgivings and difficulties during the creation of the Mass in B Minor and that the
"outcome" of this process would palpably evidence them. Is there not a comparable
problem in the facts that the Protestant cantatas are now sung in concert halls as
well as churches, and that both audiences are not mostly German Lutherans? Only
if talk about "Bach's nature" and other, like talk about genesis, cause or context,
is thought to impinge on the self-enclosed world of the work of art.
One more argument to the same effect, which some readers may think the most
cogent of any. The author of a standard, full-dress study of the cantatas expresses
the usual piety: " ... we see the heart of a great man and a profound believer
revealed in a way unlike anything else in the history of religious art. ,,5 And yet, in
the two volumes, a painstakingly detailed, even minute, analysis of the cantatas, one
can hardly find a single, even cursory reference to the composer's "profound"
religious beliefs. 6
If my position has been well-argued, we may now be willing to suppose the
following. Suppose, per impossibile, we learn that, during the time in which Bach's
music was little-known, some clever compiler of the Verzeichnis had contrived to
ascribe to Bach the liturgical music that had in fact been composed by a playful,
irreverent, secular-minded 18th-century Deist, and that Bach himself was, like many
of his relatives, simply a routinier who had written little music. What difference,
if any, would that make, aesthetically? What difference, if any, should that make,
aesthetically? Would the cantatas forthwith divest themselves of their "brooding
spirituality"? Would we find, in ostensibly aesthetic experience, that they are now
"insincere," "hollow craftsmanship"?
Consider, finally, the experience of the audiences for folk and popular art as it is
described by Hauser, to whom it is time we returned. He gives as the reason for their
failure "to treat art as art" that they approach it "with the common interests,
hopes, and fears of the group." One might take Hauser to be saying that they are
therefore unable to appreciate "authentic" art only. For, as the latter term suggests,
Hauser is greatly inclined to restrict "art" to this art. His reason for doing so will
appeal to many who have extensive experience of the arts. "When one thinks of the
creations of Michelangelo or Rembrandt, Bach ... one feels reluctant to reckon as
art either the playful and clumsy ... songs of peasants or the literature and music
of the modern entertainment industry with its coquetry and flattery of the common
man" (281-282). Hauser does not, however, convert this feeling into a categorial
exclusion, so that peasant dances and mass entertainments keep their place, albeit
lower, within the realm of art. 7 Just these forms of art typically appeal to "the

5. W.G. Whittaker, "Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)," in The Heritage oj Music, ed. Foss
(London, 1927), p. 35.
6. W. Gillies Whittaker, The Cantatas oj Johann Sebastian Bach, 2 vols. (London, 1959, 1964). Cf.
I, 167-168, but note that the reference is to the text only.
7. Cf. op. cit., pp. 280, 283, 288, 297.
34

common interests, hopes, and fears of the group.,,8 Hauser contends that
"Country-folk do not judge art by aesthetic standards" because they "lack ... the
conception of art as a special affair of its own" (295) and his condemnation of the
mass audience is even more censorious (cf. 346,355). I now undertake to develop
and ground Hauser's judgment along the lines of the foregoing discussion.
Folk and popular audiences might have no deliberate ulterior purpose, like the
deliberate, sometimes feverish desire for play or entertainment, or the desire to
commune with the artist's soul. Nonetheless, their stolid insistence that the work
must be congenial to and gratify the "real life" interests of their group subverts
appreciation. Some, doubtless relatively few works of folk and popular art will call
into question or challenge the values of the group. They will be rejected, their
aesthetic worth, whatever it may be, going unappreciated. But when the work is an
unquestioning celebration of common beliefs and goals, can we say, as Hauser does,
that the audience's preoccupation is "extraneous to it"? We can, and we should,
for we can fairly trace the characteristic pattern of such perception. Even in this,
admittedly inferior art, the group's values are embodied in an artistic medium,
which exists nowhere in "real life" and are individuated by its structure. The
audience that approaches the art intent upon its "relationships," as Hauser says,
to patriotic or racial traditions will abstract from the work the allusions that enter
into those relations. These allusions will be extricated from their sensory, imagistic,
rhythmic embodiment. They will be used as mnemonic or stereotypical cues. So they
revive the feelings the members of the audience brought with them before ever they
saw or heard the work of art. The audience is not, as Hauser puts it, "able and
willing to translate their own experiences into a more condensed and difficult
language" (361). What should have been a challenge of uniqueness is thereby
generalized into the reassurance of familiarity. Here, as before, the viewer dictates
to the object. His interest demands gratification. The object must serve it. Then the
work of art is distorted and demeaned.
In all these cases, the self obtrudes into and warps perception. It is awkward to
describe these spectators and hearers as "selfish." The situation in which one
apprehends art, successfully or otherwise, is non-competitive, non-exclusive. Since
one does not compete with or deprive others, ane cannot therefore sacrifice their
desires to one's own, altruistic behavior is not even a logical possibility. Let us say
instead that in such situations the desire for personal gratification is "self-seeking."
Then one other distinction. In the cases of play and entertainment, and the
reassurance of group values, the self is installed at the center of attention. The
object is an instrumentality toward the self's demands of relaxation or the
stimulation of pre-artistic feelings and is, as such, lightly abandoned if it fails to
serve. The putative music-lover who looks for the religious personality of Bach is
rather different. He is also self-seeking. Yet he is looking for something he takes
to be ingredient in the music. He is, moreover, outgoing because he is eager to meet

8. Cf. op. cit., pp. 288, 3()()-301, 355-357.

 35

a soul greater than his own. Let us say that he is not "self-centered."
Authentically aesthetic appreciation is neither self-seeking nor self-centered. The
percipient must approach the work of art without any interest that employs the work
toward its own end. He must be disinterested. Then and then alone can his interest
terminate in the work itself. It is the interest of focussing attention vigilantly upon
the object, in so doing contemplating its inherent properties and their qualities. In
establishing this attitude, the percipient accepts and submits to the autonomy of the
work, which is now, and not as previously, the lawgiver. He enters sympathetically
into its world, which is now for him the only world. He does not balk at its beliefs,
feelings, and values. They may be remote from those of his usual, stable self, even
at variance with his own, even diametrically opposed. The cognitive or moral
judgments, or the practical action, that would otherwise be precipitated, are not
permitted to appear, inhibited, as they are, by disinterestedness. Else how could the
classics have endured? When, but only when, the percipient apprehends the work
disinterestedly, can he contemplate it for its own sake alone. Only then can he "let
it be as it is, in its appaearance." 9
That we, all of us, come to art, as to everything else, with our memories, loyalties,
and dispositions, is indisputable, a mere banality. That we cannnot, therefore, keep
this self in abeyance and thereby shed its baggage when art holds out to us another
world, intoxicating and coercive, is a non sequitur, and, in respect of aesthetic
experience, a fatally unfortunate inference.
Hauser set us off toward distinguishing the aesthetic by locating the non-aesthetic
in folk and popular audiences. Hauser does not share the conception of the aesthetic
attitude I am presently working out. His own is not, however, very far from it. 1O
I further suggest that the ground on which Hauser rules against those audiences,
viz., that they fail "to treat art as art," brings him even closer to aesthetic
disinterestedness. It is therefore additional warrant for my expansion of the passage
from which we began.
Like its close relative, "art for art's sake," the phrase, "to treat art as art," is,
absent some clarification of the nature of art, as vague as such slogans ought to be.
Yet it clearly implies alternative ways of "treating" art. Thus its affinity to aesthetic
disinterestedness emerges. From its historical inception, that concept has defined
itself against the alternatives. Its theorists have typically proceeded by specifying
commonplace approaches to art, showing that they are animated by some ulterior
purpose or another, and arguing that the work does not therefore enjoy the
appreciation that alone warrants the honorific, "aesthetic." Among these purposes

9. Hannah Arendt, "The Crisis in Culture," in Between Past and Future (New York, 1983), p. 210.
10. "The attitude of aesthetic receptiveness leaves the object of experience more or less unaffected; it
is in fact no more than an attempt to identify oneself as closely as possible with the intention of
the artist. This intention is the objective value that has to be apprehended" (175). Readers of this
volume will be familiar with the acute difficulties, theoretical and practical, in appealing to the
intention of the artist. Otherwise, Hauser sees the aesthetic attitude as receptiveness to the inherent
properties of the object, which is left "unaffected."
36

are the desire to own or possess the object or to gain knowledge from it. 11 My
discussion in the preceding pages is, obviously, of the same form.
The upshot of these negations is the determination that aesthetic perception must
be free of the purposes that deflect attention from the inherent properties of the
work of art or, indeed, any object. This way of thinking about aesthetic experience
has run through all three centuries of modern aesthetics. In many theorists, it has
been overt and official. Elsewhere, even when there has been no overt reference to
disinterestedness, the idea has been taken up into and has de-cisively shaped the
formulation of other concepts. Most notably, the concepts, art, and, better yet,fine
art. It is anything but a coincidence that "the fine arts" are first grouped together
in the 18th century, when aesthetic disinterestedness receives its first theoretical
exposition. 12 It is anything but a coincidence that such locutions as "art for art's
sake" and "to treat art as art" first enter into philosophical and critical discourse
only after the 18th century. There are innumerably many ways to "treat" art; there
are innumerable causes of the creation of art; art can serve diverse purposes,
whether those intended by the artist; there are enormous, palpable differences
between the various arts and between particular works of art. Yet "art as art" and
"art for art's sake," gnomic as they are, point exclusively to the self-contained
works. So too, similarly, throughout modern aesthetics, a spate of definitions, not
only those which distinguish the fine arts in terms of the artist's intention and/or
their demonstrated capacity to reward disinterested perception, but also those which
restrict the definiens to the inherent properties of the work and those analyses which
rule out such properties as truth to the real world, didacticism, or moral betterment.
Denis Donoghue's meta-cntIcIsm is explicitly influenced by aesthetic
disinterestedness. Donoghue cites Kant on the concept 13 and his own employment
of it is on lines long familiar in the philosophical tradition. "Normally we look at
things mainly for their use" (36). "An experience is aesthetic when the main quality
of it is appreciation, not possessiveness" (122). "Appreciation involves absorption
in the work, a pause in one's ordinary life to enjoy something other than itself"
(125). It is because concern with the artist is inimical to "absorption in the work"
that Donoghue cautions against it. When we "turn aside" to the artist, "one interest
has displaced the other" (36). Moreover, even if we return to his work, such interest
"wouldn't have provoked the right sort of attention," for we would view it "as
further illustration of a personal image" (37).
Divagation from the art to the artist is but one of the several varieties of non-
aesthetic experience that Donoghue isolates. All of them, so his thesis runs, are
efforts to evade the "mystery" that is essential to the work of art and a sense of
which must therefore be ingredient in aesthetic appreciation. So we "run away from

11. Cf. Jerome Stolnitz, "On the Origins of 'Aesthetic Disinterestedness' ," Journal of Aesthetics and
Art Criticism, vol. XX, no. 2 (Winter, 1961), 131-143.
12. Idem., 142.
13. Denis Donoghue, The Arts Without Mystery (Boston, 1983), pp. 125-126; cf. p. 128.
 37

the artist's works and concentrate on him, an easier subject because he is ...
unsecretive" (36).
Donoghue affords us other actualities of non-aesthetic experience beyond those
we have just considered.

To see a poem or a picture as fulfilling a category is to reach a premature sense of it. Naming
or labelling is important because it is the most effective means of making something familiar,
and familiarity is necessary if the arts are to be managed. The snag is that the familiarity
comes too soon, the label imposes local clarity by ridding the work of its mystery and
releasing the viewer from his hesitation (77; d. 110-111).

Donoghue speaks here of those who, bewildered by recent avant-garde movements,

resort to such labels as "Action Painting" to overcome their unease. In doing so,
however, they blur the differences between the works thus run together (cf. 77).
Their sense of each work is "premature."
This seems to me, for one, an astute observation on the encounters with a good
deal of recent art and, indeed, not only recent art. Donoghue brings before us
would-be percipients who, quite literally, lose sight of the object. But I want to
apply the passage to another case. I want to make out the consequences for
appreciation, not of an omnibus label, but of a unique label for a single painting.
The painting is, moreover, much closer to mainstream art than the recent avant-
garde, is, indeed, probably the best-known painting of this century. For these two
reasons, the quoted passage may be shown to have even broader and less obvious
pertinence than its author assigns to it.
It is generally agreed that Picasso's Guernica is a problem painting. It has been
chided for being unintelligible to the layman and even experts who think it as great
as any painting of the century concede its difficulty. 14 There is ample cause for what
Donoghue calls the viewer's "hesitation." Is the setting outdoors or indoors or
both?; what is the eye or lightbulb or ... close to the triangle's apex?; and so on at
considerable length. But then there is the title, which seems to provide "local
clarity." There may not anywhere be a single discussion of the painting that does
not allude to the bombing. But Guernica has nothing whatever to do with Guernica.
The bombing stimulated the process of painting but the easy inference that it
therefore entered into the product of the process, the mural, is invalidated by
observation of the mural.
There are no bombers or bombs or any bomb fragments. The event (is it an
event?) is not taking place in 1937 or at any other date. The setting is not Guernica
or any other locale one could find in the most complete atlas. The relief that the
title holds out to the bewildered viewer is therefore worse than "premature." It is
constricting. The would-be clarification of the painting is, in Donoghue's here

14. Cf. Alfred H. Barr, jf., Picasso: Fifty Years of His Art (New York, 1974), p. 202; Juan Larrea,
Guernica. Pablo Picasso, trans. Krappe (New York, 1947), passim.
38

doubly apt term, merely "local." But this painting has no locus. The locus of the
painting is its own world. Better said, the painting is its own world. Certainly,
Picasso had well-known reasons for choosing the title. Those reasons are now,
however, as outdated as the historical events of half a century ago that gave rise to
them. The painting is not dated and gives no indication of becoming so.
The "label," taken seriously, invites a mortal error. It misrepresents the
individuality of the work and thereby warps perception. Even the mo~t expert critics
are not immune to this error. Indeed, critics are the chief targets of Donoghue's
polemic for their efforts to make works of art "seem cosy," "knowable" (21). An
authoritative writer on Picasso, "labelling" Guernica "a historical picture," sees
"the women screaming in terror as death falls senselessly from the sky." 15 Yet all
that he or anyone else can see is a woman falling from a house that is, in the most
schematic representation imaginable, on fire. Another critic says of the Guernica
that there is in it "something of the 'Agit-prop' wall-newspaper raised to the scale
of epic - which lays it open to comprehensive explanation .... " 16 It is precisely
critics' assurance of "comprehensive explanation" that Donoghue contests
throughout The Arts Without Mystery. This critic apparently extenuates his guilt
by the limiting "something of." It may be further extenuation that the
"explanation" is not given. Nonetheless, "'Agit-prop' wall-newspaper raised to the
scale of epic" is a markedly dubious, not to say self-nullifying description. We have
plenty of Agit-prop posters for comparison. Artistic and aesthetic merit aside, they
are combative, distinctly unambiguous, propagandistic incitements of topical
grievances. Would we think of the Guernica as in any, even restricted respect, the
same kind of thing, if we did not approach it as a work significantly related to an
event that is, not vaguely or metaphorically, but quite literally and strictly, outside
the work?
Knowledge other than that provided by the "label," and similarly outside the
work, has been called upon to "rid it of its mystery." I take a single image from
the painting, but this among the more important ones. That the bull symbolizes
Fascism, which even Picasso, with his intense contemporary political feelings, found
it necessary to gainsay, 17 is a reductio of the interpretation derived from the title
on which I have just animadverted. There are less "local" interpretations. Research
into the earlier oeuvre has turned up frequent depictions of the bull prior to the
mural. An authoritative critic finds the bull appearing there as a "sign of demonic
fury .... " 18 Jaffe accordingly reproduces the 1934 oil, Bullfight, in which the black
bull is crushing the horse underfoot (128). Thus instructed, he asserts that the bull
in Guernica is the "(sign) of ... ruthless brute force .... " (37). And there are other
sources that can be cited to the same conclusion: the myth of Europa and the bull;

15. Pierre Daix, Picasso (New York, 1965), p. 166.

16. John Russell, The Meanings of Modern Art (New York, 1981), p. 287.
17. Cf. Barr, op. cit., p. 202.
18. Hans L. C. Jaffe, Picasso" trans. Guterman (New York, n.d.), p. 35.
 39

the Spanish bullfight; common knowledge of the nature of the animal.

Then assume, what some critics would not for an instant grant, 19 that the bull
in Guernica has the properties attributed to it in these other contexts. Jaffe uses
substantially the same general terms that describe the earlier BUllfight to denote
these attributes. General terms, taken over from the great world, must be qualified,
sharpened, specified, to hit off, as nearly as can be, the individuality of the world
of the work of art. Is the "fury" in the eyes of this bull "demonic"? Is the "force"
of its "bemused and stationary" 20 posture "ruthless"? The interacting
relationships with the other inhabitants of this self-contained world, its modulations
of black and white, its forms, all of which individualize the image further, create
subtle and complicated questions, of which I choose one. With what sort of
"force," specifically, does the bull hover over the mother carrying the dead (?)
child? Surely not the force of the Bullfight. It is, I take it, clear that these and a
host of similar questions, mutatis mutandis, are just as appositely put to those critics
who have, to dispel mystery, gone back to other earlier efforts by the artist and there
found the bull depicted as beautiful and dignified, 21 or humane and virtuous. 22
It does not matter which putative genesis the critic fastens upon. To speak of the
artist for just a moment, he can always change his mind, responding to the energies
and demands of this new world currently in the making. In the case of Picasso, he
must have done so, one way or another, unless the bull in Guernica has contrary
attributes. But it is the product, not the process, that concerns us in aesthetic
appreciation and in the interpretation that is faithful to such appreciation. The
qualities and "meanings" of the work of art are exclusively its own. They are
independent of genesis or cause or context.
I draw one other moral. Once it be acknowledge that a good deal of critics'
employment of knowledge from outside the work fails to be adjusted to and
otherwise does violence to the perceivable body of the work, in which it must
necessarily be tested, a larger doubt is raised. How far is such knowledge needful
at all? The occasion for its use is much less, by some considerable margin, than the
practice of art criticism would lead us to believe.
The work of art is the touchstone. The external knowledge is, unless the critic has
radically confused his priorities, merely hypothetical and ancillary. 23 Not only is
recourse to such knowledge open to consequences as unwholesome as those just
discussed. But now we may come to think that the employment of such knowledge
is, often at least, simply gratuitous. It is by scrupulous attention to the work itself

19. Cf., e.g., Timothy Hilton, Picasso (New York, 1975), p. 240; Larrea, op. cit., p. 37; Wilhelm Boeck
and Jaime Sabartes, Picasso (New York, n.d.), p. 231.
20. ~usssell, op. cit., p. 288.
21. Cf. Hilton, op. cit., p. 240.
22. Cf. Larrea, op. cit., p. 37; Boeck and Sabartes, op. cit.,p. 230.
23. Cf. Jerome Stolnitz, '''You Can't Separate the Work of Art from the Artist'," Philosophy and
Literature, vol. 8, no. 2 (Oct., 1984),209-221; Jerome Stolnitz, "Painting and Painter in Aesthetic
Education," Journal oj Aesthetic Education, vol. 18, no. 3 (Fall, 1984), 23-36).
40

that the percipient can often, and more safely, assimilate those images or passages
he at first finds puzzling. He will do so by focussed perception of their manifest
properties and by com-prehension of their relations to their neighbors and to the
whole.
Take the viewer, seeing the bull in Guernica, who is ignorant of Picasso's earlier
paintings and graphics, of mythology, of the Spanish bullfight, even of ordinary
knowledge of the animal. How much worse off is he? Is he worse off at all? He sees
this animal - this animal - its eyes, its bulk, its stance, its posture compared to that
of the stricken horse and the other fallen or broken creatures, its position relative
to the mother and child, and so on. Thus he ascertains its nature. The percipient
sees that the bull possesses force, or at least, force of a certain sort. Not of the sort,
"ruthless brute." The critic's preconception would be misleading, but our viewer
is free of it. Neither is the critic necessary. The force of the bull is disclosed to
focussed perception of the painting itself. The character of the image is
individualized by another relation within the work. The force of the bull is not,
surely, the impetuous (indignant?) force of the woman with the lamp. Perhaps,
moreover, this contrast, together with the appearance of the bull, endow the animal
with dignity,24 of a certain sort. Again, our viewer has no need of knowledge from
outside the work. Innocent of knowledge from the great world, about the great
world, he can nevertheless see the world before him, indeed, more clearly and more
sympathetically.
Not unlikely, the nature of the bull will remain somewhat indeterminate, allusive.
Quite likely, it will not be readily verbalizable. These are objections only for those
who begin with the crippling demand for "comprehensive explanation," in a
language which, however finely sharpened, can never hit off the individuality of the
image and of the painting that are seized only in aesthetic appreciation.
Lacking world enough and time, I offer one other instance, as simple as can be.
Hamlet, pursuing the Ghost, is held back by his prudent comrades, whereupon he
cries

... unhand me, gentlemen; -

By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me. (I, iv).

The present-day reader will at first think that "let" means "allow" or "permit";
puzzled, he may then read the word in the contexts of the lines and of their
utterance; he can thus arrive at the correct meaning, "hinder." His puzzlement will
be overcome without benefit of footnote or glossary. I invite the reader to consider
how much of critical apparatus is, in this way, expendable, and so gratuitous.

Donoghue intends by "mystery" something far beyond the meaning of an

unambiguous, archaic word. He affirms it not only of such art as Action Painting

24. Cf. Barr, op. cit., p. 202.

 41

or Guernica. As has been indicated, he finds it in all art. After reason and language
have done their utmost, mystery remains (cf. 13, 105). It "is not a secret message
which the critic, in principle, could discover" (32; cf. 12, 142). It remains to
"pervade" appreciation (cf. 44).
Donoghue's elucidation of the salient meaning of "mystery" is not, so far as I
see, as clear as could be wished. Replacing "mystery" with "occult power" (36) is
certainly unhelpful. Distinctly more helpful, however, is Donoghue's elucidation of
the term which he identifies with the work's mystery, its "presence, the force of its
presence" (32). "The achieved work of art is present to itself, more fully at one with
itself, than anything in the world which completes its meaning elsewhere, apart from
its own form" (27). Again, "a thing's being completely at one with itself, fully what
it is .... " (102). This is, one might say to illustrate Donoghue, the mystery of a
Renoir study of bourgeois as much as of Action Painting or Guernica. Thus art
gives us "the sense of the unique presence of objects .... While we are aware of these
objects, we live for the time being according to a rhythm of interest quite different
from our normal rhythm .... " (121-122).
The reader will now have come to some judgment on both Donoghue's argument
and my remarks in application of it. He will have come, at the same time, to a
judgment on the heuristic power of aesthetic disinterestedness. Donoghue's
conception of "the achieved work of art" is among the theories of art, cited
previously, which became firmly entrenched in educated thought only after and just
because of the formulation of this concept. Perception without ulterior purpose
enjoins resolute attention to the object for its own sake, to its unique qualities, to
its unique being. The concept therefore directs inquiry into those who will not accept
the work's mystery or presence, will not "let it be as it is." The concept seeks out
those who put the cognitive interest first, attempting to make the work "seem
cosy," "knowable." It enables diagnosis of "labelling" which converts ostensibly
aesthetic experience into what is justifiably denominated non-aesthetic experience.
That the work is the exclusive object of perception implies, for meta-criticism, that
it is the touchstone. Thus the concept leads to disclosure of abuses, excesses, and
redundancies in criticism that are by no means occasional. It generates, finally,
humility in criticism: "The pleasure offered by a work of art is the pleasure of
understanding an object for its own sake even though understanding can't be more
than partial" (100).

Leonard Meyer's description of the response of the "primitive" to music is readily

subsumed under now familiar pathologies.

The differentia between art music and primitive music lies in speed of tendency gratification.
The primitive seeks almost immediate gratification for his tendencies whether these be
biological or musical. Nor can he tolerate uncertainty. And it is because distant departures
from the certainty and repose of the tonic note and lengthy delays in gratification are
insufferable to him that the tonal repertory of the primitive is limited ... self-imposed
42

tendency inhibition and the willingness to bear uncertainty are indications of maturity. They
are signs ... that the animal is becoming a man. 25

Donoghue said a moment ago that, in the face of "achieved" art, "we live for the
time being according to a rhythm of interest quite different from our normal
rhythm." This is most strictly and obviously true of music. Manifestly, however,
unless we are bemused by the distinction between the "temporal" and "spatial"
arts, every work of whatever art establishes its own rhythm. Set aside those works
of folk, mass, or didactic art which were so much addressed to their contemporary
audiences that they were later found dated, though not, therefore, devoid of value.
Think rather of those works which, though addressed to the contemporary
audience, e.g., the cantatas of Bach, or which were even, as a result, highly topical,
e.g., the comedies of Aristophanes, have been found supremely valuable far beyond
their own time. Each of these works has its own cosmogony. Its world is not a
response to audience demands. Its world energizes itself and unfolds in response to
and in fulfillment of its own impulses, its own expectations, its own searchings. Its
rhythm is therefore unique. The tempo is that requisite to the creation of this world,
its size and complexity, the extremes of its topography, the balance between mass
and movement. The pulse keeps the life of the world going during stasis, the rests,
the caesuras, the recessive areas. The rhythm may be and often, or even typically,
is relentlessly grave and single-minded. Because such art is not obligated to its
audience, its "uncertainty" is not subject to arbitrary abridgement or facile,
pandering resolution. Its uncertainties are those of creating a world, those of
overcoming obstacles, reconciling imbalances, the temporally prolonged unification
of enormous diversities, even when the possibility of such unity seems doubtful, of
getting back to the tonic.
Meyer's "primitive" is both self-seeking and self-centered. He carries with him,
and cannot divorce himself from, the insistence that things must serve his desires,
"biological" or aesthetic, and that they must do so quickly. His self, gripped by this
need for "tendency gratification," dominates his experience. "Art music" and art
of comparable quality in the other media, because it will not serve him, cannot then
become the center of his attention. Its will is to be itself, faithful to its own integrity.
Such art can be appreciated only by the percipient who can rise to the demand of
taking on "for the time being" the self enjoined by the work. But then his attention
and all of his capacities of perception and response must be wholly object-centered.
Authentic aesthetic appreciation is open only to the attitude of aesthetic
disinterestedness.
Meyer cites as an instance of "primitive music" present-day "pop" music (494).
So he reminds us that this and the other actualities of non-aesthetic experience we
have distinguished are also, as the French has it, very much actualites.

25. Leonard B. Meyer, "Some Remarks on Value and Greatness in Music," Journal of Aesthetics and
Art Criticism, vol. XVII, no. 4 (June, 1959), 494.
 43

II

"Disinterested curiosity," "disinterested love," and "disinterested religious

worship," unlike "aesthetic disinterestedness," are not philosopher's jargon. They
are staples of ordinary discourse.
One might be curious about some natural phenomenon - a cloud formation,
when the observer is not concerned about tomorrow's weather, but is moved to ask,
"What makes the clouds so dense?" "Love is not love" unless it be of the person
for himself or herself. And thus is God worshipped by the pious. These are the
experiences that invite "disinterested" in ordinary discourse. They resemble
aesthetic perception, most obviously in that they are not self-centered. Occasionally,
indeed, they pass over into aesthetic experience. As they stand, however, they are
not aesthetic. If they were, they would lose their own character and purpose.
Curiosity, even "idle" curiosity, seeks to know. It must therefore bring to bear
available principles of explanation and, by analysis of the phenomenon, collect
selected properties under them. When knowledge is gained, curiosity is stilled. Then
the object no longer arouses attention. When no explanation is forthcoming, it
remains interesting as a cognitive puzzle or else it is abandoned. Finally, from the
onset of curiosity, through investigation, to its termination, successful or
unsuccessful, curiosity is detached from its object. Perplexity is an estrangement.
The aesthetic attitude is, by contrast, incompatible with perplexity. It is
sympathetic, for the object is accepted and embraced for what it is, its qualities just
as they are. The aesthetic attitude excludes seeking knowledge about the object. Its
address to the object is contemplation, i.e., sustained, focussed perception. The
curious person may also contemplate the phenomenon, but he does so not for the
thing's own sake but in order to hit upon clues toward explanation. Aesthetic
contemplation terminates in the object. Should the object arouse perplexity, the
aesthetic attitude is displaced. Critical analysis and explication of the work of art
are cognitive pursuits of the sort required for the satisfaction of curiosity. They treat
the work as matter for inqtliry, to be, sometimes fruitfully, sometimes fatally,
dissected, so that selected properties can be brought under principles or devices of
explanation or judgment. Otherwise, the aesthetic object is not a cognitive puzzle.
Donoghue's "mystery" is not, we have seen, mystification. Therefore, neither the
acquisition of knowledge nor the failure to gain knowledge conclude the aesthetic
experience.
Love and worship are not, unlike curiosity, detached from their objects. They
seek or achieve union or communion. Again unlike curiosity, they do not always
seek knowledge about the object. Like aesthetic experience, love and worship accept
and are warmed in the nature of their object, even should it be mysterious. But the
beloved or God are not aesthetic objects. The attitude taken toward them is not one
of contemplation only. For they are constraints upon one's future behavior. They
are the centers of one's ongoing experience. The beloved and God engage the stable,
everyday self. They define and enforce many of its beliefs, loyalties, and actions,
44

even for a lifetime: "Love's not Time's fool." To love or worship them for their
own sake is to acknowledge the worthiness of the obligations they create. A love
wholly aesthetic would be a betrayal, since there would be no caring for and
fostering of the welfare of the loved one, with their attendant agencies. God is not
worshipped out of hope of reward or fear of punishment. Yet God makes demands
on one's later being, in the purification of the self or in dealing with others. To
worship God is to avow that God is a goal to be achieved, sometimes a Being to
be "imitated."
The aesthetic attitude excludes the ramifying, ulterior pursuits and obligations of
love and worship, as of curiosity. It dictates attention and contemplation alone. Its
object is not, therefore, something to be nurtured or an ideal to be striven for. The
quotidian, practical self is not engaged. One's concern with the thing is fulfilled in
the thing. Concern with any future beyond the life of the experienced object undoes
the aesthetic attitude. Nowhere but in the aesthetic attitude is an object apprehended
for its own sake alone.
We can now deal with the meanings of the word that is applied to all these modes
of experience and thereby complete the analysis of aesthetic disinterestedness.
The meaning of "disinterested," when predicated of curiosity, love, and worship,
is initially captured by "without regard to self-seeking or selfish desires." Then
specification of these desires is determined by the distinctive purpose and structure
of each of these activities. Curiosity seeks to still a cognitive itch, usually in a non-
competitive situation, and is therefore self-seeking, but not selfish. We call curiosity
"disinterested" when it does not look to any tangible gain thereby. When they are
disinterested, love and worship too are not motivated toward tangible gain, but they
are much more complicated. Here the desires of others are very much part of the
situation, so that selfishness is considerably more than a logical possibility. The
selfish desires are for any future state of the self inimical to the self demanded by
the objects of love and worship. Disinterested love seeks the well-being of the
beloved at whatever cost to oneself, possibly including self-sacrifice.
"Disinterested" love, directed to a person, takes on the meaning of solicitude or
caring, to mankind, of benevolence, to one's country, of the actions of the patriot.
Disinterested worship entails a commitment to service in God's will. Such
commitment requires living by God's commands and prohibitions and thus behavior
of various kinds toward His creatures. Any desire for some future state of the self
that would not satisfy the needs and wants of the beloved or the dictates of God
impairs or destroys disinterestedness. A love withdrawn when it is not requited is
no longer disinterested; the disinterested worship of God is that finally exacted from
Job and the vineyard laborers.
"Disinterested," when predicated of aesthetic experience, has a meaning related
to but broader than those just distinguished. Since the apprehension of art does not
involve the desires of others, it cannot be selfish. It can, however, be self-seeking.
Aesthetic disinterestedness, by excluding any ulterior purpose, signifies the absence
of regard to any desires for the self, such as the desire to still perplexity or for
 45

tangible gain. It excludes the need for distraction and all of the other self-seeking
desires we have examined. Unlike disinterested love and worship, it signifies the
absence of regard to any future state of the self. The object is not taken to create
any demands that are to be met once its life has been attended to. Nor does the
disinterested percipient bring with him and impose any such demands on it. Any
concern with the psychological or moral consequences of his experience are
diversionary or destructive. Finally, then, any concern whatever that is not
ingredient in scrupulous attention to the object for its own sake is non-aesthetic.
"Disinterestedness," when predicated of attention to and contemplation of an
object, means that, apart from perceiving its inherent properties and whatever
qualities they disclose, there is no interest in attaining any goal, for the self or
another, by doing so.
Such experience is possible. Such experience is actual, though, as we have found,
too often unattained, so pervasive are the impulses that counterfeit it. Aesthetic
experience requires the effort of disinterestedness, submitting the self to the object,
suppressing its past where need be, always oblivious to its future. And even when
the effort has been made, and disinterestedness has been achieved, the experience
can be so profoundly rewarding that we think ourselves unworthy that we should
have beheld the ordered plenitude of this unique world.
 47

ESSAY FOUR

CAN WE SPEAK OF 'AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE'?

Michael H. Mitias

A number of philosophers have, during the past two decades, focused attention on
the essential nature, or identity, of aesthetic experience: what makes an experience
aesthetic, or what kind of experience is the aesthetic experience? Put differently,
how can we distinguish an aesthetic experience from a moral, religious, or practical
experience? Moreover, is it intelligible, plausible, to speak of 'aesthetic experience'
at all? If so, what does it mean for such an event, activity, or act to exist and to
be aesthetic? I raise this line of questions mainly because some philosophers 1 have
questioned a long standing tradition of taking almost for granted that 'aesthetic
experience' is an integral element - indeed, the ground, basis - of aesthetic
enjoyment and evaluation. In a recent article, for example, Kingsley Price has
argued that the question, What makes an experience aesthetic? , does not ask, What
makes the awareness (the mental state by which we perceive the art work) in an
aesthetic experience aesthetic?, but rather, What makes the object in an aesthetic
experience an aesthetic object?2 And in his latest work, Understanding the Arts, 3
John Hospers has tried to show that the whole concept of aesthetic experience is
confused, muddy, and perhaps untenable: it is extremely difficult, if not impossible,
to speak of aesthetic experience as a unique type of experience, as an experience
distinguishable from moral, religious, intellectual, or sexual experience.
I would readily admit that the concept of aesthetic experience is vague, misused,
and in some cases abused, and that it is, consequently in need of clarification,
perhaps overhaul; but I cannot readily admit that we cannot speak, at least in
principle, intelligibley of aesthetic experience or that we cannot identify this
experience as a type of experience. Although Hospers raises a number of important
and difficult questions regarding the existence and identity of aesthetiC experience,
and although he advances strong arguments to validate his claim, he does not, I

I. The first philosopher who advanced a serious analysis of the being and identity of the aesthetic
experience was J .0. Urmson, "What Makes a Situation Aesthetic?" Proceedings of the Aristotelian
Society, Supplementary Vol., XXXI, 1957. See also W.E. Kennick, "Does Traditional Aesthetic
Rest on a Mistake?" Mind, Vol. 67,1958; O. Schlesinger, "Aesthetic Experience and the Definition
of Art," The British Journal of Aesthetics, O. Dickie, "The Myth of the Aesthetic Attitude,"
American Philosophical Quarterly, I, 1964; M. Cohen, "Aesthetic Essence," Philosophy in
America ed. Max Black (London, 1962).
2. K. Price, "What Makes an Experience Aesthetic?" The British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 19, 1979.
3. J. Hospers, Understanding the Arts, (Prentice-Hall, 1982).
48

think, succeed in showing that 'aesthetic experience' is a useless or senseless concept.

In this paper I intend to analyze and evaluate the main argument which Hospers
offers in support of his view. The propositions which I plan to defend are: (1) the
principle of artistic distinction is possession of aesthetic qualities; that is, an artefact
is a work of art in so far as it possesses, or embodies, aesthetic qualities; (2) an
experience of an art work is, or becomes, aesthetic when it is an actualization, or
as Ingarden would say concretization, of the basic qualities, or values, usually
designated as aesthetic qualities, or values.

Let us begin our discussion of Hosper's view by asking: what kind of experiences
are aesthetic experiences? The emphasis in this question in on the identity of the
aesthetic experience, viz., what aspect, or character, distinguishes the aesthetic
experience from other types of experiences? Hospers quotes, though briefly,
Stolnitz's answer to the question: "the aesthetic experience is the experience one has
when the aesthetic attitude is sustained." 4 But this answer is unsatisfactory mainly
because it "makes the experience depend on first having the attitude; and it has the
unfortunate consequence that, if it turns out that there isn't after all an aesthetic
attitude, then there can be no aesthetic experience either, since the experience is
defined in terms of the attitude." 5 This argument rests on the assumption that
having an aesthetic attitude in an event of aesthetic perception is what makes the
experience in that event aesthetic; therefore, if the attitude is a phantom, i.e., does
not exist, the alleged aesthetic experience would not, eo ipso, exist. And even if it
exists, is it not possible for one to assume such an attitude towards an art work but
not have an aesthetic experience simply because the work is bad or aesthetically
trivial? And is it not possible for one to have an aesthetic experience suddenly, or
spontaneously, without having the chance to gear himself into an aesthetic attitude?
Hospers has a lengthy chapter in Understanding the Arts in which he does his best
to show that the aesthetic attitude as a principle of aesthetic distinction does not
exist. He acknowledges, however, that his negative findings on the aesthetic attitude
do not rule out the possibility, or even plausibility, of speaking intelligibly of
aesthetic experience. We can, that is, still speak of 'aesthetic experience' even
though we may hold that aesthetic attitude as a necessary, or sufficient, condition
for the being of an aesthetic experience does not exist. We should, accordingly, ask
once more: what makes an experience aesthetic? An adequate answer to this
question is not, for Hospers, possible - why?
We may, to begin with, advance pleasure as a criterion, that is, as a necessary,
but not sufficient, condition for an experience to be an aesthetic experience; thus

4. Understanding the Arts" p. 353.

5. Ibid.
 49

we say: an experience is aesthetic in as much as it is pleasurable, enjoyable. But this

criterion is one-sided, not only because 'pleasure' as a concept is vague but
especially because not all experiences of art works are in fact 'pleasant'; it is true
that some art works please us, but many others do not. "Works of art," Hospers
writes, "can do more than please you; they can move you, shock you, startle you
into a new awareness, channel your mind into new modes of perceiving, the
experience of which (especially at the outset) you would hardly describe as
pleasant." 6 It would not help to say that no experience is aesthetic unless it is
pleasant, or that all aesthetic experiences are pleasant in addition to being (though
not necessarily) shocking, insightful, inspiring, soothing, etc., because such a
statement is arbitrary and contrary to our experience of art works in general. A great
work, e.g., Guernica, is not pleasant, yet it is an artistic masterpiece. Moreover,
even if all aesthetic experiences are pleasant this criterion fails to account for how,
or what it means for, an experience to be aesthetic, for pleasantness accompanies
a wide range of other types of experience: "sexual experiences are pleasant; are they
aesthetic experiences? The experience of breaking a roomful of crockery is pleasant
to those who want to work off some tension; that of beating up old ladies is pleasant
to hoodlums. These can hardly be called aesthetic. The experience of playing games
is or can be pleasant; is it therefore aesthetic? To call all pleasant experiences
aesthetic will be to cast our net much too wide." 7
Thus in order for pleasure to be a necessary condition for the being of aesthetic
experience, in order for it to make the experience aesthetic, it must be more than
mere pleasure, but a special kind of pleasure - aesthetic pleasure? Are we, then, to
say, with Ducasse, that "what makes a pleasure aesthetic is not some peculiarity
intrinsic to it, but only the fact that the pleasure is one being obtained through the
mere contemplation of the object that is the source of it?" 8 This qualification
would not help because pleasant comtemplative activity extends beyond the domain
of art; one may contemplate a problem, a street, a factory, God etc., and his
experience in each case may be pleasant, but does this fact make the experience
necessarily aesthetic? No. Again, what sort of contemplative activity makes an
experience aesthetic - practical, or when it is performed for its won sake, i.e.,
instrinsically? But is it not possible to contemplate a trivial object instrinsecally?
This only shows that the mere contemplation of an object, or an art work, is not
enough to make an experience of the object aesthetic. At this point of his discussion,
Hospers introduces H. Mead's view of what makes an experience aesthetic: "the
aesthetic experience is a pleasurable absortion in the perceptual aspects of
phenomena." 9 What we should spotlight in this definition is the emphasis on the
sensuous, perceptual, charater of the aesthetic experience: an experience is aesthetic

6. Ibid., p. 354.
7. Ibid.
8. Ibid., p. 355.
9. Ibid.
50

in so far as it is a pleasurable absortion (or contemplation?) of the perceptual

aspects. Accordingly, are we to claim that what makes an experience aesthetic is the
fact that it is a pleasant, sensuous, experience obtained while contemplating the
perceptual relationships of the art work? It would seem that this is a necessary
inference from Mead's definition. But this view, Hospers immediately points out,
is one-sided, for it eliminates from the realm of art not only intellectual experiences,
as in logic and mathematics, but also the whole art of literature. 10
We are in need, then, of a criterion, or set of criteria, which can define the
peculiar aspect of aesthetic experience in all the arts. This need seems at first look
to be met by Monroe Beardsley's definition of the aesthetic experience:

a person is having an aesthetic experience during a particular stretch of time if and only if
the greater part of his mental activity during that time is united and made pleasurable by
being tied to the form and qualities of a sensuously presented or imaginatively intended
object on which his primary attention is concentrated. 11

Two essential features of aesthetic experience are contained in this definition: (1) in
perceiving a work of art, wether sensuous or imaginative, the relevant sense, or
imagination, should be fixed, absorbed, by the form and given properties of the art
work; the experience should be actuated by the structure of the work. (2) The
experience should be pleasant, at least to some degree; there should, in other words,
be an emotional response of some intensity to the formal and qualitative aspects of
the work. Hospers adds two more features from Beardsley's Aesthetics: (3) the
aesthetic experience should be coherent; it should hang together; (4) the experience
should be complete in itself; the pleasure or emotional intensity it occasions depends
exclusively on the internal structure and elements of the given art work.
Athough systematic, and seems to provide an adequate account of what makes
an experience aesthetic, this view fails for the following reasons. First, "it is more
descriptive of some of the experiences one has in enjoying the arts than the others.
The third condition, for example, applies in an obvious way to temporal arts such
as literature and music, but not as clearly to spatial arts such as painting and
sculpture." 12 Second, the four features which Beardsley advances do not
characterize, or distinguish, aesthetic experience as a special type of experience.
Third, it is diffucult to determine, or ascertain, whether we can distinguish or
classify a species of experience called 'aesthetic experience', primarily because we
cannot discover one feature, or property, common to all the experiences we usually

10. I am aware that some philosophers have argued that the literary work of art is a perceived, i.e.,
sensuous, object, or that it is somehow grounded in, at least to some extent, sense-perception.
Though radical, this view is hardly recognized by the majority of aestheticians. For a discussion of
this question see my study, "Ontological Status of the Literary Work of Art," in Journal of
Aesthetic Education (Winter, 1983).
II. Understanding the Arts, pp. 357-358.
12. Ibid., p. 359.
 51

call 'aesthetic experience'. What is common, for example, between our enjoyment
of a comedy and a tragedy? Again,

the felt qualities of the experiences of various persons, even those thoroughly steeped in the
arts, are extremely various. This is all the more so when we consider not only the variety of
persons doing the experiencing, their diverse backgrounds and temperaments, but also the
great differences in the artistic media, and the various genres of art within each medium, not
to mention the even greater differences between our responses to art and our responses to
nature. If we take all these experiences together considering both the variations in the kinds
of objects which caused them it may well be that the variety of experience is too great to be
included under any category label, such as 'aesthetich experience'. 13

II

A thoughtful, critical, look at the preceding train of reasoning adopted in the

preceding discussoin clearly shows that the source of Hospers's main discontent
with the concept of aesthetic experience is this: 'aesthetic' in 'aesthetic experience'
does not denote a quality, or a complex of qualities, which is common to the sort
of experience which we usually have when we approach and perceive art works for
the sake of enjoyment or criticism. The four features, or criteria, which Beardsley
has proposed (and which systematize those offered by Ducasse, Mead, and others)
are not sufficient enough to explain or account for the unique identity of the
aesthetic experience, not only because such features seem to attend other types of
experience, for example, sexual experience, but also because empirical observation
does not show or confirm the existence of such experience: art works, as well as the
people who perceive them, are diverse; they are, strictly speaking, generically
different from each other. As I have just indicated on behalf of Hospers, in what
sense is one's experience of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, e.g., similar to his
experience of Picasso's Guernica? If the structure and content of the experience is
in general determined by its objects, and if the objects of these two experiences are
generically different, should we not conclude that these two experiences are
generically different? And if they are generically different, is it at all sensible to look
for an essential property common to them? This line of resoning is inadequate -
why?
First of all, because it rests on a questionable, indeed debatable, assumption: viz.,
a class of 'art works' does not qua type exist; accordingly 'art' as a concept cannot
be defined. Art works, Hospers tells us, are diverse; they do not share a common
aspect, or nature, on the basis of which they can be defined and classified. Thus the
experiences of objects we ordinarily call 'art works' would be diverse and would,
consequently, resist a general definition or classification. It would then seem that
the denial of the possibility of aesthetic experience as a distinguishable class of

13. Ibid., p. 360.

52

human events is a logical corollary to the denial of 'art' as a type or class of objects.
If, on the other hand, we grant that art works constitute a class, if, in other words,
we grant that they somehow possess an art-making aspect, it would follow that the
experiences which these works occasion would constitute a class, and this in virtue
of the ingression of this aspect in the experiences
But is it the case that 'art' cannot be defined, or that the large number of
symphonies, paintings, statues, buildings, poems, novels, etc., which we usually call
art works do not share a common feature or aspect on the basis of which they can
be grouped as a class and to which we can meaningfully apply the term 'art'?
Aestheticians have been debating this question with a high degree of vigor during
the past two decades; many theories and arguments and ways of analyzing the
problem have been advanced to solve, and perhaps dissolve, the problem. I am not
quite certain that all the philosophers who have participated in this debate are
reconciled or agreed on a general happy solution to the problem. Of one thing,
though, I am certain, viz., it is extremely difficult, almost impossible, to define, or
attempt to define, 'art' on the basis of observable or exhibited, property, or set of
properties. And the aestheticians who constructed theories of art like Kant, Hegel,
Schopenhauer, Croce, Collingwood, Santayana, Dewey, Fry, to mention just a few
names, did not, I am certain, distinguish art works as a class on the basis of
empirically observable properties, but on the basis of unexhibited properties,
properties that come to life, fruition, or actualization in the aesthetic experience.
Art is, and should be, defined not on the basis of how an art work 'ordinarily',
merely, or naively appears to the senses but on the basis of what it does to the
imagination. This is based on the fundamental assumption that the artistic about
art, or what makes an object art, is not a finished product or aspect but a spiritual
content which acquires its structure and meaning in the process of aesthetic
perception. If the artistic about art is to be reduced to a complex of sensible qualities
directly perceivable by the senses and perceived the way we perceive ordinary objects
then art loses it unique character in our life and the history of culture. The so-called
art works would then be reduced to ordinary artefacts like the rest of man made
objects which come and pass out of existence without leaving a significant
impression upon the course of human civilization.
The point which I am trying to stress, and which Hospers is reluctant to grant,
is that 'art' can be defined: there is a basic element, or aspect, which is common
to all the things commonly called art works. This element, or aspect, is usually called
beauty, or aesthetic quality. The first term is both vague and narrow in its
application; this is why it is abandoned by manyaestheticians and artists. The latter
term is, I think, expressive and useful. An artefact is a work of art in as much as
it possess aesthetic qualities and is therefore the ground of an aesthetic experience.
I do not here need to sketch a theory of art, or art work; but I need to emphasize
that it is quite meaningful to hold that an art work is an artefact made by man
thoughtfully, consciously, and purposefully; as such it is a construct, a form, which
embodies aesthetic qualities. These qualities 'exist' in the work as a complex of
 53

potentialities awaiting realization qua meaning in aesthetic perception. It might help

if I quote a distinguished authority on this subject. Harold Osborne, writes,

a work of art is a construct which is constituted by the possession of aesthetic qualities,

aesthetic qualities being a necessary though not perhaps a sufficient condition for any artefact
to be classified as a work of art. Aesthetic qualities, it is generally agreed, belong to the wider
class of 'emergent' properties, which means that aesthetic qualities cannot be derived or
deduced from non-aesthetic qualities and their interrelations by the application of a system
of rules although any change in the relevant non-aesthetic qualities of a construct will effect
a change, perhaps disproportionately, in its aesthetic qualities. Most works of art are complex
constructs with aesthetic qualities existing at various levels of containment constituting a kind
of hierarchy. The work of art perceived as a whole - a Gestalt - has over-all aesthetic qualities
and the contained parts have also their aesthetic qualities. The aesthetic characteristics at each
higher level of containment are 'emergent' not only from the non-aesthetic properties of the
construct but 'emergent' also from aesthetic qualities of the contained parts. 14

This view which is succinctly articulated by Osborne is shared, so far as I know, by

a large number of aestheticians on both sides of the Atlantic. It calls for two
remarks: (1) the defining character of an art work, or what makes the work art, is
possession of aesthetic qualities; (2) these qualities are not given as ready made or
finally formed realities, but as possibilities for realization inherent in the work as
a meaningful, significant form. They emerge as gestalten in the activity of aesthetic
perception.
I may be asked: What is aesthetic qualitiy? Is aesthetic quality similar, or
identical, in all art works? We raise this question simply to see whether we can
establish a basis for defining 'art works' and consequently 'aesthetic experiences';
for if the so-called aesthetic quality which belongs to all art works is diverse in
character Hospers' main objection would remain both alive and forceful. Hence,
we should ask: what is the essential character of aesthetic quality? Does this sort
of quality have a general essence and existence in all art works? An adequate answer
to this question requires not merely a long article but a book. 15 I raise it only
because it is our duty as philosophers not to shy away from any question regardless
of whether it is difficult or impossible. But on the basis of my experience and the
testimony of art critics and philosophers I can, however, say that though rich in its
scope, appeal, and depth the aesthetic quality appears to have a general identity in
all the arts, and art works: regardless of its habitat - a poem, a novel, a statue, a
dance, a building, a symphony or a film - aesthetic quality belongs to the art works
as a potentiality, i.e., as a human aspect that can be actualized as meaning in the
aesthetic experience. Its dual character, (1) potentiality (inasmuch as it belongs to
the art work) and (2) meaning (inasmuch as it belongs to the aesthetic experience),

14. H. Osborne, "Inspiration," The British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 17, 1977.
15. Cf. S. Pepper, Aesthetic Quality (Westport Greenwood Press, 1970); M. Dufrenne,
Phenomenology of the Aesthetic Experience (Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1973).
54

is what delimits and determines the sort of identity aesthetic quality enjoys. We
approach, prize, and experience art works primarily because they promise a special
kind of experience and satisfaction, an experience and a satisfaction which are
uniquely different from the ones which are usually labelled moral, religious,
rational; or practical. This promise is grounded, made possible, by the fact that art
works are the sort of objects which possess special qualities. i.e., aesthetic qualities.
Now, if possession of aesthetic quality is the basis upon which art works are
grouped as a class of objects, and if it is the principle of artistic distinction, if it
is , in other words, the differentiae of an artefact qua art, then it should follow that
the experiences which this class of objects occasion must have a common element
between them. This element is a necessary ingredient of the experience mainly
because one cannot be said to experience such an object as art unless one experiences
it aesthetically.

III

But Hospers would object: if aesthetic qualities are essentially unexhibited, or, as
you say, exist as a complex of potentialities in the art work, if they come to life and
acquire existence and identity in an aesthetic experience, then we have no way to
know either what makes art works art or aesthetic experience aesthetic, for the
aesthetic experiences of the people who perceive and appreciate art works are, as
we say, diverse; it is in principle extremely difficult for two or more individual
percipients to have the same experience of one, or more, objects. Can we formulate
rationally objective criteria according to which we can establish the aesthetic identity
of these experiences? Again, do we not beg the question of we say that an aesthetic
experience, or having one, is the criterion by which we distinguish, or identify, an
object as a work of art? For, how can I have an aestheic experience of an object
to begin with if I do not know ahead of time that the object I am approaching is
a work of art? And if I know ahead of time that it is art, how did I happen to possess
this knowledge? Accidentally, or by design?
Let me state at the outset that we do not beg the question if we hold that the
criterion by which we 'know' an object to be a work of art is experiencing the object
aesthetically, or the capacity of the object to occasion an aesthetic experience; for
we do not, cannot, know the essence - indeed any aspect - of an object unless we
first perceive it: perception is a necessary condition for the being and knowledge of
any concrete object whatsoever. Thus if an object possesses certain qualities I
should first perceive it, I should, that is, recreate the unity of these qualities in my
perception, or experience, in order for me to know what it is or to relate it to other
objects if I need to do so. We usually bump into all sorts of objects in our daily
lives - buildings, roads, trees, flowers, animals, people, etc. - and we can, upon
request, 'identify' any of these perceptual objects by a quick glance most of the
time, and we tend to think that in this activity we 'perceive' the object; but this is
 55

a gross mistake, for we do not frequently sense, i.e., see, smell, hear, or taste such
objects; at best, we name, or classify, them, we subsume them under the general
concept by which we discourse or communicate about the world around us. Real
perception takes place when we focus our sensuous attention on an object
completely, when the sense, or senses, involved and the mental powers of the mind
are given totally to the object as a complex presentation of colors, lines, sounds or
movements, along with other types of qualities. During this activity, I do not merely
think the object; I sense, perceice, it; I form a percept of it. And the percept I form
is a specific, concrete, individual; for it is ojthe specific, concrete, individual object
I have perceived. Only when this perceptual activity takes place can I say that I
perceive and become in a position to know the object. Accordingly in order for me
to know the identity of any object I must perceive it, viz., experience it: only in this
sort of experience can I grasp the peculiar qualities which constitute this identity.
Thus the sort of experience I have of the object is the ultimate ground, basis, of any
claim or aspect I attribute to it; put differently, I have no right to attribute anything
to the object unless what I attribute is perceived by me in the experience of the
object. Though brief, this account of perception essentially applies to the perception
of the art work, but with a difference. Let me now elucidate this difference and draw
some conclusions from it.
Like the ordinary physical object, the art work is fundamentally a sensuous
object. But the qualities - aesthetic qualities, I mean - which 'make' it art are not
given as ready made to ordinary perception the way whiteness is given to the paper
on which I am now writing. From the standpoint of ordinary perception, the art
work is as natural, and given, as any other object which attracts our sensuous
attention in the course of daily activity. This feature calls for our earlier question:
how do we recognize, or identify, such an object as art? This question becomes
doubly important especially when we are told that works like paintings, symphonies,
statues, poems, etc., which appear to ordinary sense-perception as generically
different from each other, are art works and that they are art because they share
an aspect - art-making aspect - among themselves.
We approach, and identify, an object as an art work, not because of certain
observable lines, colors, or representation, and not because it is an ordinary object
or an artefact formed to serve a practical purpose, but because it is apurposive, i.e.,
significant, form, a form capable of realizing a meaningful experience in which we
are delighted, enlightened, inspired, and in which the very heart of our imagination
is enlivened. That is, I am able to distinguish a fine work of art from an ordinary
object, or artefact, by the fact that the former invites me or presents itself to my
sensibility as a purposive form. And I am able to make this distinction, and respond
to the object as art, mainly because I know what it means for something to be a
fine work of art. This knowledge, or better cognitive skill, is usually acquired when
one becomes a member of the artworld, when one is exposed to the art works which
inhabit our cities, museums, auditoriums, opera houses, literary books, and learns
to appreciate and discourse about the nature and peculiar aspects of these and
56

similar works. In every artistic domain there are broadly articulated conventions,
rules, or procedures which guide us in our approach to, and perception of, the art
works of that domain. We should readily admit, with Hospers, that a sunset, or a
human face, can be as beautiful as an art work produced by an artist. The two types
of objects are strictly speaking formed, ordered, and possess aesthetic qualities
which are the ground of the beauty which appears in and through their form. We
should also admit that the beauty of a natural object may exceed the beauty of many
an art work. But what distinguishes a fine work of art from any natural scene, for
example, is that the fundamental character of the fine work of art is human
purposiveness.
When I perceive a beautiful sunset, e.g., the content of my perception is primarily
sensuous: the 'feelings' I have when I attend to the inter-relatedness of the colors,
lines, and spatial configuration, including the gentle breeze which flirts with my
body, are a direct, yet creative, response to the qualities which I immediately
perceive; my response begins and ends with the sunset scene. But when I perceive
a fine work of art, say Renoir's Gabrielle, I do not only respond actively and
creatively to the complex order of aesthetic qualities which please my vision but also
to the human element, to the human qualities which are pregnant, i.e., potential,
in the portrait as a representation and which transcend what is immediately given.
In perceiving this work, I recreate, as Dewey and Croce would say, the object in my
perception and partly participate in the world which Renoir lived when he was
creating this piece. My experience in this case ceases to be merely sensuous; it
becomes human, and as such it exists not simply to my sensibility but also to my
imagination - cognitive imagination, I should say - which savors, enjoys, the
aesthetic qualities which the artist has succeeded in creating during the production
of the painting. Thus what is peculiar to our experience of fine works of art, and
what makes this experience aesthetic, is not merely sensuous pleasure but the
capacity of the 'York to move, enlighten, delight or perhaps enhance our sense of
value and provide an occasion for a joyful, meaningful experience. Creation and
attainment of human meaning is the raison d'etre of artistic creation and
perception. This is, I think, what Osborne had in mind when he argued in his
insightful article, "Aesthetic Perception," that the aesthetic experience is a peak
experience:

it is the apprehension of richly and tensely organized perceptual material without practical
implications that extends perceptual faculties and brings about the expansion of awareness
which ... is the hallmark of aesthetic activity." 16

16. H. Oshorne, "Aesthetic Perception," The British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 18, 1978; see also his
recent articles, "Expressiveness in the Arts," The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, XLI,
1982; "What is a Work of Art?" The British journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 21, 1981.
 57

In this sort of activity the sensuous element of the art work is not neglected or
discarded but, as Hegel and Alexander have argued, spiritualized; 17 it is a human
character. And it acquires this character mainly because the artist has mixed
"himself with his materials," 18 because he created a form, a configuration of
sensuous elements that is capable of actualizing an imaginative, meaningful
experience. It is this aspect of the art work which led philosophers like Cassirer and
Langer to define the essential nature of art in general as symbol and philosophers
like Dufrenne, Pepper, and Ingarden to define the art work as an aesthetic object,
i.e., as an object destined for the human imagination. They were led to these views
because they clearly saw that art works are cultural phenomena: as such they
embody some of the highest values, i.e., meanings, which adorn the spiritual fabric
of society. Thus if we grant that what makes an artefact a work of art is possession
of aesthetic qualities qua purposive form, if this form exists as a potentiality
awaiting realization in aesthetic perception, i.e., as a function of the art work as a
sensuous form, if we also grant that the actualization and enjoyment of the form
is what makes an experience aesthetic, and that we acquire a skill in identifying and
perceiving works of fine art as we acquire membership in the artworld of the society
to which we happen to belong, it follows that we do not beg the question when we
hold that we determine whether an object is a work of art by experiencing that
object aesthetically.
Let us grant for the sake of argument, Hospers would argue, that one can have
an aesthetic experience, an experience which can be aesthetic by perceiving the
aesthetic qualities of an art work qua purposive form, how can we establish that the
diverse experiences which people have of the diversity of art works actually possess,
at least in principle, some aesthetic character? I have already argued that the
principle of artistic distinction in general is possession of purposive form. This
means that regardless of the sort of sensuous medium in which it appears - words,
sounds, lines, colors, marble, movements, etc. - a form is purposive inasmuch as
it is capable of realizing a meaningful, life-enchancing experience. The texture of
this experience is not merely concept, sensation, emotion, or a mental representation
of some kind, but an image, an imaginative reality in which sensation, emotion and
concept fuse into a special kind of apprehension - noetic apprehension. When we
deny, with Hospers, the possibiliby of aesthetic experience on the grounds that the
qualities of the experiences people have of art works are diverse, not to speak of
the generic diversity of the art works themselves, we have to be clear about what
it is that we are denying. If the principle of artistic, and consequently aesthetic,
distinction is purposive form, if the essence of this form is a gestalt, a dynamic
quality, created and enjoyed in and by the imagination in aesthetic perception, i.e.,

17. Cf. S. Alexander, Beauty and Other Forms of Value (New York: Thomas Y. Crowley, 1968), pp.
53ff.; G. W. F. Hegel, The Philosophy of Fine Art, tr. T.M. Knox (Oxford University Press, 1980),
Introduction. Cf. also, M Mitias, "Hegel on the Art Object," The Personalist, Vol. 56, 1975.
18. Alexander, Beauty and Other Forms of Value, pp. l8-l9.!1l1 It
58

if it is unexhibited aesthetic quality, and if this quality is intended for the human
imagination as a universal faculty, I do not think that it is logically offensive to hold
that (1) diverse types of art works may possess this form, and (2) people with diverse
individual characters can basically have similar experiences of such works. For if the
purposive form I have been speaking of is grounded in the sensuous form which
constitutes the physical being of the art, if this form is an objectively given structure,
and if, furthermore, the structure of the experience is determined and guided by the
sensuous form, it should follow that the qualitative aspects of the experience would
necessarily be a realized content of the art work as a complex of sensuous qualities.
The attempt to stress diversity in art works, as well as in the experiences which
the works occasion, strikes me as unnecessary, on the one hand, and as sophistic,
on the other, not only because artistic masterpieces have always existed in our midst,
and people have continued to enjoy them since the Golden Age of Greece, but
especially because the structure of human sensibility, the general values we live by,
the general socio-cultural conditions under which we recognize, appreciate, and
evaluate art works more confirm, rather than deny, that the experiences we usually
enjoy when we seek and perceive art works are uniquely different form those which
we enjoy when we help others, pray to God, watch a football game, or have a sexual
experience. My task in the preceding discussion has not been to elucidate the nature
of aesthetic value, or the extent to which aesthetic experiences do in fact vary, but
only to show that it is possible to articulate one (or more) criterion as a principle
both of artistic and aesthetic distinction.
 59

PART II

HAVING AN AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE

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ESSAY FIVE

EXPERIENCING AESTHETICALLY, AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE, AND

EXPERIENCE IN AESTHETICS

Robert Ginsberg

I paced the platform of the suburban line at the principal rail station in Philadelphia
on a gray day in "late autumn. The platform had nothing of interest. No object,
nothing of significance, not a streak of color relieved the pervasive dullness. The
city was blocked out by dirty windows, the billboards were innane, not enough light
existed to read, not enough time was left to compose my thoughts. I nervously
strode here as I had done over the years, ill-at-ease, at a loss, accumulating the
moments of wasted time. I glanced up. For the first time I saw the skylight that
covered the protective superstructure and added gray obscurity to the somber
platform. The panes of reinforced glass had cracked and been patched in black. The
thick black lines differed for each pane and made a sensuous pattern of pure forms.
The rigid superstructure encased a set of freely dancing figures, and the dance
extended the full length of the waiting platform. My heart opened with joy in the
discovery of the pleasurable forms. When the train came I stepped aboard in
ecstasy.
The story illustrates the operation of unanticipated experiencing aesthetically in
the midst of the mundane. No expectation of finding delight guided my steps. I was
not in the aesthetic mood: that heightened preparedness of senses and sensibility
aimed at experiencing the beautiful, the charming, the unified, etc. Indeed, I was
absorbed in the nonaesthetic mood: inattentive, undirected, insensitive,
uninterested. I could not say that while pacing the platform I was seeking the
aesthetic. I would admit to being distressed by the dull and ordinary - the mundane
- which it seemed could not be fled. Yet the aesthetic occurred. Its occurrence is
a bonus to daily experience in the world - the mundane.
This kind of occurrence is possible only if we acknowledge that I was secretly
seeking the aesthetic. Unknown to myself I directed my steps and turned my head
in a quest for the aesthetic. This we do daily. Moving along the grubby
thoroughfares of life we keep an eye open for any possibility of experiencing
aesthetically. This is rarely our primary motivation. Usually, we have practical goals

Mitias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility oj the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhojj Publishers, Dordrecht
62
 63

that direct our activity: the train must be taken, the parking place must be found,
the meal must be eaten, the work must be done. Some people move through the
world with an eye ever open to learning. Others are unconsciously seeking the
opening for power, including sexual power. But we all likely wish for the aesthetic
to occur.
To the extraterrestrial observer hovering about Philadelphia's suburban station
the incident is clear: a specimen of the strange animal that delights in beauty is
trapped in unpleasant surroundings and chances upon an unnoticed feature of the
world that suitably arouses the aesthetic apparatus. Part of the gratification is due
to the surprise of encountering the source for gratification.
We are aesthetic beings wandering about aimlessly or busily occupied with
practical matters. We have forgotten what the extraterrestrian is aware of, and we
surprise ourselves with the happening of the aesthetic. In the rail station I did not
think I am such a being, ready and willing to experience aesthetically. That is a
theoretical position. It is contained somewhere in the texts I was carrying for my
course in Media. What happened was not theoretical but experiential. Indeed,
theory does not happen, it is derived.
What happened in the experience? Many things. I cannot enumerate them all nor
give them a sequence. Experiencing aesthetically is organic. Aesthetic joy occurs in
the sense of wholeness in which what happens fits together in harmony. To relate
my perceptual activity focussed on the advertising poster or to describe my
psychological reactions to the garbage lying alongside the rails are quite different
tasks than telling about the occurrence that was primarily aesthetic. At the simplest
level of analysis, what happened in my discovery of the overhead figures was the
delectation in the pure sensuous form of the lines. The abstraction of pattern found
an appreciator craning his neck. We may analyze the thickness of line and its
angularity within the space of the pane and continue with the variation in the
extended series. The forms have the vitality of musical notes or dancing figures. In
the grasp of their pure form I introduce association and metaphor. I experience the
forms as dancing figures - that comparison is no afterthought about the experience.
The experiencing is colored and shaped by a range of ironies. The protective panes
are cracked, the cracked glass is repaired, the cracks reappear through the repairs.
The glass is meant to let in light, the repairs block out light, the panes let in too little
light. The ceiling is crowded with unnoticed dancing figures, the platform is
alternately empty or crowded with standing figures. The poignant and the amusing
give way to one another in the experience. Reflections attach themselves to
perceptions. The experiencing somehow ties in with travelling, decay, the passage
of time, brokenness and ruin.
The experiencing sprang out of a rich context, though prior to its happening I
would have said no context for enjoyment was present. Thus, the happening was
redemptive. Experiencing aesthetically converts the continuity of drabness into the
setting for sparkling vitality. The transformation from lacklustre to joy is
occasioned by discovery. Discovery is the matter of a moment. One moment I dwell
64

in the dull world in whic~ nothing holds together pleasantly. The next moment
everything comes together at once. The field of experience is unified with tonic
enjoyment. The moment of discovery is like a balloon lighter than air that
unexpectedly is released. Aesthetic discovery is liberation from the ordinary bonds
of the earth. It is elevation and alleviation of the spirit.
What did I discover? An aesthetic object? Here was a large, rich, fascinating
pattern everyone seems to have missed. The object then absorbs one's attention. But
this account is too easy. It is more fit for discovery of an outstanding work of art
in a museum: an aesthetic object found in an aesthetic context by an aesthetic
seeker. At the train station I was not deliberately engaged in an aesthetic search,
what happened was not in an aesthetic context, and the object of my discovery,
though aesthetic, was not intentionally so as a work of art. The discovery, then, in
this case must be appreciated as a process of discovering, of disclosing and
uncovering, in the course of which the subject participates in the aesthetic. An
object was discovered but equally important was the subject in discovery.
I was no mere observer. I was engaged, unexpectedly, in the happening.
Something happened to me on that platform but I had a part in its happening.
Experiencing aesthetically in the world is participatory.involvement by which one
discovers oneself as well as the world. I have never been the same. Each week
thereafter while waiting for the train I would eagerly give myself to enjoyment of
the dancing figures. They extend over the length of the great platforms so that
hundreds of figures abound. I brought my camera along and made many studies.
That portion of wasted time to which I had been condemned now resonated with
the high tonality of life worth living. Others followed my eye and tried to make out
what I was photographing. No glint of recognition appeared in their eyes, no
confirming smile. All they saw, it seems, was cracked glass. Was this man taking
pictures for a survey of building conditions? They could see the figures but they had
not yet the experience.
Experiencing aesthetically is both an apprehending and an evaluating. To
recognize the vigorous formal activity of the pattern is to appreciate it while seeing
it, and seeing it is thanks to appreciating it. In other matters of life we apprehend
while holding involvement and judgement in suspension. Enjoyment often is an
investment we make after the fact. But the fact is shaped and selected in
experiencing aesthetically as we are recognizing it. The fact is, our observation is
normative. How fact and value can intertwine may be puzzling in theory but they
happen this way in experience.
I hesitate to call experiencing aesthetically having an aesthetic experience. Let us
reserve the latter for experience sought in the aesthetic realm whose chief inhabitants
are works of art. Dewey makes a wonderful case in Art as Experience for the
aesthetics of an experience which may be intellectual or practical rather than artistic.
Thus, the solving of a mathematical problem may have its aesthetic quality in the
wholeness of activity. Dewey, then, points us toward a better appreciation of life.
But what happened to me on the railway platform does not fit neatly into either an
 65

aesthetic experience or the aesthetics of an experience. It did not occur within an

aesthetic realm and was not sought, though it succeeded in annexing territory to the
aesthetic and it sprang from a being wishing aesthetic relief. It was an experience,
complete and satisfying, though its contents were aesthetic elements. We might
bring all these theories together by calling what happened an aesthetic experience
in life.
I hesitate to settle the question of categorization for fear of losing something in
the experience. A unified experience theory is an impressive intellectual achievement
but it may not capture the richness of different kinds of experience. Hence, let us
keep experience open by speaking of experiencing aesthetically for the momentous
incident at the train station. So momentous was that happening that it may have
been more than aesthetic; it may have been metaphysical. Consider the event as the
revelation of being in which alienated subject and dull world suddenly coalesce in
vital mutality. Before the discovery, the epiphany, I stood apart from the world, and
the world was not worth being with. The impatience of the pacing was no idle
passing of the time waiting for the train. It was the expression of a felt gulf of being.
I was at a loss, a stranger not at home in being. Nothing in the train station
welcomed me. This, alas, is the ordinary state of affairs. We are caught up in a
world of things and tasks. We are always going somewhere or waiting for
something. The nowness and fullness of being with (mitsein) is rarely encountered.
But encountered it is. Being breaks through the separation of subject from object,
rescuing us from isolation. Thus, being taught me not only the beauty of the forms
dancing overhead but the value of being there, of experiencing, of participating in
what is. The aesthetic pleasure, then, was melded with a joie de vivre as I found
beauty and being. Therefore, we must talk of the incident at the station as ecstasy
or sublimity, extending to the highest reaches of the aesthetic where life and world
wondrously conjoin.
The discovery of the dancing figures taught me an experiential lesson, of which
I need daily reminder. For if the dullest railway platform, devoid of interest and
hospitality, may open itself to my joyful participation in quickened existence, then
the rest of the world around me that I have taken for granted, that I have passed
by, that I have thought uninteresting, may also come alive for me. The value of the
world may be raised instantaneously with the exhilaration of my soul. What
happened for me on the platform was not merely an aesthetic experience: it was the
sudden coming together of soul and world. Now I am talking of Zen, which can
never be understood by talking, and I am getting into mysticism, which leads off
in another direction than the clarification of the aesthetic. The aesthetician may be
content to stop here, cleaving to the aesthetic and avoiding the metaphysical. Yet
experiencing aesthetically, as in the incident at the station, may be understood as
a model for and a step in the direction of the sudden union of alienated self and
dull world into vibrant, joyous being. Awakened to this possibility, one may enter
a cosmic adventure in traversing the mundane. This gray sky above, this pile of dirt
below, this tired face across from me, may be the unanticipated invitations to
redemption.
66

II

I climbed the heights above Yosemite Valley, California in order to see the splendid
granite mountain, Half Dome, in its fullest view. Approaching the edge through the
woods I was filled with heightened expectation. I saw the ruin of a cabin and my
approach caused the alignment of the chimney on this side of the valley with the
shorn mountain across the valley. I stopped. Something happened. The stone
verticals corresponded, one human-shaped, the other natural. The human site was
still engaged in sightseeing. I was on its side. I saw the famous sight through the
eyes of the ruin. I had come expecting beauty; I discovered an unexpected dimension
to the beauty of the scene/seen.
In this experience I had been seeking the aesthetic. I knew I would find it, for I
had seen post cards in advance and was following the trail map. The seeking took
considerable effort and time. It was a heavy investment. I was not going for the
scientific purpose of studying rock formation, nor was it for the recreational
purpose of exercising my limbs in the fresh air, though that exertion added intensity
to the experience and was its context. Primarily, I was going for the scenic wonders.
No wonder that I would take delight in seeing Half Dome. The expectation elicited
the outcome. I was suitably prepared. No distractions of practical consideration -
or theoretic - detracted from my concentrated expectancy. Indeed, the world all
around me on the climb contributed to the context for my goal. I was on the terrain
of Nature in a national park, following the trail to a viewpoint upon a celebrated
natural formation. Each step in the climb not only brought me closer but obliged
me to sense the altitude. Moving through the thick woods was in anticipatory
contrast to the great gap of the valley and the starkness of the treeless granite
boulder.
My spirit and my senses were heightened. I was keenly aware of the world, eager
to experience it. My senses were willing to be gratified by their fullest exercise.
Hence my eye 'Yas sharp, but so was my ear and my nose. I was open to experiencing
aesthetically. And on the way I did take minor pleasure in a bird's song, a tree's
sway, and a cloud's contortion. I was in the world considered as potential aesthetic
realm. Any pleasing feature that appeared would be welcomed. And that welcoming
mode drew forth pleasing features. A tonic subjective at-homeness with the world
pervaded my feelings. I was in the right mood to enjoy Nature.
Then the unexpected happened. I had no thought in reaching the natural heights
that a human structure would be present. Normally, I would have avoided any such
structure as I directed my steps toward the natural view. In retrospect it makes sense
that a service building be present at the trail end. It may have had facilities for
visit~rs and played an interpretive role. But the building was not present when I
arrived. It was absent though its ruin was present. And that ruin spoke to my
experience as related to what I had come to see. If I had been trudging on in a dulled
state, passing the time in surroundings - like those of the railway station - that did
not draw interest, I might well have missed the chimney, walked past it as if it were
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another tree on the way to the goal. The heightened intensity of my sensibility
allowed the chimney to be integrated into the experiencing aesthetically. Readiness
was all. The extraterrestrial aesthetician would explain that the creature it was
observing on the trail was a specimen of an aesthetic being whose experiencing
apparatus for the aesthetic was on full alert. The individual was completely given
over to the enjoyment of its experience. And while headed in the direction of an
anticipated goal it was nonetheless open to enjoying anything that came its way.
Something quite unexpected came its way, and it was ready to attend to it, getting
the maximum aesthetic value out of the encounter. The creature was embarked on
an adventure in experience. Given the wide range of accessible natural wonders in
the national park, the individual in the right mood was bound to make gratifying
discoveries.
What are the contents of the aesthetic discovery? Formal properties of beauty
may be pointed to in what I saw: the verticals as distinctively shaped and gathering
space about them, and the interplay between the two kinds of vertical shapes over
the enormous intervening space. The pleasure of perspective entered, for though the
chimney is miniscule compared to Half Dome, my approaching it from the trail
made it assume visual and spatial dignity equal to the mountain. Complexity of
human meaning is encountered with poignant irony. The chimney is an enduring
marker of the human value placed on the mountain visible from this point. Here
human hands raised stones to shelter an experience of pure stone. So I have come
to the right place; I am at home. But the human occupation has been lifted; our
presence has turned to stone. Nature has reclaimed its elements. Half Dome presides
over the petrifaction of the world. Chimney and mountain are in dialogue as I sense
the switching between their perspectives. I am present in ruin and in unity.
My presence is essential to the discovery. It is not of an aesthetic object. That term
is as awkward here as on the railway platform. Yes, Half Dome is a mighty object
of splendor, perhaps sublimity, that is treated as natural aesthetic object in
photography. And the chimney with Half Dome in the background may also be
photographed as aesthetic object. But my SUbjective role in the encounter is
participatory involvement. My moving toward the "objects" brought them to
relationship, formally and meaningfully. My discovery is of them and of myself.
The enjoyment is of their presence and of my presence in bringing them into
presence. In the woods, as on the railway platform, discovery embraces my creative
contribution to what is being experienced aesthetically. I am not the willing recipient
of what is given but the giver. Objects willingly receive from my subjectivity their
elevated status in experiencing aesthetically. Discovery in such experience is no mere
enlargement by accumulation whereby we experience more with each incident. This
is a consumer model of enjoyment: get more for your money, keep adding items
to your list, collect the variety available. Whether consumer experience is aesthetic
is doubtful. The discovery we have been talking about is an expansion of the
discoverer accompanied by joyful recognition of one's creative being as participant.
The third party present, then, at Yosemite is I. I am the third vertical. Aligned
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with chimney and mountain I am that being of flesh and blood who detects them,
responds to them, dwells with them. I restore the chimney's human service by
sighting the mountain through it. The nature I have climbed to see is seen through
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the human vision. I am on the side of life. The trees and the solitary human being
frame the pile of stones and the distant side of stone. The trees sway and I breathe.
We are not incidental to the sight. We are of the incident at the site. Life triumphs
and rewards itself. My climb has been a success. What a beautiful day. But I have
somehow stopped in the ruin. The pile of my bones is covered by living flesh while
the cabin has died, leaving its backbone of stone. Even the fabled mountain across
the way is a ruin: a half dome whose face was torn away ages ago. Destructive power
is savored in the very bringing together of elements in the experience which is
creative. I am keenly alive but mortal, a mover through trails but standing still. I
am that eager discoverer of scenic nature who discovers myself in the scene, having
been naturally drawn to the sheltering suggestion of the silent chimney.
Incongruity operates here, as it usually does in the experience of ruins. While a
house without a chimney is no surprise, the chimney without a house contributes
curiously to experience. It has ceased its evidently intended function but continues
to stand by its function in structure and tone. It is a chimney we recognize, not an
unidentified pile of stones. But a chimney is an odd thing to find in a forest, though
a cabin with chimney would not be strange. A national park is a protected area
intended to preserve valuable creatures, natural formations, and human
contributions. The park now becomes protector of the chimney. I have climbed to
see Half Dome, but here I am with a chimney.
Is there a lesson in the experience? Yes: to enjoyably experience the world one
should keep one's eye open, be on one's toes, be ready for discovery all the way,
especially when one enters an acknowledged terrain of the aesthetic. Take the time
to be found by what we do not know awaits us. Invest in openness. On the way to
the known masterpieces one may enter experiences more gratifying aesthetically
than viewing the celebrated object, for the process of discovery may be richer than
the observation of the given. Do not be blind to the details of the passage as one
seeks the great, for greatness may be experienced in full attentiveness to the detail.
Awake to the surroundings so that they are no longer context, background,
sidelines, but central organizing powers in experience that may even have a place
for participation by the celebrated beauties.
Did I have an aesthetic experience in Yosemite? It still seems preferable to reserve
that term for something in the realm of art or else focussed simply on a natural
object. I may have had an aesthetic experience of Half Dome itself in its majestic
form in the course of the afternoon but I do not remember it. Memory on that score
is blurred with photographs and paintings of the mountain. I saw much of Half
Dome that memorable day and the next, but I hesitate to say that one of the
sightings was an aesthetic experience, for the experiences overlapped and blurred.
But what happened at the chimney site seems more than aesthetic. As at the railway
station, a deeper life experience transpired. It was experiencing aesthetically but it
was an experience of being.
A lesson I quickly learned from the chimney was that something else, such as a
tree, could also serve in aesthetic relationship with Half Dome. So I moved from
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tree to tree discovering pattern, relationship, and occasional incongruity. Clumps

of trees served as well. Then posts, fence railings, a bench, a young couple taking
in the view, an overflowing garbage can. The challenge to experience was to see the
famous mountain not for itself, all alone, but through the eyes of other presences,
inanimate as well as living. The nature photographer knows the trick of composition
whereby the foliage is made to frame the feature instead of letting it stick out in bare
sky. What I was looking for was not the single most effective view. Instead, I was
exploring the coming upon configurations: the process in which I participated,
experiencing aesthetically, was greater than the possible outcome, the delimitation
of an aesthetic object for its enjoyment.
If the chimney had taught me how to approach Half Dome, then Half Dome
taught me how to appreciate the chimney. I could re-experience the chimney in the
trees. The chimney too could be approached in terms of the soil and ash that lay
at its feet. What at first was sensed as dull waste became the focus of attention. At
the foot of the chimney grew a green plant, pressing its foliage upward in graceful
arches. The plant was on the side where the cabin had been. It had greater formal
beauty in its individual simplicity than the same kind of plant growing in profusion
a few feet away on the side that had always been outside the building. The human
structure that was meant to shut out nature now sheltered a natural beauty enriched
by its ashes. In appreciating the simple plant I was also appreciating my
appreciation. The surprise was pleasant in finding in myself an unexpected power
of enjoying an unnoticed feature of the world. That self-confirming appreciation,
that patting of oneself on the back, leads to further discovery. Experiencing
aesthetically is liberating because it lighty tosses aside layers of inhibition or dullness
in its revelation of fresh participation. The burden of the world is lightened. The
more we penetrate its presence the more our burden is relieved. The weight of
apartness is overcome in the joy of experience.
While admiring the leaves of this plant whose species hitherto had merely been
weeds or at most wild growth, I notice an insect marching upon the arch of the green
blade. The compact form is a well~equipped sentient voyager following a trail. I
drop to my knees. The insect has crossed the vast space on a noble bridge and
gingerly steps upon the earth to commence unknown adventures. But this earth is
really the remains of the construction introduced by a grander species. What is our
grandeur to the insect? It makes its way over the splinters and ash, the dust and
detritus until, the line is crossed and the world outside the cabin is entered. That
distinction so important to our species is nought to our hero who jumps up on a
leaf tip of the same kind of plant and heads into the obscurity of the woods. Una
selva oscura. I crawl after it.
My guide through the forest makes me see things with different eyes. Before I had
traveled six feet above. I had missed the floor for the forest. What had been
underfoot was a world filled with marvels. I had failed to experience what I had
been stepping on, so busy was I in moving on to experience. Even as I resolved to
keep my eye open and experience the detail, my eye was averted and I missed the
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detail. The insect, my companion in the world, taught me this new perspective.
Crawling into the brush I discovered what must be for this creature great mountains,
tall trees, wide valleys, interlocking trails, and perhaps the remains of a chimney.
Patterns emerged, coalesced, succeeded one another. Juxtapositions, jarring or
jocular, jaunted about the forest floor. I lost my friend in the thicket as I lay full
length upon the brambled earth. Had I been found like this by others of my species
following the trail to the viewpoint for Half Dome, would they have said I was
experiencing aesthetically, was lost in ecstasy, or was infected with mountain
madness? Why not say all three.
This kind of experiencing of nature, like that incident in the human world of the
railway station, turns out to be an exploration of being. Experiencing aesthetically,
then, can be metaphysical happening, or, if it is not quite that, then it is a good
model and preparation for metaphysical happening. Thereby, the aesthetic is a
guiding kind of experience for meaningful existence and not the mere luxury it is
often made out to be, reserved for those with the time and money to indulge
themselves. We may even be made to feel guilty about our strolls through the world
which have no aim other than enjoyment of the fullness of experience in being, fa
joie de vivre. We seek excuses for our behavior: we are really seeking more
knowledge about nature, we are studying exotic cultural conditions, we need the
exercise to keep fit, etc. Who shall argue that experiencing aesthetically is central
to who we are and may become as human beings? For in this experience, accessible
to every person, is the humanizing cord that links us to the world. This is the coming
of world into life, the coming together of our selves and being. We all sit .at the edge
of the most profound experience. No need to climb mountains.
The two experiences I have related move from the aesthetic to the mystical but
their movements are different. The experience at the station was redemptive of the
world which surrounded in apparent worthlessness. It was a mighty reversal. The
experience on the trail was expansive toward the world which lay before me.

So various, so beautiful, so new.

It was a giant step forward. The context in Philadelphia was opposed to the
aesthetic; in Yosemite everything welcomed the aesthetic. On the platform I sought
relief from the world. On the trail I sought confirmation from the world. My senses
were dulled, withdrawn, dissatisfied in the one case; in the other they were alert,
active, eager for gratification. Tone and mood in Philadelphia were of a person
isolated, shut off from the world, while in the national park I was an explorer
entering the world. The discovery made on the platform went against the grain of
experience; the discovery made in the woods was in the direction pointed to by
experience.
The two movements are not available as choices. Instead, they choose one. I have
walked through natural wonders in a dulled state, heading for the official sights,
and unappreciative of the present detail and moment. I have stood on dark railway
72

platforms with all my sensibility illumined, discovering the aesthetic in the pattern
of waste strewn between the tracks. When sightseeing as acknowledged vacationers
we are more inclined to be chosen by the experience that occurred at Yosemite. But
we have to be protected from the hurry and worry that go with travel, the guilt
inhibition, and the mentality of consumership. Even then it is difficult to sustain
the alerted openness for more than a few days. We fall back into the mundane from
the heights of experiencing aesthetically. Yet the railway instance shows that
prolonged dwelling in the mundane may be elevated suddenly by the wonderful.
That we can have both kinds of experience speaks of the wonder that we are: human
beings able to enjoy being.

III

A scene in Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal engrosses my interest, drawing me

into the film to sense it fully. The principal characters are relaxing outdoors. The
Knight meets the young woman, Mia. Her husband Jof arrives, having been rescued
by the Squire. Jof gives Mia a bracelet. Introductions are made. A bowl of milk and
strawberries is passed about. The Knight is touched by the love and purity of the
little family. His anguish over faith slips away. He smiles, "I shall remember this
moment." He announces, "I'll carry this memory between my hands as carefully
as if it were a bowl filled to the brim with fresh milk." Then he goes off with resolve
to continue his chess game with Death. In this scene the Knight discovers the
meaning of existence, which he had not found in the Crusades. He had asked Death
for the reprieve, while the game lasts, so that he might find some such meaning. The
bowl has been handled like a chalice so that a beaufiful communion has occurred.
The two parties - the strolling players and the Knight's retinue - will join and
traverse the forest together.
Throughout the scene a silent observer is the mask of Death hung by the players'
wagon. This is a static symbol picked up by the angle of the camera to juxtapose
with the human figures seemingly safe from the threat of death. All the while that
innocence, love, kindness, and companionship flourish so naturally on this hillside,
nothing is lost to the sight of Death. Death looks over the shoulders of the company.
Thus, Death is not something left behind or kept outside; it is the perpetual context
of our lives, the ever-present player in our midst. Of the little group only the Knight
knows this. He has no need of the mask to remind him of the presence of Death.
Yet he smiles, having found something of value: "it will be enough for me." And
with this unforgettable moment he is ready to face Death again. So are we all, for
we have shared in the communion which affirms the value of life even under the
gaze of Death. We are of the company. We cannot forget the scene anymore than
can the Knight, for he instructs us to remember it. Only we among the company can
appreciate what the Knight has found memorable. The Squire who has joined the
scene with the mute Girl naps, and Jof picks out a tune.
The scene has made good use of two easily accessible cinematic means of shaping
 73

meaning and building effect. The mask is the purely visual means. The object is
there in the picture. The Knight's statement is dialogue that we hear - in Swedish.
He tells us what is meaningful. We see and we hear. The scene's purport and place
is easy to experience. The passing of the bowl is more complex cinematically, for
we have to follow the movement of an object and its use by the characters. But its
symbolic significance is clear, thanks to the Knight. The way he looks at it, the way
he holds it, the way he alludes to it, invests it for us with moving meaning. The
passing of the bowl is both humble and profound. The scene brings together the
simplicity of plain living with the twisting depths of metaphysical and spiritual
search. The answers to the search appear to the Knight in the bowl that comes into
his hands.
I have remembered the scene in the twenty-five years since I first saw the film as
a student. In recent re-screenings of the film for my students I have looked forward
to that scene, wishing to grasp it even more fully. Every feature of the cinematic
stands to be sensed and assessed: the positioning and movement of the bodies, for
the entrances and exits are carefully staged as are the tableaux; the direction of
viewing in the eyes of the figures, as they look off, within, or at one another; the

The illustration on this page is taken from the Modern Film Scripts edition of The Seventh Seal: A
Film by Ingmar Bergman, published in New York by Simon and Schuster, 1960. Used by permission of
Lorrimer Publishing Limited, London.
74

lighting, which among other things, illumines the Knight's rare smile; the identity
and placement of other objects in the scene, such as the musical instrument, a horse,
the wagon, picnic cloths; the costuming and hairstyling that make Mia (Bibi
Andersson) so refreshingly lovely, the Knight (Max von Sydow) so heroically
somber, the Squire (Gunnar Bjornstrand) so gruffly down-to-earth, and Jof (Nils
Poppe) so whimsically harmless; the pacing in the scene whereby the elapse of time
is felt so differently by the characters; and the rest of the dialogue, the sound effects,
including "music, the camera angles, the shots, and the montage.
But the experience of the complex work of art is inexhaustible. The aesthetic
experience, for now we may apply the term with confidence, opens itself to further
appreciation of detail, more heightened attentiveness to features, and a deeper
encounter upon repeating the experience. The presumption operative in enjoyment
of the great work of art is that everything in it, no matter how incidental it appears
at first, is contributory to the aesthetic worth and may be attended to closely. Just
as we fell upon our knees in Yosemite to perceive the configuration of a mite or in
Philadelphia we craned our neck to follow the parade of overhead cracked figures,
so in The Seventh Seal we may probe every corner of the screen, catch every murmur
of sound, fasten on anything moving. In the aesthetic experience we are also in a
world - the world of the work of art or aesthetic object - where successive discovery
rewards intensified participation.
Let me just focus on one additional feature of the scene by Bergman: the bracelet.
Giving Mia the bracelet seems a minor piece of stage business that re-establishes the
loving contentment between the bruised Jof and the worried Mia. He enters seeking
her consolation, having escaped a close call at the inn. The bracelet was stolen at
the last moment in Jof's departure. Thus, despite his helplessness he has his wits
about him. And poetic justice is served, for the cruel Raval, who almost killed Jof,
~as trying to sell the bracelet which he earlier had stolen. Justice, however, is served
in more drastic terms at the inn when the Squire slits Raval's face as he warned he
would do after their earlier meeting.
At that earlier meeting the Squire observed Raval rob a corpse of its jewelry.
Raval had been the seminarian responsible for sending the Knight (and Squire) on
the wild goose chase of the Crusades. Now he is caught in venal impiety. The third
meeting of Raval and the Squire will occur in the forest where the Knight's party
and that of the players pause. Raval raves and froths in the horrible pangs of the
plague and dies. Has he caught the disease while robbing corpses? Does the
transmitted bracelet assure the death of Jof and Mia? Is the disease spread by the
sharing of the milk bowl? In retrospect, the uplifting scene of communion appears
sinister. Is the Death's mask grinning because it sees the inevitable conquest of death
over all?
The innocent family does escape death that night thanks to the Knight's ruse with
Death, for as he topples the gameboard, Jof and Mia make off in the woods with
their infant. The Knight has cheated Death even though he has lost the game. But
Death is not fooled. He is aware of the Knight's move and presumably confident
 75

that no one will escape the cloak of death when the time comes. Has the Knight
found something in life worth dying for, or is all life futile and death therefore
meaningless?
The experience of the picnic scene is colored by the preceding scenes and by those
which follow. The scene gives much to the film as a whole, yet we cannot fully
appreciate it without a good sense of the film as a whole. Consider the penultimate
scene: Death arrives to claim his due at the Knight's castle. The ,last supper is
interrupted by this singular guest. The mute Girl, horrified by the world, greets
Death with a smile and her first words. The Knight's wife, abandoned for ten years
of Crusading, plays the impeccable hostess and welcomes Death to the castle. The
Squire, firm-eyed and unflinching in his attachment to life, is silenced by his
superiors but under protest. And the Knight? He is lost in a frenzy of prayer. For
the first time our hero looks fearful. His is not the fear of Death but the Angst that
struggles with faith. At the last moment, then, the Knight does not know. The call
to God is unanswered. What has the Knight forgotten? What have we forgotten?
That moment in the very same day that was pronounced unforgettable. That
communion with innocence which the Knight pronounced as enough for him is not
enough. That gentle being-together with human beings is eclipsed by the Knight's
anguished isolation from God. We were of the earlier party and feel ourselves on
hand as Death comes to the castle. What shall be our final words? What in life is
sufficient for us? The mask of Death on the wagon's stake also gazed out from the
scene at us. How are we the living to address our coming death? We shudder at these
unarticulated thoughts, these troubling probes of our being, as The Seventh Seal
comes to a close with a Dance of Death.
This aesthetic experience, like the experiencing aesthetically, has brought us to the
edge of the metaphysical. In the experience of the film, a work of art, we have the
chance to encounter our being. Perhaps the art of the work consists in obliging that
encounter. Or it may be that the art work remains purely aesthetic while suggesting
lines of reflection we may pursue on our own as metaphysicians. Thus, The Seventh
Seal becomes a good stimulant of philosophic discussion on the meaning of life even
if we do not discuss it as a work of art. I do not insist here on the metaphysical
grounding of the three kinds of experience related, for fear of losing the reader's
appreciation of the aesthetic in the experience. No amount of analysis and argument
will demonstrate the breakthroughs to the metaphysical which I have suggested for
these experiences. Whether such a thing happens will have to be determined by your
experience.
My experience of the film shares several features with the other incidents.
Encounter with the film was participatory. I had to turn my attention to it in the
fullest way psychologically and sensually. I actively engaged in the film, seeking its
significant features. I could not rely on the film bringing everything to me to be
absorbed. I had presence in the experience. I responded to the smoke and odors as
if I were there sniffing them. My breathing and heartbeat were tuned to the beat
and pace of the film. Experiencing cinema is no simple matter of seeing and hearing.
76

Spatially, I felt myself present in scenes, sitting, for example, in the circle where the
bowl of milk is passed. The heightening of attention paid off in the theatre as it had
on the trail and the platform. I was able to grasp more and to experience the detail.
This served as incentive for yet further heightening.
Discovery advanced the appreciation of the film. Discovery of the links between
the scenes, such as the bracelet, obliged one scene to be felt in confrontation with
the others. The self-referential features of the film reinforced the effort to grasp
fully, to respond to everything, to experience its unity. What was discovered led me
deeper into the film and deeper into myself. The simplicity of the film as a clearcut
allegory dissolved into its rich and puzzling turns. I discovered myself as journeyer
through the film.
The aesthetic experience was normative at each of its moments. I perceived what
was valuable and valued what I perceived simultaneously. Some qualities and values
were easier to seize, such as the Knight's memorable speech on the hillside. The
scene has been structured for that, played for that, filmed for that, edited for that.
And to recognize all that while experiencing it is gratifying. It is a good scene; it
is aesthetically enjoyable. But much in that scene and others of this complex art
work had to be spotted, selected, and given value by my heightened awareness. The
film invited me to try my experience in detecting all of its features. The bonus of
experiencing works of art is that artists have presumably invested such works with
endless features worth detecting and taking delectation from. Lying on the trail or
standing on the platform, we cannot be so confident that our efforts will be amply
rewarded. The world is not thought of as accessible to infinite aesthetic experiencing
but great art works may be thought of as infinite worlds of the aesthetic.
The fullness of my willing absorption in the film is greater than my high-spirited
exploration of the national park, for in the darkened theatre all concerns of
sociability and safety disappear. I need attend to nothing other than the film which
looms up from the screen to occupy space. Similar absorption occurs in the concert
hall and playhouse, though at intermission I must return to the social world. It is
difficult to have this total concentration in a work in a great art museum because
of the traffic and conversation. With proper habituation, reading a book in the
security of a library or study may have this full involvement. Looking at a film on
television in one's living room does not allow for the full experience because the
context remains the world of one's living room rather than the world of the art
work.
In sightseeing I may be seeking full experience of the wonders of civilization and
nature but I cannot completely give myself over to that. I have to watch my footing
on the trail and the platform. I can't afford to miss my train, and I can't afford
to be found by a bear. The presence of other human beings on the trail and waiting
for the train are social inhibitions to ecstasy. The realm of art is a consolation for
the world in which we experience cautiously. But the experience of art also may
encourage our experiencing life aesthetically. For the participatory, normative, and
revelation~J dimensions of aesthetic experience may be tried out in the world.
 77

IV

I have chosen three incidents that may be visually illustrated so that the reader has
an experiential object at hand in addition to all this talk about experience. But
illustrations are not experiences. A picture of a mountain is not a mountain. A still
photograph is not a cinematic scene. While you may gaze at the pattern of dancing
figures from Philadelphia you see them close at hand by looking straight ahead or
down at the table, I met them by looking above my head. While the three
experiences were visual they were more than that. Cinema is auditory: "I shall
remember this moment." And one's immobile presence in an anonymous darkened
space is contributory to the illusion and spatiality of film. The climb was crucial to
the event at Yosemite. How could I follow the path of my little guide to experience
without dropping to my knees and crawling? In Philadelphia the pacing with the
heavy burden of time was prerequisite to the release felt in the exuberance of aerial
dancing forms. Context and approach, antecedent moment and goal, are part of the
aesthetic experience and experiencing aesthetically.
The three examples push beyond aesthetic matters to questions of being and
meaning. The reader need not follow. Metaphysical grounding or direction may be
rarely experienced in any aesthetic happening. We can just as well use examples that
steer clear of the mystical. But these stories were told to remind you that aesthetic
considerations can involve the deepest kinds of other considerations so that
aesthetics need not rest near the bottom of matters of philosophic importance but
may be appreciated as deserving a place near the top.
But why examples at all when what philosophy calls for is theory? Normally we
begin with a theory, draw some distinctions, and then apply it to examples. A
unified theory of experience and the aesthetic may be latent here so that you can
draw it out of the chapter. I am not sure one is here. I prefer to leave the three kinds
of experience discussed as each worthy and distinctive. While they share features,
they diverge. They appear to complement one another rather than illustrate a
common core.
The three cases need to be complemented by others that fit in between. Thus,
consider moving through the human-made world, say, the Budapest railway station
designed by Eiffel, with the same heightened intensity and open expectation with
which I entered the national park. Consider moving through the dull, uninteresting
stretches of the natural world, with that same oppression of spirit I had in
Philadelphia, and yet discover a redeeming pattern of dancing weeds. Consider the
field of experience as a mix of the natural and human-made. Consider moving
through a palace of the arts and making the discovery of a neglected masterpiece.
Consider reading a dull novel one feels obliged to get through only to light upon
a superb passage. Consider reading a dull chapter of an academic book and
suddenly experiencing fully something human that it has been awkwardly talking
about. Such considerations will enrich theory; more important, they will enrich
experience.
78

Instead of treating you to the fitting of theory to experiences, I have drawn you
into the experience of theorizing as shaped by experiences. The three stories I have
subjected you to, then, are not examples for theory but stimulants for experience.
Experience, not theory, is the creative source for responding, reflecting, and
exploring. Philosophers who work on aesthetic matters need to keep their soul full
of experience - and not only of aesthetic objects. This chapter, then, has been
crafted to be something other than persuasive and demonstrative. It has meant to
lead you, in an unanticipated fashion, to participatory discovery in my experiences
and thence to such a joy in your experience that you will never forget this moment.
 79

ESSAY SIX

THE DEWEY AN VIEW OF EXPERIENCE

Lawrence Haworth

"Experience" is no longer a technical term in philosophy, if it ever was. In the

Anglo-American philosophical tradition, it has been understood to refer to "the
given" . In this tradition, discussion of what experience is has focussed especially on
two matters. First: Does the sense-datum theory, its precursors or successors,
adequately capture the nature of the given? Or are those who oppose this view by
insisting that the given is better described, with James, as a "booming, buzzing
confusion" closer to the truth? Second: What role does the given play in our gaining
knowledge of a world? Does the given provide raw material which we then work
up into knowledge by categorizing it? And if so, what is the status of these
categories? Are they in turn derived from experience? Or are they part of the
furniture of our minds? Are we able to extract knowledge from the given by working
it up in non-problematic ways ... as would be held, for example, by those who
believe that the given is susceptible of description by means of incorrigible protocol
statements?
It would advance understanding of distinctively esthetic experience (or of the
esthetic in experience) hardly at all if the present discussion focussed on the
questions about experience which are uppermost in the Anglo-American tradition.
Fortunately, there is in the indigenous American philosophical tradition a different
understanding of experience which can be more usefully deployed for present
purposes. I have in mind the view of experience developed by John Dewey. Dewey's
account stresses three points which I want to develop in my own way here. The first
is that experience does not consist simply in "having experiences" but includes as
well an active aspect, and that these two, having experiences and being active are
typically interrelated in a certain way. The second is that in experience means and
ends form a continuum. The third is that a distinction may be made between the
consciousness which a non-human animal has, mere feeling and awareness, and that

Mitias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility oj the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhojj Publishers. Dordrecht
80

which is characteristic of humans, sense-giving consciousness, by which meanings

are assigned to events.!
In developin~ an account of experience which builds on these three elements,
Dewey was going back to the original meaning of the verb, to experience: to put to
a test. Thus, in the OED one of the early uses shown is this one: "Make experience
of my loyalty, by some service." In this use we can understand that the person who
is invited to carry out the test, to make the experience, will by doing so, have an
experience in the contemporary philosophical sense. Specifically, the person will
experience that behaviour of the speaker which exhibits the speaker's loyalty. There
is accordingly a significant connection between the original use of the verb, to
experience, and its contemporary philosophical use. But Dewey develops the three
themes in such a way as to exhibit that there advantages in reverting to a modified
form of its original sense.
In this Deweyan usage, "experience" refers to a connection of events, either to
something that happens in consequence of something done, or to something one
does in consequence of something that happens. The experience is that when one
acts in some way something follows, or that when something happens one acts or
responds in some way. The experience is attributed to the actor. But what is
experienced is not, as the modern view would have it, either the acting or the noted
consequence or antecedent of the action. Rather, the experience is, precisely, the
action as prompted by the antecedent event, or as yielding a consequence. Here
something must be experienced, that is, the subject of the experience must have it.
In light of this, Dewey's choice of terms, "doing" and "undergoing", is
appropriate. But, again, the experience in this usage does not consist merely in the
sequence, a doing followed by something undergone. It consists in these as
connected: the doing as bringing on that which is then undergone; that which is
undergone as brought on by (or prompting) that which is done.
There would be no point in insisting that to experience "really" means to test,
that an experience "really" is a means/consequence connection, and in
recommending that contemporary philosophers drop the prevalent subjective use of
experience in favour of Dewey's broader one. I do think, however, that there would
be some advantage in adding the Deweyan notion to our arsenal. One advantage is
that the broader notion embeds the narrower, subjective sense of the term.
Experience, as something we merely have, only occurs in the course of experiencing,
in Dewey's sense. (1) It is only by making reference to the broader use of the term
that we can understand many of the features of subjective experience. (2) And, in
particular, our understanding of esthetic and of artistic experience, of what they
have in common and of how they should be distinguished, is advanced by having

1. The two works of Dewey's on which the following account is based are Experience and Nature,
second edition (LaSalle, Illinois: Open Court, 1929); and Art as Experience (New York: Minton,
Balch & Co., 1934). For the former, see especially Chapters 1, 8, and 9; for the latter, Chapters
1,2, and 3.
 81

the Deweyan notion in view. I shall begin by developing the first of these two points
and shall conclude by developing the second. In discussing the first I shall be simply
assembling a few of Dewey's central themes for purposes of my own. In discussing
the second I shall elaborate a suggestion, regarding the way the notions of the
esthetic and the artistic apply to experience, which builds on but goes beyond
Dewey's own account.

Experience and consciousness

Experience consists in the foregoing interaction of something done with something

undergone. But how the two interact is a key variable. At one extreme, the vanishing
point of experience, what one does is insensitive to what was undergone in
consequence of previous activities. One acts without any regard for the outcome of
prior action and, as it may be, in a way which is shown by that outcome to be ill-
advised. One doesn't, as we say, "learn from experience". In that case, one doesn't
have any experience. One's doings and undergoings are not experienced. As will be
seen, they are not' 'experienced" in both senses of that term: they aren't subjectively
experienced, and they don't qualify as experience in the broader, Deweyan use.
At the other extreme, what one does is exceptionally well-adapted to those prior
consequences. In contemporary parlance, there is feedback control. One acts.
Something happens which taken up as feedback (is undergone). And then in
subsequent action one adapts. The course of the ongoing action is controlled by the
stream of feedback which comes to one in this way, under the guidance of the
purpose which animates one. This remark applies to all activity - intellectual,
artistic, as well as mechanical. When one thinks to some purpose, which usually
takes the form of writing or speaking aloud, one may express a thought, note its
contribution to the project, and then either cancel it or continue with further
expressions which extend the theme started. There is a view, possibly ill-formed at
the start, of where one wants to go. In carrying on, and in reaction to initial starts
and stops, one both more clearly defines one's purpose and settles on how the
project is to proceed. Sensitivity to feedback simultaneously advances the project
toward its goal and gives continuity to the process of getting there. In all activity,
it is owing to this sensitivity to feedback that the active person earns the accolade
"intelligent". In firing mortars, the aiming of the first shell may be haphazard.
What is important is that one note whether it was long or short; if long, a second
may be sent short. Then the third shell can be deliberately placed between the first
two. Again, an intelligent mechanic tunes an engine by making an adjustment,
listening to the result, and then fine tuning.
When one is being actively intelligent in this sense, by seeking out feedback and
adapting to it, one is "making experience" , putting something to a test. The relation
between the broader notion of experience and the subjective sense of that term is
especially brought out by noting two consequences of this testing. (1) It is in the
82

course of such testing, such experiencing, that one becomes conscious. (2) By
experiencing in this sense meanings are developed and one's mind is formed. These
consequences are intimately related: consciousness, in the sense intended here, is of
meanings, or of things as meaningful. Thus, the process, experience, which yields
meanings also occasions the calling up "from mind" and to the forefront of
consciousness, to vivid awareness, of those meanings, acquired through prior
experience, which bear on one's contemporaneous project. Each of these points
needs elaboration.

Experience and vivid awareness

It is a familiar fact that when one is engaged in entirely routine behaviour one is
not conscious of one's surroundings or even of the fact that one is engaged in the
behaviour. You drive to work over a route you follow every day. The traffic is
"normal": all of the other drivers are performing as expected and the responses this
calls for from you are well-practised. If, after having arrived at work, you are asked
to describe what occurred as you were travelling there, you will get your answer by
consulting what you know about such trips, not by calling to mind the experiences
you had on the way that day. Because everything was routine you had no
experiences; that is, you were not called upon to put anything to a test. There was
no occasion for checking out means/consequence connections. And because there
was no experiencing there was no vivid awareness of what you underwent along the
route.
Ordinarily, one "sees" grass without seeing it. the question, "What colour was
the grass today?", seems odd. One knows the answer and can supply it quickly. But
typically the answer is gotten by consulting one's store of knowledge, not by
recalling anything actually seen earlier in the day.
When is it that one actually does become aware of the road and other drivers?
What is going on when one notices (that is, becomes vividly aware of) the colour
of the grass? For a start we want to say that something out of the ordinary must
happen. A driver ahead of us brakes abruptly. Our own way is impeded. We
suddenly note the rear of the other car, for the first time as it were. The notion of
changing lanes occurs to us. This leads to action by which we become aware of the
traffic behind us, again for the first time. On gaining the clear lane, we settle back
into the somnolent state from which the braking driver summoned us. The
"experiences" momentarily had in the course of deciding how to respond, and then
changing lanes, occurred (or were sought out) in the course of making or verifying
means/consequence connections, that is, in the course of experiencing. The
somnolent state was one which presented, or apeared to present, no occasion for
experiencing in this sense: no means/consequence connections were being called into
question.
Again, painters are said to be considerably more knowledgeable concerning the
 83

colour of grass than the ordinary person is. They gain this knowledge by having
projects, analogous to the project of avoiding the braking driver, which require
them to attend to the grass, to seek out what is literally there for the eye to see. Here
the means/consequence connection, testing of which yields the vivid awareness,
refers to the project of applying paint to a canvas so as to replicate or give an
impression of a view which is before one. For the rest of us, the project by which
we actually confront the colour of grass may be that of finding a dropped penny.
The brown of the parched blade of grass is capable of camouflaging the penny, so
that in the course of the search we have experiences by which we overcome our
stereotypical view that grass is, just, "green".
In referring to "vivid awareness" I have in mind a notion of degrees of
consciousness. The colour of the grass is brought to centre stage. Our being' 'vividly
aware" of it is an aspect of our "attending closely" to it, of our "minding" it -
as in "mind the stairs". This implies that we may be less than vividly aware of
something, without its being entirely "out of mind', without our being entirely
unaware of it.
Appeal to the fact that there are degrees of awareness enables us to respond to
a difficulty one may find with the foregoing association of experiencing with
awareness. How is it, one may ask, that people who are not conscious of their
surroundings may be brought to awareness of them by some unexpected event?
There must be consciousness of the surroundings to notice that something
unexpected has occurred. But in that case the occasion for consciousness cannot be
the unexpected event.
In considering this objection it is important to be clear concerning what it calls
into question. That we are typically unaware of our surroundings unless something
out of the ordinary and challenging to our contemporaneous projects is occurring
is simply a fact which anyone can confirm for oneself. Thus, the "objection" does
not call that into question but presents rather a need to reconcile that fact with
another one - the fact, also evident, that people often are called from their
inattentiveness by unexpected events.
The driver is unaware of the car ahead. It brakes. Suddenly, the inattentive driver
is called to attention. But previously a candy wrapper had fluttered from that same
car and the fact was not noted. The explanation appears to be as follows: Typically
one is wary. One looks, or generally stays alert, for clues that bear on one's projects.
This wariness prompts inspection of most of the sensory inputs which come to one.
But the inspection, hence the awareness, only goes as far as is necessary to ascertain
the relevance of those inputs for one's projects. Once it is ascertained that the item
under inspection is not relevant, the process of inspecting it ceases. It is notorious
that we are generally able to identify things on the basis of very limited inspection
of them. Thus a couple who have lived together for a long time may literally see
very little of one another. The bit that needs to be seen to discover that the person
before one is one's spouse is very little indeed. Once this is ascertained, then, unless
one's projects make other features of the spouse relevant ("Did he get that hair cut
84

he was talking about?"; "Was it raining when she left the office?"), the inspection,
and along with it awareness of the spouse, cease. The root of "awareness" is
"wary" .

Consciousness and meanings

With humans, consciousness is of objects and a world. In at least most non-humans,

we may speculate, consciousness takes the form of awareness without sense, without
meanings. Feelings and qualities are had, and experienced events portend, bode well
or ill, but no objects are presented. A consciousness which consists in making sense
of events is no doubt continuous with one which consists simply in awareness of
feeling and quality. The latter grows insensibly out of the former, by stages and,
if Dewey is right, contemporaneously with development of language and of the sorts
of interactions among humans which language facilitates. But with achievement of
the mode of consciousness which distinguishes humans a profound transformation
is wrought. Then we find it difficult indeed to grasp what it is like to be aware but
make no sense of the qualitites and feelings which constitute the awareness. So great
is the transformation that it seems natural to refer to two different senses of the term
"consciousness" .
The vivid awareness discussed in the preceding section, to which we are brought
by signs of there being something out of the ordinary in our environment which puts
our ongoing projects into jeopardy, is awareness of meanings: consciousness in the
developed, human sense. The meanings had are means/consequence connections
and the objects constituted by these meanings are known in terms of their status
either as means for achieving consequences or as consequences of specific
operations.
The process of experiencing is one of making means/consequence connections.
Experience becomes conscious by virtue of the presence to it of problems and
opportunities. It makes sense by virtue of one's grasp of how to respond to the
problems and seize the opportunities. The problems and opportunities bring one
into a waking state, a condition of more or less vivid awareness. Seen otherwise,
this "state" is the process of uncovering or recalling relevant meanings
(means/consequence connections) which enable one either to respond to the
problems, or to seize the opportunities. In the process, such sense as we are able to
make of our world is achieved, meanings are acquired. Those meanings, as had by
us, accumulate to form mind. As such, they serve as resources for the solution of
future problems, or for seizing future opportunities.

Having an experience

On the face of it, this Deweyan notion of experience is of no more use for clarifiying
 85

specifically artistic and esthetic experience than is the view of experience embedded
in the Anglo-American philosophical tradition. Is not the stress on problem-solving
(even when broadened to encompass response to opportunities) too practical to
permit a happy marriage of our everyday notions of esthetic experience and of
artistic activity with this Deweyan view? The mediating concept which facilitates
bringing the Deweyan notion to bear on artistic activity and distinctively esthetic
experience is that of "an experience". Occasionally, but perhaps not so often as we
would like, a course of experience has a unity and coherence - a beginning, middle,
and end - which leads us to think of it afterward as an experience. Having played
an exciting tennis match, having eaten a memorable meal, we may say, "That was
an experience!" In such circumstances, there is a pronounced sense of the unity and
coherence of the experience, and also of its endedness or sufficiency. Often, by
contrast, the experiences we have, or in which we are involved, seem episodic; and
often the process of experiencing seems, by contrast with these occasions of
decisively having an experience, diffuse.
An experience, in this sense, has all of the characteristics discussed in the
preceding sections. There is doing and undergoing, and this not merely as a sequence
but so that the connections of the doing and undergoing are made and the doing
is instituted for the sake of specific consequences. Problems and opportunities are
presented and are responded to, seized. In the course of doing so, there is vivid
awareness and a sense of engagement - an awareness which entails heightened sense.
The tennis match, given that it was an experience, caught one up. One was engaged
sensitively, adapting strokes and strategy to the observed course of play. The
outcome, whether it spelled victory or defeat, seemed to be, more than an abrupt
cessation of play, a culmination of what went on in the course of play, and
especially of the "experiencing" one brought to that course. Such "experiencing"
was the glue which gave the event the deeply felt coherence and endedness it was
felt to have.
Similarly with the memorable meal. Its being an experience involved coherence
and a sense of endedness, completion, which were prepared by the active
"experiencing" which the diners brought to the event. Without their engagement
- had they merely "consumed" without sensitive response and controlled movement
- there would have been no heightened awareness, with the result that the experience
would not have been elevated in the way that provokes the exclamation, "That was
an experience!" Nor would there have been a sense that the event had a beginning,
middle, and end, a sense of coherence and of endedness.
Two things are thus evident. First, the sorts of experiencing which we pick out
when we gather together certain events and refer to them as having formed an
experience are those which suggest many of the qualities and traits of art and the
esthetic. Second, these qualities and traits are consequences of the specific features
of experience stressed in the Deweyan account. Thus, an experience is differentiated
from the diffuse experiencing of everyday by its coherence, heightened awareness,
and endedness, all of which is made manifest as a pronounced sense of having a
86

beginning, middle, and end. These features do not define the esthetic and artistic,
but they identify the terrain within which the artistic and esthetic are to be found.
The pronounced sense of having a beginning, middle, and end results from a
person's "making experience" in something like the original sense of the term: from
one's pursuing a project in a controlled way by taking up feedback, adapting
subsequent behaviour to it, noting outcomes and making further adaptations, all for
the sake of the culmination such experiencing prepares.

Means and ends in experience

An experience is marked by endedness. But there is an ambiguity which needs to

be resolved. We may begin by considering the different ways in which means and
ends are related in experience. All experience, let us say, is purposeful. It serves an
end which, for the experiencer, is an end-in-view or aim, that for the sake of which
the person engages in the experience. The activities that person undertakes in the
experience are means to that end.
There are, however, three importantly different ways in which means may be
related to the ends they serve; and there is, moreover, an important difference in
the views one may take toward the ends for which one strives. The different
means/ends relations are marked by the "distance" between means and ends. An
end is in any case an outcome of the means which bring it about. But the end may
be a direct consequence of those means. Or it may be a mere outcome of the means.
Or, finally, it may be, in a sense, identical with the means.
Examples will help here. Imagine three cases. (1) Someone is building a bird
house. She cuts some pieces of wood, glues and screws them together, sands the
wood, then stains it. The end for the sake of which she undertakes these various
steps is to have a bird house. The completed house is a direct consequence of the
means she chooses in pursuit of that end. (2) Someone is working in a factory, for
$10 an hour. Her work consists in assembling pieces of wood which have previously
been stamped out into various shapes. The object she assembles is a bird house. Her
end-in-view, however, is not a completed bird house but the money which she earns
as a result of putting in 8 hours a day assembling the pieces of wood. This end-in-
view, as realized, is a mere outcome of her activity, of the means which bring it
about. (3) Someone is building a bird house. Now, however, her end-in-view is more
immediate than in the first two cases. It is neither a mere outcome of her activity,
nor a consequence of that activity. Rather, she is building the bird house in order
to be engaged in that activity. Thus, her end-in-view is that very activity, the
elements of which form means to the end.
The other distinction, between pursuing an end for its own sake, and pursuing
it as a means to something else (between an end-in-view having immediate value for
the person pursuing it, and having only instrumental value), cross-cuts the foregoing
distinctions. (1) When a person's end-in-view is a mere outcome of the means which
 87

will bring it about, that outcome may be sought for itself or for the sake of some
further result. The factory worker may be a miser and want money just to have it;
or she may want the money in order that, having it, she may satisfy other wants of
hers. (2) Similarly when the end-in-view is a direct consequence of the applied
means: the maker of bird houses may be making the bird houses for sale, or just
to have and enjoy them. (3) And even though her end-in-view may be the activity
in which she is engaged, she may be aiming at that "result" not because it is seen
as itself worth undertaking but as a means to something else. (She may be engaged
in the activity of building bird houses from an interest in that activity, so that to
the question, "Why are you doing that?" her best answer might be, "To have the
experience of doing it." But the reason why she wants the experience of doing it may
be that she wants subsequently to rely on that experience in writing a novel in which
a key character builds bird houses "for the fun of it".)
There are, then, six cases to consider. The end sought may be either intrinsically
or instrumentally valued; and it may be a mere outcome, a consequence of, or
identical with the means: (1) intrinsic/outcome; (2) intrinsic/consequential;
(3)intrinsic/identical; (4 )instrumental! outcome; (5)instrumental!consequential; (6)
instrumental! identical.
In any especially meaningful sense, the idea of "an experience" only applies to
(2) and (3). Whenever one's aim is a mere outcome of one's activity - (1) and (4)
- and whenever the end-in-view is not sought for its own sake but as a means to
some further end - (4), (5), and (6) - the experience in which one is engaged does
not qualify in any distinctive way as an experience.
First, when the end-in-view is a mere outcome (when its achievement is not a
consequence of the activity which brings it about), achievement of the result ends
the activity but not in such a way that the activity, the means, and the outcome
cohere to form a connected whole of the sort alluded to when speaking of "an
experience". Thus, one works and then at the end of the day picks up the money;
but the working doesn't straightforwardly create the picking up of the money.
Second, when the end sought is not sought for its own sake, but merely as a means
to something else, then achieving the end does not complete the activity. The
experience is not properly ended. Thus, if the craftsman building a bird house is
merely making a commodity, something for sale and nothing else, then the activity
of building it does not end with completion of the bird house. That completion is
but a stage in a process which will end when the sale is made (assuming that selling
the bird house is the envisaged end of the process).
Put positively: for one's doings and undergoings to form "an experience", it is
necessary that one's end-in-view be the consequence of one's activity, or that it be
identical with the activity; and it is necessary that the end-in-view be sought for its
own sake. Otherwise, the activity does not properly end with achievement of the
end-in-view. For this to happen, two things are necessary. First, the end-in-view
must be wanted for itself, not as a means to something else. Second, the end-in-view
must be a natural culmination of the activity rather than a mere outcome not
intrinsically related with the activity.
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An experience, art, and the esthetic

It is notorious that in English we lack a word for referring simultaneously to artistic

activity and esthetic experience, or a term for the domain to which both refer. We
think of the former as a species of doing; the latter as a species of undergoing. We
think of the former as a mode of activity; the latter as a mode of spectating, on-
looking. The former belongs to the category of making, the latter to the category
of observing. The Deweyan notion of experience, by catching up the phases of doing
and undergoing into one process, provides a category under which both art and the
esthetic might be subsumed. If we think of both artistic activity and the esthetic as
experiences, and moreover, assume that each reasonably complete artistic and
esthetic experience passes through all the phases of experience to a culmination or
completion, so that it forms an experience, then we will be well positioned for
bringing art and the esthetic, as experiences, under one category, and for
distinguishing them within that category. To anticipate: the distinction between the
artistic and esthetic coincides with that between intrinsic/consequential and
intrinsic/identical experience.
First, any artistic experience, if reasonably complete, will be an experience: the
person will do, undergo, and then continue doing in a way which is sensitive to the
feedback gotten from that which is undergone. In the process the work will
gradually come into being and at a certain point the person will observe what has
been made and sense that it is completed and that it is time to stop. Owing to the
control the evolving end-in-view exerts at each step in the process, after sensing that
the work is completed the person will be able to look back over the steps by which
it was brought to completion and identify them as forming a whole, as possessing
unity and coherence, of the sort alluded to when we speak of an experience.
The same may be said of esthetic experience: the spectator undergoes, of course,
but is also active. This activity of searching out and testing gives coherence to the
matter observed. Now, however, whether the experience reaches a culmination, and
what the dominant quality of the experience is to be, are more or less out of one's
hands: one is at the mercy of the maker of the object or event experienced.
Any artistic or esthetic experience, then, if reasonably complete, qualifies as an
experience. In addition, to state the obvious, they share the feature of being
concerned with works of art, the former with making, the later with enjoying, works
of art. But something more systematic and analytical may be said. Consider the
difference between a group playing a piece of music and another group enjoying the
performance. The former are engaged in artistic production; their experience is,
primarily at any rate, artistic. The latter are engaged in esthetic experience. What
essential differences are there between these two experiences?
As suggested, the answer is provided by the distinction between
"identical/intrinsic" and "consequential/intrinsic" experiences. The performers,
qua artists, are making something, a rendition, say, of the Dvorak Cello Concerto.
This "object" will be a consequence of their joint playing, and their end-in-view is
 89

this object. The object is wanted for itself: they are striving to ensure, by their
individual contributions to the final result, that the object is fine of its kind and
satisfies their standards for pieces of this sort. Contemporaneously, the audience are
engaged in an experience which similarly has as its end-in-view the completed
Dvorak concerto. They also want the object "for itself". That is, artistic and
esthetic experiences share the characteristic of being intrinsic. It is this feature which
ensures that, when reasonably complete, they will form an experience. For the
players, engaged in an artistic experience, the completed performance of the
concerto will be a consequence; the activities in which they engage form means to
that end. For the audience, engaged in an esthetic experience, the completed
performance will be, simply, the completion of an activity or experience. Insofar as
the players are engaged in an artistic experience, their end-in-view is the concerto
(the heard concerto), considered as an activity or experience.
The point becomes clear when we imagine that the players are simultaneously
engaged in artistic and esthetic experience: they are "making an object" which they
value for its own sake, and are also engrossed in the music as it unfolds, savouring
each note. Insofar as their experience is esthetic the activity itself is their end-in-
view: they are doing it to be doing it. Insofar as their experience is artistic, the
consequence of that activity is their end-in-view: they are doing it so that it might
be done well. But now they are both engrossed in the activity and playing with an
eye to achieving a satisfying rendition of the piece. These observations bear on the
distinction between art and the esthetic, considered as experiences. They do not
answer two normative questions: In virtue of what is art good art? In virtue of what
is esthetic experience, not merely esthetic rather than something else, but good of
its kind?
 91

ESSAY SEVEN

EXPERIENCE AND THEORY IN AESTHETICS

Arnold Berleant

Art has long fascinated and puzzled philosophers, and from classical times on they
have attempted to understand it. The early discussions tended to wonder about the
nature of the phenomena of art, about such things as what art is and how it relates
to the cosmos, how we respond to beautiful things, the moral and salubrious powers
of art, and how art objects are created. Moreover, much attention was paid to art
as the exercise of human skill. Plato, for example, combined art in various human
enterprises with the use of knowledge toward the achievement of good and found
its highest development in the royal art of the statesman. His well known mistrust
of the imitative arts of the poet and the painter led Plato to associate their works
with illusionistic appearances, misleading to varying degrees and dangerous for the
pleasure they generate. He believed, however, that there is a ladder of beauty up
which we can ascend beyond the illusory, an ascent which culminates in grasping
the imperishable, super-sensible, ideal form of beauty.! Aristotle's interest in
imitation led him to its fulfillment in tragedy, and in his incomplete treatise on the
arts he devoted the major part of his attention to its features: its constituents, its
order, its effects. The universal element is achieved here, Aristotle believed, in "the
embodied logic of a tragic plot," and the cathartic effect of tragedy restores
balanced functioning to the soul-body suffering from excess or deficiency. The place
of art in this period is both broad in its scope and central in the life of society. 2
All this, of course, is well known and I mention it merely to indicate that while
we do not have a codified theory of art in either of these two originators of
aesthetics, we do have a richness of discussion that centers around art as an activity:
an activity that is at once cosmic, social, and individual; and activity that brings
understanding of a sort and is possibly salutary and even exalting. In the modern
age, however, questions about what art is have tended to center around the idea of
experience. This parallels the great shift in the history of philosophy from matters
of ontology to those of epistemology. In place of starting from an examination of

I. Statesman, 305; Republic, VI, 505, also V and VII, Alcibiades I; Symposium.
2. Poetics. Cj. K. Gilbert & H. Kuhn, A History oj Esthetics, rev. ed., (Bloomington, 1954), pp. 3,
22, 28-29, 37, 69, 70, 77.

Mitias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility oj the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhojj Publishers, Dordrecht
92

the nature of the universe and thence to the human place in the order of things, we
have come, since Descartes and Kant, to the discovery that all inquiry has its
inception in the human situation. Thus we are led to the inevitable recognition that
the human factor in every kind of awareness and knowledge is structurally
unavoidable. The scope of our claims has narrowed, then, and while the human
place has become less cosmic, it is more pervasive and personal. Whatever the world
be, we can only encounter it and know it as human beings. Hence we are less likely
to ask what makes something art than we are to consider how our experience of art
is to be explained, and when we pose the former question, we answer it in terms of
the latter. Theories of beauty have given way to ones of emotion, feeling,
communication, and even symbol is regarded as the embodiment of feeling. And
questions that purport to be about art objects, like the search for aesthetic qualities,
turn out to be attempts to locate experiential properties of such objects, since such
properties as delicate, graceful, elegant, lovely, and beautiful require aesthetic
sensitivity to be perceived. 3
Now it is generally recognized that this shift from the being of art to its experience
occurred in the eighteenth century when modern aesthetics first emerged. While the
writers of that period did not dispute the claim that beauty is a property of objects,
they held that any such property lies not in the material from which the object is
fashioned but in what that material acquires in becoming art. This property comes
from a principle of meaning, regulation, and order, and that principle must be
supplied by the mind. And it led Shaftesbury, the most important spokesman for
this changed approach to art, to hold that a particular sort of attention is necessary
to apprehend such beauty. Hence arises the famous notion of disinterestedness, an
attitude which considers the art object for its own sake without regard to further
purposes, and which requires the separation of the object from its surroundings. 4
Toward the end of the eighteenth century, Reid located the common feature of all
objects in which beauty can be found "in the moral and intellectual perfections of
the mind and in its active powers .... ,,5 And while Kant remained true to the classical
view of art as an activity of making, he described beautiful art as a product which
pleases us solely in the act of judging it. Taste, he held, is the faculty of judging
or representing an object "by an entirely disinterested satisfaction or
dissatisfaction," and it is the object of such satisfaction that is called beautiful. 6 So
it comes about that the experience of art takes on central importance and that we
are held to attain this experience through the use of a special attitude termed
aesthetic. Although this is a brief review of a rich and lengthy history, its thrust is

3. Frank Sibley, "Aesthetic Concepts," in J. Margolis, Philosophy Looks at the Arts (NY: Scribner's,
1962), pp. 63-87.
4. Characteristics (1711) (NY: 19(0), Vol. I, pI 94; II, pp. 136-7, 130-1.
5. On the Intellectual Powers oj Man (1785), "Of Beauty."
6. Critique oj Judgment (1790), Sect. 5.
 93

clear: the locus of art lies not in the object but in the attitude we assume in
experiencing it.
Now there are at least three approaches that may be taken in grounding a theory
of the aesthetic attitude. The philosophical-historical argument I just surveyed is
one of them. Since we recognize that all experience and knowledge must rest on the
human person, this is equally true in that particular domain we call art. Thus it is
the attitude we assume in appreciation that is the essential factor. Yet while this
argument purports to give a new account that can accommodate the changed
consciousness of the modern age, it suffers from several difficulties. Not the least
of these is the fact that questions of art, typically an afterthought of philosophy,
have regularly been approached under the influence of other considerations -
moral, metaphysical, epistemological, formal. We find this as much the case for
those philosophers I have cited as for those for whom an understanding of art and
beauty was less central. Indeed it has been customary for philosophers to deal with
the theory of art after having already developed a philosophical position, so that
their aesthetics becomes a consequence of that position. As perceptive as their
insights may be, the dependence of aesthetics remains. One finds this true from
Schopenhauer and Nietzsche to Langer and Goodman.
A different argument might seem to J:>e possible from the standpoint of
psychology. Indeed, as a perceptual event the experience of art would appear to fall
quite naturally within the purview of psychology and the characterization of such
experience might be considered the proper province of the psychological sciences.
Such has been the direction of much theorizing about art in the present century, and
while a good deal of important work has been done from this standpoint, the result
on the whole has been no more satisfactory than that based on the philosophical,
but for different reasons. Sometimes the psychological approach to art imports
philosophical assumptions, as in the vastly influential theory of psychical distance
advanced by Bullough. Reporting on such experiences as a fog at sea and a theatrical
performance, Bullough merely transfers the Kantian notion of disinterestedness to
describe these occurrences, experiences which he orders and governs by the very
notion at issue. Starting with a preconception that insists on the necessity for
separation and distance in regarding something aesthetically, Bullough, whose case
is typical, finds that only those experiences that conform to this requirement are
acceptable in aesthetic appreciation. 7
Such circularity is not uncommon. Moreover, other psychological approaches
fare little better. The Freudian direction stresses the creative mechanism rather than
the perceptual and tends to assimilate artistic activity and aesthetic responsiveness
to the psycho-sexual development of the individual. 8 Here psychological theory

7. Edward Bullough, " 'Psychical Distance' as a Factor in Art and an Esthetic Principle," British
Journal oj Psychology, Vol. V (1913).
8. E.g. Otto Rank, Art and Artist, (New York, 1932); Ernst Kris, Psycholanalytic Explorations in Art
(New York, 1958).
94

functions as axiomatically as the philosophical, and the empirical grounds of

aesthetic perception are neglected. Gestalt theories center around these last in a
welcome return to the phenomena of art, yet the stress on visual patterning
predominates, imposing an unnecessary restriction on the perceptual range.
Moreover, the neo-Kantian influence leads to an almost exclusive interest in the
organization of separate perceptual objects. And these objects are then connected
to the human perceiver by a deus ex machina called isomorphism, a concept which
holds that spatial perception parallels the spatial pattern of brain excitation. Finally,
in its experimental modes psychological aesthetics is likely to document preferential
responses to art objects, neglecting both the fact that appreciative perception is a
cultivated capacity and the fact that patterns of response themselves reflect the
influence of social tradition and custom.
This highly general review of the philosophical-historical and the psychological
arguments for art is not, of course, meant as a blithe dismissal of nearly three
centuries of effort and illumination. Rather it is intended to identify some basic
ways in which art has been explained from the point of view of human experience.
And it suggests further that explanations of this sort may suffer from certain
internal limitations as well as from the influence of outside allegiances, from logical
and theoretical difficulties as well as from influences coming from sources that lie
mainly outside the actual phenomena of art. There is, however, another argument
that can be proposed for a theory of aesthetic experience, one I shall call the
argument from art, from the phenomena of art - a phenomenological argument,
if you will, and it is the one I shall pursue here.
This argument is phenomenological for two principal reasons. One lies in its
attempt to set aside all preconceptions, to bracket every presupposition about what
aesthetic experience must or should be. The experience of art must be approached
as much as possible de novo, freshly, as the source from which all theoretical
constructs draw their sustenance. Such an argument begins with the occasion of
such experiences and not with any philosophical encumbrances about the structure
of the world or of experience itself, presumptions about human nature, or about
the values to be sustained by art. The other sense in which this argument in
phenomenological is that it attempts to base itself on a purely descriptive mode of
characterization, to rest its concepts, its distinctions, its theoretical shape as much
as possible on the actual occurrence of art and the aesthetic in human experience. 9
It is odd that the history of aesthetics shows so few attempts to develop the theory
of art from an examination of the experience of the arts, themselves. Perhaps
Aristotle's is the most important exception to this history of disregard, and that may
be why his theory of tragedy is perennially insightful and compelling. Nor is it a
subsumptive theory, placing art under the guidance of a more comprehensive

9. The direction I shall develop here is phenomenological in its basic commitment and approach, using
aspects of its methodology more than its tradition and terminology. It makes no attempt to extend
to aesthetics the specific concepts and ontological dispositions of Husserl or his successors.
 95

principle. What would happen if we were to follow a similar approach today? What
theory of aesthetic experience would emerge from an examination of the experiences
we have with art? Experience is the central term here, and all that we can say about
art and the aesthetic is in some wayan elaboration of this notion. It is essential in
attempting to answer the question, however, to escape the prevalent tendency to
regard the notion of experience as a purely subjective, psychological event, a
tendency as strong in traditional phenomenology as it is in traditional empiricism.
Let me begin, then, by attempting to disentangle the concept of experience from the
hereditary characteristics it has acquired during the past two centuries.
To the western philosophical mind the term 'experience' connotes 'empiricism,'
and empiricism, in turn, is likely to suggest the major tradition in British
philosophy. Most of what many of us understand by experience comes, then, from
our reading of that succession of thinkers stretching from Francis Bacon, through
Bentham and Mill (although Mill's modifications of that tradition may have
produced a qualitative change), to the logical positivists of the present century. The
most influential contributors here are undoubtedly Locke, Berkeley, and Hume.
What this history of British empiricism has bequeathed to us is a view of
experience as the composite product of separate, discrete sensations. Whether these
unitary perceptions be called "ideas that we receive from sensation" (Locke),10
"ideas actually imprinted on the senses" (Berkeley),11 "impressions" (Hume),12
calculable units of pleasure or pain (Bentham) or, as with more recent writers, sense
data or other immediately given percepts, it is alleged that these elements are what
we experience directly and immediately. Furthermore, all knowledge is derived from
these elements by a process of reflection that combines and orders them into the
more complex structures of our cognitive world. Now such units of perception are
sensory ones and it is from this that experience is said to have a subjective ground.
Is not sensation something that can be traced to the mind? Is it not a personal, inner
awareness, an effect caused by impinging causes from the world outside? If this be
taken, as it usually is, as the obvious truth of common sense, the challenge for this
philosophical direction, then, is to explain how it is we come to acquire knowledge
of that external world which is the source of our experiences. As much ingenuity
has gone to explain this as has been directed to that same end by the subjective
rationalism of the Cartesians.
Now if one applies to the question of experience the same Occamist rigor that the
empiricist tradition urges we direct toward logical and metaphysical claims, it is
clear that such an account of experience is neither descriptive nor simple. In fact
it pre-judges our experience by imposing on it a division between the human person
and the world that, for all its initial plausibility, rests on a particular historical and
cultural tradition, a tradition not shared in other times and places. There is much

10. John Locke, Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book II, Ch. 1, Sect. 2,3.
11. George Berkeley, Principles oj Human Knowledge, Part First, I.
12. David Hume, An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Section II.
96

that could be adduced here from philosophical argument, cultural anthropology,

developmental psychology, and other sources to dispute this Cartesian division of
things into an inner domain and the outer world, but this is not the place to rehearse
the issue. Suffice it to offer a number of basic reasons for proposing we set it aside.
One is the logical one just now cited. If simplicity be sought, surely the less
assumptive stance is the preferable. To introduce a structure to the subject before
its investigation not only begs the question of its nature but alters all subsequent
inference. Hence it is desirable in the interest of simplicity to begin without any pre-
judgment. A similar conclusion follows from adopting a phenomenological
methcdology. Approaching experience without any presuppositions requires us to
call into question as well the usual tendency to regard it as a personal, subjective
occurrence. Even that most common of beginnings is neither pure nor innocent. One
might propose, moreover, a heuristic reason for starting with the unity of
experience. There are a number of recent philosophers, Dewey primary among
them, who have shown how the unfortunate dualisms of the post-Enlightment
period have produced a tangle of problems for philosophers and a host of
confusions for thoughtful persons. Beginning with a less prejudicial position evades
many of those difficulties and offers simliar promise for aesthetics.
There is yet another reason for adopting the unity of experience as the ground
on which to begin an examination of aesthetic experience, a reason closer to the
matter at hand. This is what we might call an argument from art. It is my claim that
the experience of the arts themselves not only is capable of exhibiting such unity but
that it often occurs and in ways that at times are subtle and at other times obvious
and compelling. The contemporary arts in particular frequently insist on experiences
of engagement by provoking us into movement or action or by forcing us into
adjustments in vision or imagination. Moreover, one can attain such experiential
 97

unity with the traditional arts as well.13 Yet in the effort to keep art distinct from
other activities and objects in human culture, our encounter is usually channelled
along a carefully paved course. Not only does such confinement restrict the force
of the arts unduly; it erects obstructions that inhibit our openness to artistic modes
that do not conform to those requirements and it forces theory to scurry after in
a vain attempt to keep up with the irrepressible inventiveness of artists. Aesthetic
theory, by legislating to art, ends by legislating itself into irrelevance. Thus to
approach the question of aesthetic experience as a personal, inner awareness, one
which then requires an explanation of the relation between the act and the object
of appreciation, would clearly be a misstep off the presuppositionless path.
There have been some who have avoided this subjectivistic reduction. When
Bergson writes in An Introduction to Metaphysics of the difference between relative
knowing and absolute knowing he is identifying the same alternative between the
dualistic relation with a separate object and the unitary condition of direct
apprehension. The first offers knowledge that is external; the second knowledge that
is from within. But Bergson's reference to knowledge is unlike our common, more
literal use of that term. For him knowledge is a condition of awareness, a grasping
of something, not a proposition or a statement of fact. And, indeed, for cases with
which to illustrate this idea he looks to the arts and to psychology, both of which
are capable of working by means of concepts, but both of which falsify their subject
matter by doing so. Concepts, unfortunately, allow only relative knowledge,
whereas it is through intuition alone that we can obtain the direct immediacy of
absolute knowledge. 14

13. This is, to be sure, a key point in the argument from experience, yet its very importance makes it
impossible to substantiate here in passing. It is enough for my purposes to cite the fact that aesthetic
engagement does indeed occur and in serious and significant ways. Clearly one cannot legislate
experiences, the history of modern aesthetics notwithstanding, and they are data for an empirical
theory. But one can, however, point out the consequences of adopting different paradigms of
aesthetic experience. The argument for the participatory model rests on the fact that it occurs in
significant and major ways, and that in many instances it is unavoidable. There is, in addition, its
effectiveness as a condition for an intense and vital encounter with the arts, indeed perhaps the most
potent condition. Such an argument from experience parallels Mill's argument for recognizing
qualities of pleasure: Only the person who has experienced both is in a position to recognize the
superiority of the higher. I have elsewhere pursued studies that document and develop the place and
occurrence of unitary aesthetic experience and am developing this theme at length in a book in
preparation, to which this essay is but an introduction. Cf. "Musical De-composition," in What
Is Music? ed. P. Alperson, (New York: Haven, forthcoming); "Art without Object," in Creation
and Interpretation, ed. by R. Stern, P. Rodman, and 1. Cobits (New York: Haven, forthcoming);
"Toward a Phenomenological Aesthetics of Environment," in Descriptions, ed. H. Silverman
and D. Ihde (State University of New York Press, 1985); "Aesthetic Participation and the Urban
Environment," in Urban Resources, Vol. I, No.4 (Summer 1984), 37-42; "The Viewer in the
Landscape," EDRA 13, Proceedings of the Thirteenth Annual Conference of the Environmental
Design Research Association (Washington, D.C., 1982), pp. 161-165; "Aesthetics and the
Contemporary Arts," Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, XXIX, 2 (Winter 1970), 155-168.
14. Henri Bergson, An Introduction to Metaphysics (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1912).
98

Yet Bergson's fascination with the different ways of knowing an object is

nonetheless still an intellectual preoccupation. Despite his agreement with common
sense that reality is independent of the mind, his account of knowing offers an
answer to the question of how we can gain an awareness of something by placing
it within a cognitive frame, and his concern is with the mental act of knowing an
object by a kind of "intellectual sympathy," as he calls itY Still there is more to
the experience of art than mental involvement, and others have pursued ways in
which the whole person, not just mind, intellect, or consciousness, is engaged. One
thinks of the notion of Einfuehlung that Lipps developed about the same time that
Bergson was writing. For Lipps, Einfuehlung or empathy begins not with a separate
object with which we then have aesthetic enjoyment and not with such a pleasure
taken in an object, but with both the object and the pleasure drawn together in a
single act.

Empathy is the fact that the antithesis between myself and the object disappears, or rather
does not yet exist. 16

This is more than a psychic unity, however. Even though Lipps retains the notion
of contemplation in his account, empathy is a concept that incorporates movement
or activity. Such activity is bound up with the observed object, both by being
derived from it and by being inseparable from it. When empathy with a physical
movement takes place, there is a consciousness that is wholly identical with the
movement.

In a word, I am now with my feeling of activity entirely and wholly in the moving figure.
Even spatially, if we can speak of the spatial extent of the ego, I am in its place. 17

There is, then, an identity here, yet this is no passive identity or purely visual
assimilation nor does it involve a private sensation or pleasure in an object. It is
rather the activity of feeling oneself into the aesthetic object, an activity which
engages not just our attention but also kinesthetic sensations such as muscle
tensions.
Dewey adopts a still more explicit recognition of total organic involvement in art.
The biological, evolutionary model underlies his account of experience and, when
he turns to art, he applies the same factors. Whether one's interests be scientific or
aesthetic, "the ultimate matter of both emphases in experience is ... the constant
rhythm that marks the interaction of the live creature with his surroundings." 18 The
function of art is consciously to restore "the union of sense, need, impulse and

15. Ibid., p. 7.
16. Theodor Lipps, "Empathy and Abstraction," in A Modern Book oj Esthetics, 3rd ed., ed. Melvin
Rader (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1960), p. 376.
17. Ibid., p. 379.
18. John Dewey, Art as Experience (New York: Minton, Balch, 1934), p. 15.
 99

action characteristic of the live creature." 19 Such experience is integrated and

consummated in what Dewey calls "an experience," the distinguishing mark of the
aesthetic.
Aesthetic involvement is carried still further in Merleau-Ponty's discussion of
perception as a synthesis which finds unity and wholeness in our sensory grasp of
objects. Such a synthesis involves the "body as the field of perception and action"
and yet goes beyond what is directly perceived to a whole, a totality, which is
ultimately the world itself. 20 In his description of seeing, Merleau-Ponty carries this
idea of physical engagement to art, particularly painting.

Since things and my body are made of the same stuff, vision must somehow take place in
them; their manifest visibility must be repeated in the body by a secret visibility.2!

More recently Mikel Dufrenne has continued this theme of perceptual unity. In
aesthetic experience the spectator assists in revealing the aesthetic object, an object
that is both a thing and its meaning and that exists through the perceiver and not
outside that person. Yet it is only in perception that the being of the aesthetic object
is realized. Not constituted by consciousness, it nonetlieless exists only for a
consciousness able to recognize it. Like Merleau-Ponty, Dufrenne argues that this
produces a relation of subject and object in which each exists only by means of the
other, as a kind of reconciliation of the two. There is no opposed physical object
here whose presence is externally related to the appreciator. One must enter into the
work in an intimate fashion, active not as a pure spectator but as an involved
viewer. 22
Such characterizations of aesthetic experience as these vary in the degree of
engagement of perceiver and object which they recognize. They may even admit, as
Dufrenne does, of a paradox between the appreciator's absorption in the object and
the distance imposed by its independent identity. 23 Whatever their differences, these
accounts reflect a development that extends aesthetic experience well beyond a state
of mind that is separate and distinct from the aesthetic object, beyond a
psychological attitude or an act of consciousness. They join in stressing
involvement, ranging from multi-sensory synaesthesia to somatic action and
continuity with the object. Thus the idea of unitary perception in aesthetic
experience has gradually taken form and has shaped an alternative to the
disinterestedness theory. This development has followed an uneven course,

19. Ibid., p. 25.

20. Maurice Merleau-Ponty, "The Primacy of Perception," in The Primacy oj Perception
(Northwestern University Press, 1964), p. 16.
21. "Eye and Mind," in The Primacy oj Perception, p. 164.
22. Mikel Dufrenne, The Phenomenology oj Aesthetic Experience, trans. by E. Casey et al. (Evanston:
Northwestern University Press, 1973), pp. 51, 205, 71, 218, 219, 56, 55.
23. Ibid., p. 232.
100

however, often hampered by vestiges of its incompatible past which are difficult to
recognize and set aside.
This brief historical review is not intended to stand as a study of the evolution
of the notion of unitary perception. It is rather an attempt to indicate some
significant stages in the emergence of the idea during the past century. Still, as we
have seen, these efforts may remain bound in certain respects to the very theory they
intend to displace. Even though they challenge certain of its key elements, they may
to a degree retain other features of that theory - its psychologism, its concentration
on the spectator, its essential passivity, the autonomy of the art object.
Yet there is still more to aesthetic experience than a responsiveness that is
expanded to include the physical order and an interdependence of perceiver and
object. What is critical for a unitary theory is recognizing the equal strength of both
the demands that art objects make on us and the active contribution of the perceiver
to the aesthetic situation. Appreciation does not emerge from a mental beacon
trained on an object of art. There is an essential reciprocity between object and
appreciator, an indivisible interplay of forces that both act on and respond to each
other, and it is the nature of this reciprocity that is the crucial point here.
Appreciative perception, then, is no mere psychological act nor is it an exclusively
personal one: It rests on the mutual engagement of person and object, an
engagement that is both active and receptive on all sides.
This intimate interplay that joins the perception of an object and the object of
perception into an indissoluble unity of experience is borne out by the demands art
makes in our appreciative engagement with it. Eloquent examples of this may be
drawn from the history of the arts. There are the Renaissance Madonnas from
whose dais unoccupied steps unfold, inviting the viewer to approach. There is the
west portal of the cathedral at Chartres that extends outward and whose flanking
jamb statues shepherd one inside. Then there is the tradition of eighteenth and
nineteenth century landscape painting in western Europe which shapes the scene so
as to lead the viewer into its space. Indeed, the entire arts of dance, music and
architecture require an essential contribution from the appreciating person for them
to function. These examples stand but as indications of how the principle of
engagement can be extended throughout the traditional arts.24
It is this participatory impulse unofficially present in the arts of the past that has
been grasped as a basic force by the arts of this century. Here one is faced with an
abundance of examples, of which only a few can be cited. Dada and surrealism,
whose effectiveness lies less in the object or the image than in the meanings and
associations the viewer is obliged to contribute, have been extended to conceptual
art, in which the object recedes into insignificance or disappears altogether. There
are paintings and sculptures, such as those of Agam and de Suvero, that require the

24. These, of course, are bold assertions, yet there are many indications in the literature of these arts
that reflect the need for the active engagement and substantive contribution of the perceiver. Cf
f.n. 13 supra.
 101

active intervention of the appreciator for them to function. Theatre that merges
actors with audience, novels that require the collaboration of the reader for their
coherence and completion, music in which, as Stravinsky expressed it, "the listener
reacts and becomes a partner in the game initiated by the creator,,25 - the
documentation is endless and constantly growing.
These are but a few tokens of what has become a major affirmation in the
contemporary arts of perceptual engagement. What these cases suggest is the need
to recognize the mutual contribution that both the perceiver and the object make
in the aesthetic situation - what I call aesthetic reciprocity. The mark of the aesthetic
cannot be taken to reside in one or the other, and the turn to experience that took
place in the eighteenth century was as one-sided and distorted as the formalist or
objectivist views before and since. However, the claim for the unity of aesthetic
experience cannot be established by decree, certainly, just as more conventional
aesthetic principles cannot be established merely by tradition. Traditions far more
ancient than this have fallen, not only to shifts in intellectual style, but to new
knowledge, changed apprehension, different assumptions, and most important
perhaps, the recognition of altered conditions and the relevance of different facts.
It is on an acceptance of all these that the unity of aesthetic experience rests.
The argument from art, then, demands a new paradigm in aesthetics. When we
take account of major perceptual innovations in the contemporary arts and a
changed apprehension of the more traditional ones, we are led to the necessity for
a model of experience that reconciles the structural opposition of perceiver and
object. Whatever its specific details, it must be a paradigm based on a return "to
the phenomena themselves." These phenomena demand a standard that will
harmonize the structural divisions that have fragmented and isolated the factors that
constitute aesthetic experience. The model best able to reflect the reconciliation that
is now required must, I believe, take the form of a participatory theory of
experience, a theory that grasps the phenomena of art and aesthetic experience, not
in the form of objects or of internal responses, but as situations, fields of experience
in which the interacting forces of perception, object, creation, and performance join
in a unified experience. How can we characterize our encounter with art and the
aesthetic as participatory engagement in the aesthetic situation?
At the center of the notion of participation stands the conceptual scheme that has
revolutionized the twentieth century mind, the theory of relativity. This is a theory
that relinquished the established scientific doctrine that space and time are absolute
domains in which things and events can be objectively located and specified. In
place of a single, total, objective order, it offered the concept of a spatio-temporal
universe in which space and time are not objectively determinable but where objects

25. Igor Stravinsky, Poetics of Music (New York: Vintage, 1956), p. 137. The actress Mercedes
McCambridge expressed the same idea speaking of radio drama: "I am a member of a team, and
the other person of the team is the person listening." In an interview on "All Things Considered,"
National Public Radio, 14 December 1983.
102

and events can only be placed in relation to an observer. This development

destroyed the cognitive ideal that had stood from the beginning of western
intellectual history - an ideal of the possibility of objective and absolute knowledge.
What is important about relativity theory is not its negative thesis that dismisses
the very possibility of objective knowledge. For relativity is more than a theory of
denial; it is one of affirmation, affirmation of the necessary contribution the human
person makes in the knowledge process. The knower is not apart from what is
known: it is rather in relation to that person's location that knowledge gains its form
and its meaning. Such a contribution by the person as knower is not like an
amendment to the constitution of the world but is rather its continual re-
constitution. The universe must now be understood as a field which varies according
to the perspective that is employed. It is not the perspective that varies as much as
the field itself that changes. Hence there is no so-called objective state of affairs to
be known; instead, the very condition of things changes with changes in the
standpoint of the observer. Thus the knower is a crucial and substantive component
of the cognitive realm.
It is hardly necessary to review here the changes that relativity theory has caused
in different spheres of knowledge and in our very ordering of reality. Yet while these
changes have been widespread and pervasive, they have been assimilated unevenly
and often with reluctance. This is particularly true in much current aesthetics and
art criticism, where the ideal of the self-sufficient work of art still retains its grip
and where a Newtonian physics of art continues to survive in the still dominant
eighteenth century doctrines of the disinterested spectator and the independent work
of art.
Despite this theoretical conservatism, however, the modern arts have in practice
insisted on embodying changes that reflect the key role of the active perceiver. The
appreciator of art is no longer a spectator-like contemplator of an intrinsically
valuable object or performance but rather a participant in an occasion, a participant
who makes a necessary and crucial contribution to the very being of the art. Just
as the notion of a fixed universe has given way to a spatio-temporal system in which
space and time are not absolute and determinative, so the notion of a pure,
independent, and self-sufficient work of art has been replaced by work which
requires a perceiver for its completion. At times the perceiver's role is overt and
active, moving about in particular ways in relation to the art object and even
manipulating it directly. At other times the perceiver engages the object in more
subtle ways, from working with a trained awareness that can activate such things
as color, linear, auditory, and spatial relationships, to supplying meanings and
associations that form the aura of consciousness that surrounds the work.
Moreover, the perceiver enters as an active force through the very process of
forming images. Whether actual or imaginative, images are a central component in
the experience of many different arts, and participating in the process of shaping
 103

images is itself a creative act. 26 Active engagement in aesthetic perception, whether

overt or imaginative, has become a hallmark of the contemporary arts and a
challenge to contemporary aesthetics. 27
The task for a theory of aesthetic experience, then, is to establish a framework
that can best describe and explain a domain of experience that has become enlarged
and changed in striking ways. Such a theory must deal with aesthetic objects and
experience as something other than an encounter between an appreciative perceiver
and a work of art, both of which are separate and discrete, and with the troublesome
complications introduced in having to account for the place of the creative artist,
the performer, and the myriad of cultural and historical factors that influence the
character of our experiences of the arts. I have tried to show that a comprehensive
aesthetic theory will respond better to the phenomena of art and aesthetics as well
as be simpler and less assumptive by taking a unitary form, a form that reconciles
and harmonizes the component factors of aesthetic activity in an integrated field of
experience.
Aesthetic experience as unitary perception, then, is characterized by continuity
and engagement, by the inseparability (but not the indistinguishability of the factors
and forces that join to give it an identity and by the active participation of the
appreciator in the aesthetic process. The unity of aesthetic experience leads us
further to acknowledge that aesthetic and artistic phenomena are situational, for
only a contextual view can reflect this unity. This is entirely different from
considering art as a synthesis of discrete elements. If this were done, its unity could
not help but be synthetic, a contrived combination of factors analyzed and
abstracted out of the original wholeness of the aesthetic occasion and then reordered
into uneasy juxtaposition. The concept that I think best expresses the original unity
of art is the notion of the "aesthetic field," an idea that works admirably in
describing this integral yet complex experience we call aesthetic. As a final step in
this sequence of clearing away aesthetic presuppositions and reinstating the
continuity and wholeness of aesthetic experience, then, let me offer a brief account
of the aesthetic field. 28
An inclusive and comprehensive theory of aesthetic experience must be expansive
enough to include in proper weight and proportion all those factors that come
together to constitute this identifiable mode of experience. To be sure, it would be

26. "We live in the midst of a whirlwind of light qualities. From this whirling confusion we build unified
entities, those forms of experience called images. To perceive an image is to participate in a forming
process; it is a creative act." Gyorgy Kepes, Language of Vision (Theobald, 1944), p. 15. What
Kepes writes about visual images applies equally to poetic ones, mutatis mutandis. Moreover, this
is but one instance of a general principle I have developed more fully elsewhere. Cf A. Berleant,
"Aesthetics and the Contemporary Arts," supra.
27. Cf. Frank Popper, Art - Action and Participation (New York: New York University Press, 1975).
28. In an earlier work I developed this notion at full length. The discussion that follows is necessarily
summary and incomplete. Cf The Aesthetic Field, A Phenomenology of Aesthetic Experience,
C.C. Thomas, Springfield, Ill., 1970.
104

foolhardy to propose a complete and final list of such factors, and only an open
theory can accommodate the unpredictable inventiveness of art. Yet we are talking
about a schema and not about specific and definitive content, and here it is possible
to identify certain key forces that seem regularly to be present in aesthetic
experience.
If we start with primary experience rather than with attitude or object, we must
move in the direction of what phenomenologists call the intentionality of
consciousness, the claim that consciousness never stands alone but is always directed
toward an object. Yet a person is not mind alone but embodied consciousness, a
conscious organism or incorporated awareness who attains reflexivity and
completion only in transactions with objects and events. Nor do these latter factors
stand independent. While not human creations, they enter into human awarenss
only by being known in conditions of confrontation and action. Transposed to the
domain of art, this means that both art objects and aesthetic appreciation are parts
of the same single active process. There is a participatory engagement of perceiver
and object or event in which each activates the other and neither can be what it is
alone. Without the one there is not the other. The viewer activates the painting,
turning it from a physical object into a perceptual one and, conversely, the painting
imposes itself on the viewer, forcing eye, body, and thought to accommodate to its
demands. So too with listener and musical sound, audience and play: each art
creates its perceiver and each perceiver brings an art into being. This is no romantic
assertion but an account of what occurs, a process that can be developed in specific
and concrete instances, and it is perhaps the principal contribution of criticism to
explicate this transaction of object and perceiver.
Nor does this occur in a miraculous instant. Experience is expansive, requiring
time for its generation and its fulfillment. There is a historical dimension to this
requirement, for every art object was fashioned by one or more creative artists and
every object in nature with which we engage aesthetically is equally the product of
the forces that shaped it. At times the signs of origin are overt and unmistakable:
the brush strokes of Guardi and de Kooning, the chisel marks on Michelangelo's
Slaves, films about making films and plays about playwriting in which the artist's
creative self-consciousness becomes part of the drama. Yet the fact of origin enters
into aesthetic experience not so much as a historical act than as a re-creative one
in which the appreciative process regenerates the sequence of experience originally
shaped by the creative artist. Natural objects are often said to be an anomaly here,
since without the machina of a deus they have no creator. Yet the process of
origination is equally present in the signs and awareness of growth, erosion,
weather, or other natural events. It is aesthetically incidental that flowers, trees,
landscapes, sunrises, and the like do not have their origin in a human act. They have
their origin, nonetheless, and tracing it is an intrinsic part of their appreciation.
Thus every appreciator acts at the same time as are-creator, re-activating the order
of perception originated earlier. More is involved than a mechanical reiteration, too,
for each re-living of art involves the person participating, and thus it takes on a
 105

distinctive character through that person's perceptual abilities and understanding.

So it is that past is always present in the sequence of perceptual events that
constitute the experience with the work. As the work does not stand fully formed
and motionless but offers an order of experience that develops a perceptual
resonance, so in following this order in appreciation one follows those features and
qualities originally fashioned by the artist. Thus an intimate collaboration develops
between appreciator and artist, both creative, the one in originating the work, the
other in personal pursuit of that same general course once again
There is still another central aspect that can be distinguished in the unity of
aesthetic experience - the performative. Performance is traditionally reserved for
arts like music and theatre in which the score or text of the artist must be realized
as an actual occasion. This has given rise to a spurious classification of the arts into
those which require realization in performance and those which do not. As is often
the case, this common sense sanctioning of the obvious protects and perpetuates a
misunderstandng, here one that obscures the inherently per formative nature of all
the arts. For every art, painting and dance, poetry and architecture, demands to be
activated in order to be realized. Whether or not a performer is required for this
is less crucial a consideration than the fact that the appreciative perceiver must make
his or her own contribution to transform the art object into an art work, to use
Dewey's distinction. 29 There is, then, a performative factor always present in the
activating force of the appreciator. This is not to disregard the importance of the
performer in those arts which demand a rendering of notation, text, or instructions
in a sensible medium. In such arts there is a double performative function at work,
one which makes that aspect more complex but not different in kind from arts which
do not require such specialized individuals for their realization.
These four factors represented by the object, the perceiver, the creator, and the
performer are the central forces at work in the aesthetic field. Yet much more must
enter into a comprehensive description. There is the effect of social institutions on
all the factors, and of historical traditions, of cultural forms and practices, of
technological influences on materials and techniques, and other such contextual
conditions. It is a false move to excise these forces in the name of conceptual purity
or artistic integrity. They must enter in a descriptive rendering of aesthetic
experience, for they have a constitutive effect on such experience. To exclude them,
as to take any single factor in the field as sufficient basis for an explanation of art,
is to simplify the experience into falsehood.
This is, of course, but a bare outline of a complex subject, yet it serves to suggest
the breadth and the content of aesthetic experience. It makes clear and undeniable
that this concept, far from being theoretically obsolete, is central to the philosophy
of art. And far from being clearly understood, the notion of experience here is
obscure and often misdirected. Usually derived mistakenly from philosophical uses
apart from art, aesthetic experience is actually the truest source for an

29. John Dewey, op. cit., p. 3.

106

understanding of primary experience in general before it assumes other modes for

other uses.
While it is difficult to return to original experience before it has been shaped and
directed by history and culture, art offers an avenue for us to follow. To read back
into our experiences with art the particular concepts and constructs of a singular
cultural tradition is to invert the relation and turn a consequence into a constituent,
a product of that particular cultural evolution into the universal ground of human
experience. If one were politically inclined one might call this a form of cultural
imperialism. It is, in any case and at the very least, a simple mistake in the logic
of causality.
 107

ESSAY EIGHT

THE AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE: AN EXPLORATION

Warren E. Steinkraus

Once when the virtuoso violinist Isaac Stern was asked what music he played for
"relaxation" after a strenuous recital, he surprised the interviewer by replying, "a
Bach Partita." It is rather expected that one who engages in concentrated artistic
activity will want to "unwind" afterwards by doing something "light" and easy that
will enable him to relax and "let his hair down." Thus when the famed conductor
Sarah Caldwell was shown in a television interview playing rollicking popular music
on the piano after one of her concerts, this was taken as typical. Isaac Stern relaxed
by playing a different composition in the same genre; Sarah Caldwell relaxed by
playing something "light" that made no demands on her powers of concentration.
It may be that in these experiences we can find clues to what distinguishes an
aesthetic experience from other kinds of experience. Apparently we may distinguish
"light" music from other types. We are often told that "light" music is easier to
play and easier to listen to. It may help one relax and is therefore not very
demanding. It may even be more palatable. It surely is not "serious." One often
speaks of 'light opera" as distinguished from grand opera. One does "light"
reading during the summer months or while travelling on the train. We may also
speak of serious or classical ballet and distinguish it from the "light" but skillful
dancing one finds in the cinema. But one does not talk about "light" architecture
or sculpture or painting. It is clear that there are many buildings which are not at
all architecture and there are many illustrations in both two and three dimensions
which are hardly serious or even artistic. They may be pleasant even if mere trifles.
Can we find some marks that distinguish the aesthetic experience from its rivals
by contrasting "light" works and "serious" ones? It does not immediately appear
so. No less a stalwart than Leo Tolstoy found the singing of peasant women "real
art transmitting a definite and strong feeling" when he contrasted it with the WIst
Piano Sonata of Beethoven. 1 In the same paragraph, he praises a story in a
children's magazine in contrast with "the celebrated novels and stories praised by
all Europe written by Zola, Bourget, Huysmans, and Kipling.,,2 Would Tolstoy go

1. Leo Tolstoy, What is art? (tr. Aylmer Maude) (London: Oxford University Press, 1930), p. 223.
2. Ibid.

Mitias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility of the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht
108

so far as to say that the experience of listening to Beethoven's 101st Piano Sonata
or reading a novel by Zola could not produce aesthetic experiences? His answer is
striking, dogmatic and well-known for he holds that those who dote on so-called
works of art have never, except perhaps in childhood "experienced that simple
feeling familiar to the plainest man and even to the child, that sense of infection with
another's feelings ... which is the very essence of art. ,,3
Tolstoy's view that what delineates authentic aesthetic response from a
counterfeit one, cannot hold if we maintain our distinction between "light" and
"serious." Counterfeit art, he says, is 'always more ornate, while true art is
modest."4 Was Sarah Caldwell experiencing genuine art when she played popular
piano music but not experiencing it when she was conducting a Schumann
symphony? One does not care to get involved with Tolstoy's rigid definitions. It is
difficult indeed to detect marks of the aesthetic experience, even its possibility. But
we are not helped at all when we are told that the spontaneous singing of peasant
women is genuinely artistic because it reflects sincere feeling while a carefully
wrought Beethoven sonata is artificial and insincere and incapable of prompting a
credible artistic experience. It is obvious that Tolstoy never heard a church cantata
of J .S. Bach (e.g. No. 65). More ornate than anything sung by a band of peasant
women, it is, but every bit as sincere and "infectious" and surely having religious
value.
If, in opposition to Tolstoy, we were to propose that a work of art is characterized
by its seriousness, originality, and formal structure, that it places demands on those
who hear or see it, and that there is no aesthetic experience unless one yields to and
responds to those demands, we should find resistance from another quarter. There
are few persons who enjoy popular forms of art such as "light" music who would
relish being told that they were not having aesthetic experiences because the things
they enjoy are not serious enough to make demands on them. Moreover, some
might argue that unless an object of art prompts some satisfying, immediate
reaction of pleasure, it is stuffy and not worthwhile. If it takes training or discipline
to enjoy something there is something artificial and inauthentic about the
experience. Anyone should be capable of an aesthetic experience. If one gets joy or
satisfaction from a work, that is enough. The art object need not meet any
requirements nor can we say anything special about what must characterize our
response.
But we cannot rest with such hazy indeterminateness. Suppose we look at the
meaning of Sport and the character of the response in a person who is said to be
a sports enthusiast - one who finds satisfaction in participating or in watching
sporting events. We may begin by distinguishing the object of a person's experience,
OB, from the response or the experience itself, E. It seems evident that unless there
is some sporting event present, an OB, there can be no sport experience, no E. One

3. Ibid. p. 226.
4. Ibid.
 109

may not say that any experience one wishes to call sporting is automatically so
merely because one likes it or finds pleasure and amusement in it. There are some
experiences which, though frolicsome and enjoyable, are not in any sense sportive.
We speak of people who are "good sports" or "bad sports" and there are objective
ways to define "unsportsmanlike conduct." There are even penalties in some games
for the latter.
Boys get pleasure out of playing baseball and watching it. They also get pleasure
from pulling out the wings of flies, tying cat's tails together, dropping bags of water
on passing pedestrians, breaking windows, and mimicking handicapped people.
Adults find excitement in participating in or watching competitive games. A few
may get enjoyment by watching or taking part in acts of cruelty. It puts a strain on
one to say that those who watched people being chewed up by lions in the days of
ancient Rome were having experiences of sport. Can there be an E when humans
find amusement in gross cruelty or in obviously unfair competition? No sports
enthusiast gets satisfaction from seeing a prize fighter carried out of the ring after
having been knocked into a coma after twelve rounds of a proper match, even if
it is not the fighter he favored to win. Serious injuries are an occasional unfortunate
result of the sport of boxing. They are not Savored by the fans. If now the same
spectators got enjoyment out of seeing a heavyweight boxer "clobber" a bantam
weight boxer in a staged prize fight, we would quickly say that it was not an E
regardless of the enthusiasm or delight reported. It was not an E because no genuine
OB was present. Similarly, a foot-race in which robust eighteen year old lads
competed with sickly five year old girls could not in any sense be ragarded as a sport
even though it might be funny as part of some bizarre comedy of the Monty Python
type.
It is instructive to observe that there are differences in what people call a proper
sportive activity, an OB. Cockfighting is illegal in much of the Northern
Hemisphere presumably because of the cruelty and waste involved. Bullfighting is
widely enjoyed in some countries but viewed as cruel and intolerable in others
despite the romanticizing of it in a Remington painting or a Hemingway novel. It
is not an Olympic Sport any more than "Roller Ball" is. But even in bullfighting
there are clear demarcations as to what is genuinely sporting and what is not.
Wanton disregard of animals or other human beings is never regarded as an
experience of sport regardless of the few twisted personalities that might get sadistic
pleasure from it. The ancient sport of Foxhunting is now facing criticism in Great
Britain because the fox is scarcely given a "sporting chance." The general sport of
hunting loses whatever charm it might have had when so-called "big game hunters"
build elaborate blinds in jungle trees, hire beaters to flush out frightened leopards,
and then fire at them with highpowered rifles equipped with telescopic sights. It is
interesting to recall the sensitivity of Confucius in this respect. In the Analects we
read: "The Master fished with a hook but not with a net. He did not shoot his arrow
at a sitting bird (VII, 27). Sports recognized in some lands but seen as repugnant
in others still have regulations which preclude cruelty. Accordingly, a subjective
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response no matter how intense or immediate does not mean that a sporting
experience has occurred. There cannot be an E without an OB. Sports experiences
are not possible unless there is a sports event present.
The parallel with aesthetic experience is obvious. Can there be an E without an
OB? The bravado of the persistent subjectivist cannot be tolerated intellectually.
Should people report delight or satisfation in something that is not genuinely
artistic, they are not having an aesthetic experience despite their protestations or
claims. Can this assertion be supported? Some will say that the aesthetic experience
is so subjective that one cannot state that there must be an aesthetic object, an OB.
Now there are indeed some subjective experiences which seem to have no
objective basis. In the field of medicine one hears of persons who have subjective
"pain" when there is no "medical" basis for it. But then the examining physician
insists on a search for the source of the pain. When nothing shows up in detailed
physical examination or in X-rays, he initiates more subtle diagnostic procedures
like checking blood structure or even ordering a brain scan. If nothing can be found
objectively, he does not aver that the pain has no source; he requests psychiatric
assistance. He does not give up his quest until the etiology is clarified in some way.
Nor can the aesthetician assert that claims of an aesthetic response are purely
phenomenological when there is no objective referent. While it is apparent that
one's subjective physiological or psychological state may make a considerable
difference in an aesthetic response, even hallucinatory experiences have some source
and do not arise ex nihilo. We need to notice too, that just as there are differing
threshholds of pain there are different threshholds for the artisic response.
But what if the objective referent is the natural world? Can we say that a painting
of a vase of flowers by Redon is a proper OB while a host of golden daffodils waving
in the breeze is not - that there is no aesthetic experience in the presence of the
beauties of nature because no artistic plan or intent is involved? In both cases there
is an OB. However, in the natural world, there is still a difference between tangled
thickets and a bright array of wildflowers. A theological or metaphysical claim that
the flowers are manifest tokens of the intentions of a divine artist may have some
merit until one ponders the rampant ugliness and disarray in the natural world and
wonders if they too are intentional. The recognition of genuine object of beauty in
the natural world seems largely to be a matter of subjective selection and isolation.
We listen to the lyrical song of the
thrush and overlook the screech owl; we delight in the lily and shun the skunk
cabbage. The OB's appear to us indiscriminately. The E seems to depend on our
specification or stipulation. That is not the case in our experience of the arts.
Are we then to assert that an E is not possible unless there is evidence of genuine
artistic intention? Notice that we are not here examining the uneasy question of
discovering artistic intentions in objects. We are interested in knowing only whether
the work of art before us is the result of a fundamental purpose to produce
something artistic. We must ask: Is this OB offered to us as something to be valued
and enjoyed aesthetically? We can categorically respond that if it is, then an E is
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possible even though one may not happen to have one. The mere presence of an
intentional artistic object does not guarantee that an E will result. But there can be
no aesthetic experience unless such an object is present. This is analogous to one's
experience of sport. We may also observe that like sport, art is "useless." It has no
aim outside of itself. Benjamin Lowe writes: "The 'uselessness' of sport is a striking
feature identical with the 'absence of purpose' in art. Sport no more than art
responds to a need; neither has an immediate aim." And then he adds that the only
justification for art and for sport is the joy one experiences. s
Here the matter of artistic intention must be sifted out from others, like the
intention to amuse, to entertain, to thrill, to provide a pastime or to excite. The
comedy "No Sex, Please, We're British" by Anthony Marriott and Alistair Foot,
has been running steadily in a London Theatre since June 3, 1971 and there is no
end in sight. It might be classed as light entertainment. No one would equate the
guffawing fun one might experience in that show with the experience one can have
during a performance of Sophocles' Antigone. The former prompts no aesthetic
experience. Nor was it intended to produce one. We grant that the motives of
creative playwrights and other artists are not unmixed. He or she may offer
entertainment and excitement but if that is all one sets out to do, the result is not
an object of art. It is entertainment. The operetta "The Chocolate Soldier" is
primarily entertainment; Richard Strauss's "Ariadne auf Naxos" is a serious artistic
effort. One would never say after viewing it: "It was very entertaining." A sports
spectacle, on the other hand, does provide thrills and entertainment, and while some
sports events have an aesthetic dimension, we do not go to a football stadium or
a tennis court to have aesthetic experiences. If they occur they are incidental.
Some things that prompt an aesthetic response may themselves not have been
intended to do so. They may have been produced merely to amuse or entertain. Is
an E occurring nevertheless? Would not that be the same as saying that one could
have a sports experience when no real sport activity was intended? This needs
further investigation.
There are fringe areas here. While we are quite sure that no sports experience is
possible when a spectacle abounds in cruelty and the conduct of the participants is
unsportsmanlike in every mentionable respect, there are instances of sports activity
which are of a lesser sort than others and in which one may find only the merest
semblance of a sportive experience. One thinks of watching children play "Little
League Baseball." All the requisites of a baseball game are present - players,
equipment, umpires, and a playing field. Yet the eleven year olds perform
miserably. Though one might find some small amusement in the mere fact of the
game itself, the whole is a shambles of wild pitches, uncaught balls, running errors
and poor batting. The game may entertain the eager parents who are there to cheer

5. Benjamin Lowe, The Beauty of Sport: A Cross-disciplinary Inquiry, (Engelwood Cliffs: Prentice-
Hall, 1977), p. 39.
112

their sons, but it is scarcely an E. An intentional sports event may prove a debacle
or be so weak in execution that one may turn away in dismay.
This may occur in the performing arts as well. There is indeed an artistic intention
in the Beethoven 101st Piano Sonata, but the pianist may play wrong notes in bad
tempo. A Shakespeare play is marvelous in concept and artistic intention, but a
High School performance of "King Lear" can be a total failure. There is no E even
though an OB is present. Or, we might say that an OB is present in the score or in
the script but those who seek to instantiate them do not have the skill or the power
to present an OB to us.
In the case of those arts which do not depend upon performance, namely,
sculpture, architecture and painting, the situation is somewhat different. Other
problems appear. One cannot say that an E occurs unless an OB is present as its
necessary condition. But there are cases of quasi-artistic objects, like realistically
painted wax dummies in "museums of horror." Other objects may be produced to
meet purely utilitarian interests. There are, accordingly, paintings comparable to
hack writing. One thinks of "calendar art" or the "genuine oil paintings" sold to
bourgeois tourists who wish to impress their neighbors or cover a vacant spot on
the wall. Most buildings are not works of art though an architect might have been
involved. The sprawling super market and the corrugated iron chicken house do not
provide aesthetic experiences. Statues of war heroes in city parks may commemorate
some escapade prompting national pride, but they do not ordinarily evince an E.
We have implied that it is the creative intention of the artist that makes possible
an E and we readily admit that not all OB's will call forth E's. But if no genuine
creative artistic motive is present, an aesthetic response cannot and will not occur,
despite claims of those who enjoy Norman Rockwell's pleasant illustrations or the
patriotic statues of Lord Nelson and General Patton or the imposing brick
courthouses fronted by simulated Doric columns of wood. If an aesthetic experience
cannot occur when an OB is not present, what may we say when an artistic OB is
present and no E is forthcoming?
The same obtains with regard to sports. Many a person has accompanied a sports
enthusiast to a stadium and has courteously endured the boredom of watching a
lengthy soccer or baseball game without having a moment of delightful sports
experience. Are there then not some requirements laid upon the observer in order
for an authentic E to take place? What one brings to a basketball game or to a
concert has much to do with whether or not an E occurs. The "preparation" and
"sensitivity" one begins with may help us see why there are such differences in
responses. A dedicated fan can find something of interest even in the dullest of
games while his companion cannot wait to go home. The SchOnberg enthusiast
brings his knowledge and developed sensitivity to the concert and hears more and
enjoys more than any ordinary listener who would rather read the advertisements
in the program notes. E's are more likely in the presence of DB's when the person
is prepared in some way. One does not need information so much as powers of
concentration. Usually a build-up of comparative experience makes an E more likely
 113

when one confronts an entirely novel OB. Accordingly one usually cannot enjoy
Bruckner until he or she has some familiarity with Beethoven and Tschaikovsky.
This is also the case when viewing static works of art. One can find profound
aesthetic satisfaction in visiting just one of the twelve Romanesque churches in
Cologne, possibly after having viewed the famous Gothic cathedral in the center of
the city. But this depends on some sensitivity to the special delights to be found in
Romanesque works. He may have an E because he knows what to observe, how to
pay attention, and how it is related to other works of religious architecture
previously seen.
There is apparently no single moment when the E occurs, no isolable atom in the
stream of consciousness which one may point to and identify precisely as an E. The
aesthetic experience from viewing architecture is an overall, general response. One
makes a series of observations over a period of some minutes and the units of
experience are "funded," as Stephen Pepper would say.6 Such an experience can
be quite rich and complex. Its discrete elements are not as readily separable as a
single sensation might be when one describes a Humian apple. But the total effect
is one of aesthetic satisfaction. Such is also the case in the response to an opera like
Wagner's "Tristan and Isolde." There is no exact moment when the E takes place
as such, though there may be high points, charming moments and climaxes in the
four hour performance. The E is a complex temporal affair, with varying periods
of aesthetic excitement. So too with the sports enthusiast who delights in the subtle
pleasures of an all-afternoon golf tournament. There are thrilling moments on the
green and exciting drives, but no single event can be called the sports experience.
It is the overall, funded occurrence that provides the E.
Now we must ask about cases in which an OB prompts an E in an observer and
there is no informed sensitivity or serious earlier preparation. Tolstoy seems to have
thought this was virtually the mark of an authentic response. Keats' initial joy in
his first reading of Chapman's Homer is a well-known case of an unexpected,
surprise response. But of course Keats had read other works and was sensitized to
literary values in a special way. There are persons unacquainted with classical ballet
who may be powerfully moved and have an intensely vivid aesthetic response at their
very first performance. One unfortunately cannot run "controls" or "experiments"
on such experiences. Similarly, a person may obtain exquisite pleasure on sampling
a new dish, perhaps of Japanese cuisine. But in this case there is a fund of
comparative eating experience to draw upon. If one had no acquaintance with
Japanese cookery beforehand, the taste buds may still respond in a way, it may be
remarked, that the eyes and ears would not when they first confront a No drama
or Kabuki dance. In the instance of a totally unexpected E, one may assume that
the person has a general mental attitude of being ready to listen and watch. And
this may be conjoined with a cultivated curiosity about things new. One is thus

6. Stephen Pepper, The Basis oj Criticism in the Arts, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963).
Seepp. 64ff and 148[f.
114

enabled to "tune in" to the work observed and experience satisfying responses. An
observer brings a lot of cultural baggage with him when he approaches any object
of art just as he does when he samples new food.
But if one should grant the points made thus far, there are still difficult questions.
This is largely because there is no single distillate for an E as there might be, say,
in drinking tea. There the liquid is taken into the mouth, squished around a bit and
then swallowed. The tasting begins at a particular point and then promptly ends and
one has a specific sensation. Each successive sip or swallow of the tea is a moment
of tasting pleasure. When the cup has been consumed, one may say: "It was a fine
cup of tea." There is no direct analogue in the phenomenology of the aesthetic
experience. Whether it is visual or aural or both, the effect of an E can never be
so straightforward as merely to affect one of the senses in an isolable way. A musical
composition has a beginning and a marked ending. Viewing a work of sculpture or
a painting begins at a specific time and ends when one walks away. The E cannot
be defined or specified in the same way as with a sip or cup of tea. One may be
entranced by a drama or musical work from beginning to end, may feel quite "lost"
in the work. With no direct awareness of time or place, one may identify with the
pattern of movement as well as the intensity of sounds or rhythms before him. What
then is the E?
Perhaps the best one can do is to list accompanying traits, which, when they occur
in some connected way may be said to comprise an aesthetic experience.? The
phenomenology is rich but that does not allow us to say there are no aesthetic
experiences. The phenomenology of sports experience is also complex. We do not
hesitate to report what we mean by an experience of sport. It too has many
characteristics. Not all the noticeable ones are present all the time but when we take
the experience as a whole, we are quite willing to say that something was indeed a
sports experience.
The inability of a philosopher or a psychologist to give a precise definition of
what constitutes the experience of sport does not mean that there are none or that
sport is merely a subjective phenomenon. The elusively indefinable aesthetic
experience, like the specious present, does occur and will continue to occur. It is not
the same as an experience of sport; it is not the same as mere entertainment; it is
not to be equated with simple sense pleasure. It cannot occur without an OB that
is the result of a primary artistic intention. It cannot take place without some
minimal sensitivity or at least ability to concentrate by the observer. We may learn
more about the meaning of the sports experience by conferring with sportsmen and
sports enthusiasts. We will learn more about the aesthetic experience by consulting
with artists and those who respond sensitively to artistic works. Conceptual analysis
can only open the door to phenomenological and philosophical understanding.

7. An example of this may be found in my own discussion of the easthetic experience in Philosophy
oj Art, Revised Edition (Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America, 1984), pp. 2-17.
 115

PART III

NATURE OF THE AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE

 117

ESSAY NINE

WHAT MAKES AN EXPERIENCE AESTHETIC?

Harold Osborne

Aestheticians love to argue about the rudiments of their craft. It is a professional

temptation to which they are peculiarly prone. Indeed the interminable disputations
on what Aesthetics is about sometimes reminds one of those committees which
spend so much of their time debating their own constitution and procedure that they
are eventually dissolved before they have got around to broaching the matters upon
which they were set up to advise. But even when people differ most vociferously,
in order for disagreement to be possible at all there must be some common ground
of understanding, some unformulated awareness, however vague, of what it is they
are in disagreement about. Within very broad limits, then, we know what it is we
are talking about when we become involved in aesthetic discussion, and pretty well
everyone would accept that mapping the anatomy of aesthetic experience is of
central importance as groundwork for the exploration of aesthetic problems. But
on this also there are several different lines of approach.
There are some who have taken the line of attempting to work out the most
elementary feature which would justify our calling any experience aesthetic. In a
well-known paper to the Aristotelian Societyl J. O. Urmson argued that aesthetic
experience cannot be differentiated from other modes of experience, such as those
characteristic of an intellectual, moral or economic interest, by a special class of
objects or by a special feature in the objects upon which it is directed or by having
a special feeling or emotion among its constituents. He therefore turned to the
question of evaluation and concluded that the judgements we call aesthetic are
grounded in our liking or dislike for simple sensory qualities of thing such as the
smell of a rose. Although this central contention was anticipated by Edward

I. J .0. Urmson, " What makes a situation aesthetic? Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society,
Supplementary Volume XXXI (1975), Reprinted in Joseph Margolis (ed.): Philosophy Looks at the
Arts (1962). Strictly, the conclusion infringes Urmson's own restrictions on aesthetic experience,
since appearance is an aspect of things and our liking/disliking is an emotional reaction.

Mitias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility of the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht
118

Bullough's theory of "psychical distance,,2 and was further developed in the field
of visual art by Vincent Tomas's article "Aesthetic Vision"3, this paper remains the
classical statement of the view that reduced to bedrock essentials aesthetic
experience which is defined by concern for the appearance of things in detachment
from their bearing upon our practical or theoretical interests, including interest in
the reality behind the appearances.
Representing a different habit of thought, Monroe C. Beardsley approached the
matter from a primary, though not exclusive interest in the more advanced levels
of aesthetic experience characteristic of our commerce with the fine arts. Working
from this point of view he made it his endeavour to distinguish aesthetic from other
modes of experience by its internal features in thes less elementary manifestations 4
and, as John Fisher has said, "he has probably come as close to developing a theory
of aesthetic experience as anyone.,,5 Beardsley believed that there are "clear and
exemplary" cases of aesthetic experience and he hoped to signpost their distinctive
character by enumeratisng a set of five very general traits. 6 As many others have

2. Edward Bullough: "Phychical Distance' as a Factor in Art and an Aesthetic Principle," British
Journal oj Psychology, V (1912). Reprinted in Elezabeth M. Wilkinson (ed.): Aesthetics: Lectures
and Essays by Edward Bullough (1957), Mervin Levich (ed.): Aesthetics and the Philosophy oj
Criticism (1963) and Melvin Rader (ed.): A Modern Book oj Aesthetics (4th ed., 1973). Using the
example of a fog at sea, Bullough argued that in our aesthetic commerce with the world we put into
abeyance our ordinary practical and personal concerns to concentrate on the appearances on things,
"distancing" the object of attention by putting it "out of gear with our practical actual self, by
allowing it to stand ourside the contect of our personal needs and ends ... " In this way, he thought,
aspects of things which usually pass unnoticed are brought into our awareness with the
transformation power of a revelation. "The sudden view of things from the reverse, usually
unnoticed side," he says, "comes upon us as a revelation, and such revelations are precisely those
of Art."
3. Vincent Tomas: "Aesthetic Vision," The Philosophical Review, LXIII, 1 (1959). "hi every case of
aesthetic vision," he writes, "what is attended to is an appearance, and the question of what actual
object ... presents that appearance does not arise." Greater critical precision was introduced into
the formulations of Vincent Tomas and his views were extended to other domains of sensation than
the visual by Frank Sibley in a paper "Aesthetics and the Looks of Things" in The journal oj
Philosophy, LVI, 19(1959) and both papers were criticised on logical grounds by Marshall Cohen
in a paper entitled "Appearance and the Aesthetic Attitude," where he introduces the distincion-
something of a red herring in this context - between the work of art as a physical thing, sayan
arrangement of pigments on canvas, and the work as appearance, i.e. the picture. Aile three papers
are reprinted in Marvin Levich (ed.), op. cit.
4. The most convenient statement of his view will be found in "Aesthetic Experience" in Michael J.
Wreen and Donald M. Callen (eds.): The Aesthetic Point oj View (1932) and in "Aesthetic
Experience Regained," Journal oj Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 23 (1969), also reprinted in the
foregoing collection.
5. John Fisher: "Beardsley on Aesthetic Experience" in John Fisher (ed.): Essays on Aesthetics:
Perspective on the Work oj Monroe C. Beardsley (1983), p. 95.
6. Beardsley's "five criteria of the aesthetic character of experience" are: object directedness; felt
freedom (from the dominance of some antecedent concerns about past and future); deatached effect
(emotional distance); active discovery; wholeness or a sense of intergration.
 119

done, he also emphasized the necessity for "unity in the dimension of coherence,"
intensity, complexity and pleasureableness.
Yet there are moments too one's attention is caught by the soughing of the wind
in the trees, the rippling of a nearby stream gentle but insistent lilt, the monotonous
murmur of the bees on a hot summer's afternoon or by the rhythmical rise and fall
of the chorus of frogs at dusk. We may be startled by the impossibly blaring colours
of a lurid desert sunset, held breathless by the distant magnificence of a snow-
capped mountain range, penetrated by the "wild glad emptiness" of sand and mud
as we stroll across a lonely river estuary, or overwhelmed by the inhuman solitude
of the vast Altiplano of the Andes, which oppresses the imagination like a lifeless
landscape from the moon. Moments such as these must be ranked as aesthetic as
well as listening rapt to the Falla Concerto, contemplating Greco's Burial oj Count
Orgaz or a painted seascape by Turner, reading Milton's Lycidas of Shelley's Ode
to the West Wind. Difficult as it undoubtedly is to find any concrete feature
common to all such aesthetic involvements with natural things, yet there is always
the intimation of a feeling that they have the nature of interludes or interruptions,
intrusions of something alien into the ordinary course of life. And this feeling is
assuredly a reflection of the attitude of detachment from practical concerns which
indicates a switch to the aesthetic mode of awareness. To be convincing our
understanding of aesthetic experience must cover such experiences as these and
despite the general recognition among philosophers that the scope of the aesthetic
is wider than the fine arts, nevertheless, as Ronald W. Hepburn remarks in his
brilliant and sensitive paper "Aesthetic Appreciation of Nature,,,7 serious study of
our aesthetic intercourse with nature has fallen badly into the background in recent
theorising.
In my own writingS I have stressed the view that the capacity of advanced
aesthetic experience is not common to all men equally, not a ready-made once-for-
all ability as when a man needs only open his eyes to see. Appreciation is a skill
which, like other skills, has to be cultivated and trained on the basis of natural
endowment. 9 Both the capacity for it and the interest to develop it are very unevenly
distributed and in those people in whom they are present they are usually restricted
in their reach. Some people are music lovers, some enjoy poetry or architecture,
others respond to the beauties of natural scenery, to the lissom grace of wild animals
or to the refinements of social elegance. In all cases the skill must be matured or
the capacity remains dormant and aesthetic experience rudimentary. Appreciation
demands the refinement of the percipience and sensitivity. I is an active, ongoing
consummation rather than passive reception and, as with all kinds of skill, practice
and enlightened cultivation are a necessary condition of accomplishment. This is the

7. In The British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol. 3, No.3 (1963).

8. See particulary H. Osborne: The Art of Appreciaton (1970). Also "The Cultivation of Sensibility
in Art Education" in Journal of Philosophy of Education, Vol. 19, No. 1 (1984).
9. Ibid.
120

more difficult to achieve because aesthetic contemplation runs counter te deeply

engrained habits of perception and instinctual attitudes of mind which dominate the
daily life of all of us. And attainment is impeded yet further because its nature is
rarely understood even among those whose profession in society includes the
teaching of appreciation.
In this paper I shall present aspects of aesthetic experience which bear principally
upon this idea that it is the outcome of a skill that needs to be cultivated and
developed in the field of percipience. I shall do this under the headings Detachment,
Expressiveness, Unicity, Imagination and Pleasure.

Detachment

The principle of psychological detachment has had a long history, going back to the
eighteenth century when "disinterested interest" was an accepted commonplace of
aesthetic thinking, and indeed with certain reservations it is still held to be valid.
As Edward Bullough so picturesquely stressed, when we take up an aesthetic stance
towards something we cut loose from our practical and manipulative interest, our
hopes and fears, desires and revulsions, even the urge towards theoretical and
scientific understanding, and so far as that thing is concerned we give precedence
to our sole perceptual or contemplative interest. From being an object of practical
preoccupation it becomes for us an occasion for the exercise and expansion of
percipience. With fine insight Immanuel Kant declared that even the question of
existence becomes a matter of indifference for the aesthetic interest and, as we have
already pointed out, this has become a main tenet among the exponents of the
"appearance" theory of aesthetic experience. It accounts too for the feeling of
intrusion or interruption that so often accompanies our aesthetic responses to
nature, for except when our interest is an aesthetic one the question of existence or
non-existence, of reality or illusion, is all-important. In our confrontations with
works of art we do, of course, automatically assume a measure of unreality. A
symbol is not that which it symbolises, a picture is not identical with what it
represents. Language itself contains a built-in element of distance, for the words by
which we communicate are not that of which they tell. And while in practical life
it is the truth of a communication that matters, when we respond to a verbal
construct as a work of art we are prepared to leave the question of truth in abeyance
and savour the communication for what it is, concentrating attention on the
contemplation of that which is told and the manner in which it is told.
Kant also precluded occurent emotional response from aesthetic engagement and
in this he is followed by most contemporary thinkers, who also stipulate at least a
measure of emotional detachment. The direct arousal of emotion is not, it is now
believed, among the functions of fine art but rather the provision of means and
occasion for cognitive experience of "knowledge by acquaintance" of emotional
situations and states. The hysterical manifestations of emotional frenzy sometimes
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evoked by Pop music in the young are not considered to be an aesthetic response;
for that consists rather in sensitive discernment of the emotional qualities inherent
in presented sonorous constructs from simple melodies to fully orchestrated
synmphonies.
At this point it is necessary to introduce two reservations. First, as Hepburn
pertinently observed, aesthetic experience of nature does not preclude involvement.

On occasion, he (the spectator) may confront natural objects as a static, disengaged observer;
but far more typically the objects envelop him on all sides. In a forest, trees surround him;
he is ringed by hills, or stands in the midst of a plain. If there is movement in the scene, the
spectator may himself be in motion and his motion mey be an important element in his
aesthetic experience .... The spectator is, of course, aesthetically detached in the sense that
he is not using nature, manipulating it or calculating how to manipulate it. He is both actor
and spectator, ingredient in the landscape and lingering on the sensations of being thus
ingredient, playing actively with nature and letting nature as it were play with him and his
awareness of himself. 10

A closely parallel experience may on occasion be integral to our realisation of a

work of art. When we no longer contemplate a piece of architecture from a distance
as a feature of the landscape, when we cease to study it in detail from the outside
and go inside, immediately a totally different kind of awareness surges over us, an
awareness in which the sense of enveloping space, perhaps vast, perhaps cramped,
but not without form, may well be paramount. Or again as we are wrapped up in
listening to a piece of music a living structure of sound may seem to build up around
us and to envelop us completely as it distends or contracts, appearing now to
approach from the distance and again to recede in its continuous progress towards
completion. One may be swept along in quasi-identification with the movement of
a painting or, as Adrian Stokes remarked in his book Stones of Rimini (1934), by
the swirl of lines in a carving by Agostino di Duccio. A sense of oneness or
participation stems from engrossment in an object sufficiently complex to sustain
attention and sufficiently unified to extend our powers of percipience. And such
involvement is not foreign to the appreciation of a work of art.
The second reservation we must make is the perhaps obvious one that the demand
for detachment does not involve jettisoning understanding or restricting awareness
to superficial sensory qualities. Many works of verbal art or representational visual
art have important, even profound, intellectual content and many others demand
for their understanding an extensive knowledge of manners, beliefs and customs in
periods removed from our own. We cannot respond to anything exept in so far as
we have apprehended it and apprehension is not possible without understanding.
We do not ask whether the situations or doctrines implicit in works of art are actual;
we attempt to savour what it would be like for the situations to be real and the
doctrines to be true. But we can do this only if we have understood what they are.

10. R.W. Hepburn, loco cit., p. 197.

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In art as in life this demands empathic imagination, which is dishonest or misleading

unless it is based upon correct understanding. But whereas in life it is possible at
a pinch to get by with a minimum of empathy, without it there is no appreciation
of what is presented in works of art. Detachment from personal concern is
necessary. But to the appreciation of our artistic heritage we need to bring into play
the whole funded stock of our knowledge and experience. And only too often that
too is revealed to be paltry.
All this demands the mastery of a new way of looking at things. But what has
so far been said about detachment applies to our manner of responding to what we
perceive, whereas the influence of practical habits penetrates deeply into the very
act of perceiving itself. Both philosphers and critics have been alive to the great
differences that exist between aesthetic perception and "our common way of
looking at things," as Schopenhauer called it. No doubt the difference stems largely
from the fact that in practical life we are interested primarily in the reality revealed
by appearences - or in the effects that the reality is likely to heve upon ourselves
- whereas in aesthetic perception our interest rests in the appearance itself. That is
the theory. For practical concern is geared for the classification and
conceptualisation that are incidental to object recognition and decision making.
What we observe and what we do not observe are determined largely by this.
Aspects of our impressions which are irrelevant to these purposes tend to pass us
by unnoticed and unperceived. We do not see what is there to be seen but what we
are interested in seeing. So from childhood we are trained to economise among the
unmanageable influx of impressions which would otherwise drive us to impotence
or distraction. We notice enough only to label the things around us, and our
perceptions are pared down and jejune. As Roger Fry once said:

We have learned the meaning-for-lie of appearances so well that we understand them, as it

were, in shorthand. The subtlest differences of appearance that have a utility value stil
continue to be appreciated, while large and important visual characters, provided they are
useless for life, will pass unnoticed .... In practical vision we have no more concern after
we have read the label on the object. II

When we are engaged in aesthetic contemplation, on the other hand, we concentrate

attention within a selected segment of the environment - say, the visial area within
the frame of a picture or a sequence of musical sounds while shutting our ears to
irrelevant noises - and within this segment we make it our aim to bring the whole
of what is there to even and undistorted awareneSs. When successful our experience
within this area is more detailed, more complete, and above all more unbiased, than
ordinarily. But this way of perception is not an easy thing to manage. With most
people it requires directed practice until the "detached"way of contemplation
becomes a skill which can be put into operation without deliberate thought on

11. Roger Fry: "The Artist's Vision," from Vision and Design (1920).
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suitable occasions. For it runs counter to deeply engrained habits of perception

which are constantly being fortified by our day-to-day practice. Yet to master it is
an essential step in cultivating the skill on which the more advanced levels of
easthetic experience depend. When confronted with a picture the aesthetically naive
person is likely first to ask himself or others what it is a picture of. Having satisfied
himself on this, he will see only that thing as he sees it in practical life and he will
remain impervious to the complicated and thrilling interplay of shapes and colours
which are displayed. For this reason the uninitiated sometimes do better to begin
with non-iconic abstract works or - as Kandinsky once found - to turn a
representational picture on its side so that the subject loses prominence. But for the
connoisseur subject and representation add importantly to the richness and
complexity of the visual relations presented.
Yet even with the reservation mentioned above it is easy to exaggerate the
difference which detachmnent creates and to postulate too complete a demarcation
between the aesthetic and the practical ways of perceiving. It is a mistake which
adherents of the "appearance" theory are inclined sometimes to make. For when
all is said and done it is a separation and not a divorce with which we have to do.
Our underlying knowledge of realities cannot be wholly discarded and indirectly
plays its inescapable part in aesthetic experience.
Urmson realised that our reactions to the simple sensory qualities of things are
inadequate to support the full range of aesthetic evaluation and almost as an
afterthought he added a second, more complex class of aesthetic criteria, for which
"it is looking to possess some quality which is non-aesthetically desirable that
matters." Among his examples are a horse or motor-car looking fast and the
"cheerful or nobly mournful character of a bird's note." He says: "What makes
the appreciation aesthetic is the fact that it is concerned with a thing's looking
somehow without concern for whether it really is like that." But as a general
principle this is too simplistic. If the reality is a matter of indifference to us and if
we do not know it, we may be content not to go behind the appearances. But the
sort and degree of detachment appropriate to The Thousand an One Nights differs
from the attitude demanded for Gulliver's Travels, The Invisible Man and Mr.
Sludge, The Medium'. In the visual field also our reactions are complex and, as
Robert Hepburn realised, people differ in the extent to which knowledge that an
appearance is deceptive disturbs aesthetic appreciation. His example is a tall tree
trunk which looks strong and hard but when approached crumbles rotten at a touch.

For some people aesthetic experience is interested not at all in reality - only in looks,
seemings; indifference to truth may be part of their definition of the aesthetic.

But, he goes on:

If we want our aesthetic experiences to be repeatable and to have stability, we shall try to
ensure that new information or subsequent experimentation will not reveal the 'seemings' as
illusions. If I know that the tree is rotten, I shall not be able again to savour its seeming-
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strength. I could, no doubt savour its 'deceptively strong appearance', but that would be a
quite different experience from the first.

If one defines the aesthetic to include indifference to fact, then perhaps rather few
of our reactions to nature are purely aesthetic without latent practical implications
in the background and different circumstances bring different considerations into
play. A forester would be apt to react differently from a tourist to the discovery that
the tree was rotten, a racing owner differently from an animal lover to the
knowledge that the sleek horse ran disappointingly slowly. Few people are disturbed
in their appreciation of the expressive qualities of birdsong by knowing that the song
serves biological functions and probably bears little or no relation to the bird's
moods. But few owners would remain aesthetically indifferent in face of the
knowledge that their car's semblance of speed was deceptive. In any case awareness
that the appearance of any utility object is misleading must annihilate the aesthetic
delight that derives from the recognition of succesful and economic adaptation of
means to purpose.
To summarise now what has been said on detachment. Like all perception,
aesthetic experience is cognitive. But its object is different and its ways are other
than the ways we are used to. Whereas in daily life we need to achieve knowledge
about the realities behind the appearances of things, when we are aesthetically
engaged it is our endeavour to increase, to make ever more vivid and complete, our
direct "knowledge by acquaintance" of the presented appearance itself. But in
subtle and indirect ways our accumulated awareness of actualities enters into and
enriches our aesthetic appreciation, particularly of natural things and objects of
utility.

Expressiveness

It is possible to take up an aesthetic attitude of detached perception towards

anything at all, contemplating its appearance without ulterior purpose. But rather
few things repay this sort of attention, exercising and expanding awareness to a
vitality beyond the ordinary. You may enjoy the smell of a rose, the timbre of a well-
tuned bell. But attention soon lapses and the more you try to concentrate on just
that sensation alone and to hold it firmly in the centre of consciousness the more
attention wanders and you find yourself thinking of other things, indulging in
daydreams and reminiscences or intellectually involved in analysis or comparisons ..
The aesthetically relevant aspects of the things which are best able to sustain and
expand aesthetic experience are for the most part emergent or, as they are also
called, " regional" properties. That is, they are properties of complex wholes which
cannot be derived from or reduced to the constituent parts of these wholes in
isolation. For example, the taste of common salt is an emergent property. It is so
since common salt is a complex substance composed of sodium and chlorine but
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"nothing that is known of the behaviour of sodium in other circumstances, and of

the behaviour of chlorine in other circumstances, and of the mutual relations of the
two elements in salt, entails that this combination of them will have the
characteristic 'salty' taste." 12 But although aesthetic qualities as the term is
commonly understood - qualities such as gracefulness, elegance, daintiness - are
emergent, not all emergent properties are aesthetic qualities. Aesthetic qualities are
distinctive in that the constiuent parts of the wholes which they qualify remain
perceptible simultaneously with them. Sodium and chlorine cannot be tasted in
common salt; but when you call something graceful its constituent parts remain
visible (or audible) although the parts are not themselves graceful. The colour
Prussian blue is not an aesthetic quality although it is an emergent property of a
synthetic pigment, introducerd in 1704, based on iron and cyanogen. But areas of
Prussian blue may be elements in a painting with stron aesthetic and expressive
qualities. This important feature of aesthetic qualities has usually been overlooked.
There is a humble brand of aesthetic qualities which are ubiquitous in life. They
may even serve a useful purpose, as, for example, when we recognise a person by
a characteristic elegance. More typically they function as decoration or adornment
and do not make a serious impact on practical attention. But in the aesthetic
experience of works of art they are of major importance. And discriminating
alertness to them demands the exercise of trained sensitivity - indeed, Frank Sibley
regarded the need for sensitivity as their distinguishing feature 13 - while most people
are possessed of this sensitivity in some degree, its deliberate enhancement both in
acuity and in range is a primary condition for the cultivation of skill in aesthetic
appreciation.
Among aesthetic qualities is a special class of emotional qualities, which are
chiefly responsible for the expressive characters attributed to things. Emotional
qualities are of two kinds, though the names by which they are designated do not
always maintain the distinction clearly. There are those which point to the effect
which a thing has upon an observer, as when we call a performance exciting or a
melody attractive. And there is a more important type - such as the qualities of
Urmson's bird music - which purport to attribute an emotional quality to the object
of contamplation. It goes without further saying that direct emotional response to
qualities of this latter type, whither by a similar, echoing emotion or by an
antiphonal emotion (e.g. pity in response to a presentation of suffering), does not
belong to aesthetic commerce with the arts. A person who identifies emotionally
with the characters in a novel or a film and does no more than that has not
experienced the work aesthetically. Which is not to say that aesthetic experience is
void of feeling. Sympathetic imagination plays a necessary part, and this too needs
cultivation and direction. For there are indeed more subtle, profound and pervasive

12. lC.D. Broad, Examination of McTaggart's Philosophy (1933), Vol. I, p. 269.

13. Frank Sibley, "Aesthetic Concepts," The Philosophical Review, LXVIII (1959), reprinted in Joseph
Margolis (ed.), op. cit.
126

expressive characters than the simple presentation of emotional disturbance and

both sensibility and an abundant provision of empathic experience contribute to the
apprehension of these.
Scenes and situations have their pronounced or muted expressive characters and
by embodying these a work of art can call up the situation without direct
representation of what it represents, it may suggest expressive traits not usually
attributed to that thing. In the visual arts expressive character may be the
predominant theme and there are a thousand ways in which colours and shapes can
be adapted to this purpose.

In his autobiographical Ruckbliche, Kandinsky wrote

A pressure of the fingers, and jubilant, joyous, thoughtful, dreamy , self-absorbed, with deep
seriousness, with bubbling roguishness, with the sigh of liberation, with the profound
resonance of sorrow, with defiant power and resistance, with yielding softness and devotion,
with stubborn self-control, with sensitiveness, unstableness of balance, came one after
another these unique beings we call colours -, each alive in and for itself, independent,
endowed with all the qualities necessary for further independent life and ready and willing
at every moment to submit to new combinations, to mix among themselves and create endless
series of new worlds ....

Through his intense feeling for the expressive value of colours Kandinsky was led
to abandon representation for abstract painting.
In music the expressive suggestion is sometimes helped by a title, giving direction
to the empathic imagination of listeners, as in Debussy's two books of Preludes and
Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. Sometimes an expressive interpretation
becomes traditional as with Handel's Harmonious Blacksmith Variations, first so
named by the singer Richard Clark, Beethovens's Moonlight Sonata, Scarlatti's
Cat's Fugue and Chopin's Cat Valse, Mendelssohn's Spinning Song of Bee's
Wedding, and so on. More often, of course, the imagination is left entirely free. But
it is the inherent expressive character that gives the key to our feeling for the
appropriateness of music to the libretto of opera or to the words of a song - thought
this sensitivity is systematically blunted by the habit of singing the same hymn tune
to a series of verses with changing emotional import.
Even many painters who eschewed all representation in favour of non-iconic
abstraction believed that their works carried expressive meaning and reference. In
his Qook The Non-Objective World Malevich described Suprematist works as a pure
expression of artistic feeling, writing that the Suprematists "have deliberately given
up the objective representation of their surroundings in order . . . to view life
through the prism of pure artistic feeling." He claimed that these abstracts
expressed such universal qulities as "the energies of black and white," " the signs
of a force" and " cosmic forms of action." Naum Gabo in his essay "The
Constructiv-e Idea in Art" asserted that Constructivism
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has revealed the universal law that the elements of visual art such as lines, colours, shapes,
possess their own forces of expression independent of an association with the external aspects
of the world; that their life and their reaction are self-conditioned psychological phenomena
rooted in human nature ...

In "Plastic Art and Pure Plastic Art" Piet Mondrian wrote that "every form, every
line has its own expression."
Non-figurative art, he thought, aims at "universal beauty," which is an expression
of the "fundamental law of equivalence which creates dynamic equilibrium and
reveals the true content of reality." 14
The expressive character of visual and musical art cannot be described
straightforwardly in words but has been called "a new speech which turns its back
on the verbal." For this reason critics sometimes allow imagination to run riot in
the attempt to communicate what they have apprehended. For example, Kurt
Leonhard wrote as follows of the drawings done by Henry Michaux in the 1950s:

In the opposition of black and white a brusque hardness is revealed which can hardly be
reconciled with the lyrical passivity of the watercolours . . . the one theme which finds its
thousands of variations in these paintings is the movement, accumulated speed, storm and
flight, the airborne and earth borne vattles of the heavenly and earthly hosts, of somersaulting
gremlins and chasing ghosts. If the key word for the watercolours is 'phantom', the word
which best sums up the basic mood of the ink drawings is 'panic'.

On the other hand the innovatory Color Field paintings done by Morris Louis
between 1954 and 1962 have a more impersonal expressive nature for which the
"cosmic" language favoured by Malevich seems not entirely imappropriate.
The expressive character manifested by abstract constructions of colours, shapes
and lines persists when these form elements in representional works, as the
expressive character of the sonorous constructs which we call music persists when
music is combined with words. The expressiveness is a quality of the construct itself
in both cases. Its apprehension demands sensitivity and skilled percipience, not
emotional reaction, though the apprehension itself may be more or less strongly
imbued with feeling and may in some people be supported by imaginative phantasy.

Unity

A great deal of quite unnecessary nonsense is written about the unity of aesthetic
experience and much of it might equally well be said about other modes of
experience too. Aesthetic experience is not unique in this regard. Indeed experience

14. This and the assay by Gabo were published in J.L. Martin, Ben Nicholson and N. Gabe (eds.) Circle
(1937, reprinted in 1971).
128

without due measure of unity and coherence is likely to land a person in a mental
institution.
With reference to our aesthetic contacts with natural thins R. W. Hepburn wrote:
We must begin by frankly denying the universal need for unity, unity of form, quality,
structure or of anything alse. We can take pleasure in sheer pluratity, in the stars of the night
sky, in a birdsong without beginning, middle or end.

We can respond to the unorganised spreading grandeur of a range of mountain

peaks, to the mild placidity of sailing boats dancing over a lake, to a scattered
collection of isolated houses in a distant valley below, or to the dull cloying deadness
of a formless mist. And we can continue the experience for as long or as short a
while as attention dictates without prescribed rhythm or cut-off time. Unity is more
important in contemplating a work of art. But that is another matter. It is demanded
there because of the function which works of art perform in sustaining percipience
at a higher than usual level of intensity or richness of content. Without unity in the
object we must perceive in "bits," which we then bring together theoretically, and
there is no expansion of the perceptual act possible.
As had been said, our ordinairy way of perception enacts a kind of
fragmentation. We notice the world in small bits - for the most part qualities or
groups of qualities which are indicative of "things" and the causual relations among
things - and these we conceptualise and classify, then bring together the fragmented
impressions in conceptual understanding. It is second nature for us to see the world
like this for life demands it. But the expanded percipience which we enjoy in
aesthetic contact with successful works of art is in many ways the opposite of this.
We strive to actualise the complete presentation without bias and without
diminution or destortion. But perception can give no more than a reflection of the
object presented. Hence it is necessary that the presentational field (the visual or
sonorous construct which is the work of art) shall itself be a complex and unified
system of interacting perceptual relations - which is something different again from
a theoretical and analytically unified system. As an elementaty illustration of such
perceptual unity one might instance a Ben Nicholson abstract painting, in which the
not quite perfect circles and squares coalesce with each other and with the spaces
to the edges of the canvas to form a single coherent perceptual
structure. Unity of this sort is a practical requirement in a work of art because only
by its means can the work exercise and expand our powers of percipience. Of course,
the observer must also possess the skill to contemplate the work in the appropriate
way and this is the skill which must be cultivated and refined.
In still another sense it is claimed that in aesthetic experience a sense of unity may
be brought about between the ovserver and the object of completation. When we
listen enthralled to a piece of music, when we are totally engrossed in a work of
literature or of visual art, the sense of separate selfhood may temporarily lapse and
we seem to be immersed in the object of our contemplation. While there can be no
doubt as to the reality of such experiences, it is easy to exaggerate their implications
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in a mystical direction. This absorption in an object of interest with partial loss of

self-awareness is not peculiar to aesthetic activity but may occur also in other fields
where interest and attention are deeply engaged. None the less aesthetic experiences
of wild nature do often seem to merge into a panethistic and quasi-mystical feeling
of identification with the whole of creation. Hepburn has made reference to a
number of writers who have noticed this effect. Oriental writers on the other hand
tend to associate the experience of art with those sublime achievements of
concentration in which lapse of a sense of personal identity is combined with a
feeling of metaphysical oneness with the universe. In this vein Ki-soo Paik has
written:

Meditation shows us the road to the world of infinite freedom from restraint in the world
of reality. To enter into the truer world of meditation, one needs to experience a 'small
death'. Professor Imamichi wrote: 'Art is what brings a man a small death, where an ecstasy
is experienced.' Such a death, of course, does not mean actual death, but a spiritual
deliverance from the physical bond. Just as death means a separation of the soul from his
body, so in a genuine, profound artistic experience, in a meditative state of mind, his soul
is separated from his body to enable him to experience an ecstasy. It is an elevantion of the
soul towards the infinite which only art can afford to bless us with. IS

This is reminiscent of the "grand aesthetic thrill" of which Clive Bell spoke. Such
intensities take us beyond the ambit of more pedestrian art appreciation. Yet there
is evidence that even in less sublime moments successful commerce with great
masterpieces of art has something in common at least with the less elevated ranges
of mystical experience in that complete absorption in the object of contemplation
with lapse of the pervading consciousness of selfhood may induce states of mind
which it is tempting to think of as spiritual contact with a wider reality. For this
experience to occur, unity in the object such as can quicken and enlarge perceptual
animation beyond the ordinary is a necessary condition.

Imagination

Although the word has other applications, and although there can be imagination
without concrete imagery, the basic meaning of "imagination," and the meaning
most thoroughly studied by psychologists, is bringing before the mind a quasi-
perception or virtual presentation, a mental picture, as it is said, of something not
actually present. This may be the revival of a past impression or it may be a
combination of past impressions in a novel way. In either case there is an
implication of fictional unreality inherent in the concept of imagination.

15. "The Aesthetic Import of Black-Ink Painting and its Efficacy in the Age of Technology," in
Tomonobu Imamichi (ed.): Eco-Ethica et Valor (Acta Institutionis Philosophiae et Aestheticae,
Vol. I, Tokyo), p. 18. Dr. Ki-soo Paik is Professor of Philosophy at Seoul National University.
130

An element of imaginative unreality is implicit also in the conventions of

representation which are well understood by all normal people. We distinguish
without trouble between the photograph and that of which it is a photograph. And
we make a further distinction between the straight photograph and the artistic
photograph or the artist's picture. When we look at a still life we "see" a jug, bottle,
pheasants, grapes, etc. which are not actually present. We know without having to
.think about it that this particular group of objects nowhere exists (the grapes are
eaten or rotten and the pheasant too) and unless we are very naive, we know that
they probably never did exist just as they are depicted since artists usually modify
their models for aesthetic purposes. Yet the impression experienced is an actual
perception, not a mental image subjectively induced. In verbal communications we
distinguish between the purportedly true record (history, biography, newspaper
reports) and accounts of things which, we assume, never and nowhere existed. There
is also imaginative phantasy found typically in mythology, folk and fairy stories,
and tales of the marvellous such as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, or the Modern
Prometheus, Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring, the Uncle Remus series of J .C.
Harris, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Moby Dick. These and their visual
analogues may be described as presentations of things we believe could not exist or
ever have existed. The better modern science fiction occupies an intermediate
position combining an element of phantasy with extrapolation from what is known
to what might come to be.
These conventions belong to representation as such and are not peculiar to the
class of repesentations which engender aesthetic experience. Most people are
sufficiently familiar with them to be able to take them for granted without the need
of conscious thought. As childeren we learn to distinguish the phantasy of fairy
story from reports of real-life situations. All but quite primitive peoples are able to
distinguish pictures of photographs from the real thing and yet to recognise what
they represent. The unreality of acted drama is embodied in much primitive ritual
and dance and its acceptance becomes part of the acquired stock of unreflected
attitudes learned by members of more advanced societies at an early age. It is not
peculiar to aesthetic contacts with work of art. There the difficulty is learning to
suppress, or defuse, the sense of unreality and to contemplate the work as a newly
created thing without raising in one's mind the question of representational
verisimilitude. In art the work of imagination is done for us at this elementary level
and we are presented with the result. What is required is to apprehend this result
with acceptance and incorporate it into our store of experience. Apart from this we
find ourselves in the presence of a new thing endowed with aesthetic and expressive
qualities more concentrated and more unified than is usual with our ordinary
experience and imagining. The value lies in its power to exercise and enlarge our
faculty of percipience.
Most images of the imagination are constructed synthetically from previous
experience. The question therefore arises whether we can image, and therefore
whether we can imagine, something completely outside our experience. William
J ames believed that we cannot.
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Sensations once experienced, modify the nervous organism, so that copies of them arise again
in the mind after the ariginal stimulus is gone. No mental copy, however, can arise in the
mind, of any kind of sensation which has never been directly excited from without. The blind
may dream of sights, the deaf of sounds, for years after they have lost their vision or hearing;
but the man born deaf can never be made to imagine what sound is like, nor can the man
born blind ever have a mental vision. 16

Others have been less certain. 17 However that mey be, it is not to be disputed that
rich and varied store of sensitively realised experience is an important asset in those
who would actualise and make their own novelties and diversities of expressive
quality displayed by many products of the fine arts. Reciprocally, the rts can
notably enlarge one's store of imaginative experience.
On the basis of the foregoing analysis I will now mention briefly several function
of imagination which are prominent in aesthetic experience of the arts. 18

I. Holistic imagination

In the apprehension of the performing arts (literature, music, drama, film, dance),
whose presentation unrolls through time, we need at each moment of the
performance to retain in memory what has gone before and to link it with the
present happening. This retention of past material, which does not necessasrily
involve conscious recall, must be imaginatively married to the ongoing presentation,
and for this to happen each incident in the presentation must itself carry imaginative
intimations of what is to come as well as being integrated with what has gone before.
This continuing memory is something other than the recollection of past experiences
after an interval of oblivion. Without it we could not even hear a succession of
intervals as amelody or a sequence of words as a sentence. Rhythm would be
impossible. Over longer presentations it may rely in part on the impast of expressive
mood and feeling rather than precise mental imagery. But in either case it is this
which vivifies and gives meaning to the performance. As in life experience becomes
meaningless when a man has lost all memory of his past, so without this integrating
power of the imagination what we now hear or see in an artistic performance is
disconnected and devoid of sense. Without it we would be no more capable of
apprehending a performance as a unified whole than is a man who hears only
isolated fragments of a new musical composition in a style outside his experience.

16. William James, Principles of Psychology, Vol. ll, p. 44.

17. M. von Senden, Raum and Gestaltanfassung (Eng. Trans. Space and Sight, 1960) has interesting
experimental qualifications of this view.
18. In what follows I am deeply indebted to R.K. Elliott's Inaugural Lecture "Imagination: A Kind of
Magical Faculty" (1975). I am also indebted to Professor Elliott for reading the script of this paper
and for many useful suggestions, particularly in the section on Pleasure.
132

I/. Empathic imagination

R.K. Elliot says:

EmpathY, which is attributed to imagination, is the capacity for entering imaginally into the
situation of another person or animal, and assuming its expression; or into the situation and
expression of some quasi-person, such as a literary character; or of entering into and
assuming the anthropomorphised expression of some plant or inanimate object. Various
phenomena which we call 'identification' belong to this type of imagination.

Identification mayor may not occur in appreciatation and if it does, it may occur
with varying degrees of completeness. In any case empathic imagination must be
distinguished from the daydream, where a person uses some feature of the work he
is contemplating as a stimulus upon which to project an unreal situation usually
featuring wish-fulfillment. This is counterproductive and impedes a balanced
apprehension of the work. In appreciation the goal must be to apprehend correctly
the quality of feeling in the work and its expressive character. Sometimes it may help
to recall imaginatively a scene or a situation which has similar expressive quality
and, as the titles of some musical works testify, the imaginative evocation may
belong to a different domain of sensation from that of the work of art. Or a
situation or object may be presented with a different expressive character from that
which we customarily attach to it. Indeed it may be the point of a work to present
a familiar situation with new and unfamiliar expressive characteristics. Correct
appreciation demands realisation of the expressive character actually attrributed in
the work and failure to achieve this is failed appreciation. This requires empathic
imagination, perhaps with some measure of identification. Substitution of the
daydream type of imaginative projection is a lapse in appreciation. But without the
vivifying power of empathic imagination art becomes bleak and unrewarding, the
fleshless bones of a crumbling skeleton.

II/. Synthetic imagination

Both Holistic and Empathic imagination may be reagarded as special cases of the
more general category of Synthetic Imagination, which is what people most
commonly think of when they speak of imagination. It is the integration of past
impressions or ideas into hitherto unexperienced combinations and the creation of
novel conjunctions. This too is pervasive in life as in art and is closely linked with
empathic insight. The social reformer, for instance - to take an example from an
unrelated field - must picture the effects of the changes he wants and must have
sympathetic or empathic insight in order to judge what the world would be like if
his proposed reforms were successfully introduced. It is synthetic imagination that
discovers likenesses and finds similes in the world around us. Hepburn points to "a
kind of exhileration, a delight that the forms of the natural world offer scope for
 133

the exercise of imagination, the leaf pattern chimes with the vein pattern the cloud
form with the mountain form and the mountain form with the human form." And
he thinks that when we find nature beautiful "an important part of our meaning
is just this, that nature's forms do provide this scope for imaginative play." In the
appreciation of art this combinatorial play of imagination is not required or
permitted. The job is done by the creative artist. But if this power of imagination
is undeveloped in a spectator, he will be unable to follow or appreciate what the
artist has done and for him the work will be dead. Without the'power of synthetic
imagination appreciation is frustrated at the start. Conversely, contact with works
of art is an important factor in stimulating and strengtening this power. As Elliot
has said: "Synoptic imagination is, in the sphere of contemplation, what creative
imagination is in the sphere of production."
Synthetic or synoptic imagination culminates in the creative act of metaphor,
where things different are not merely juxtaposed for comparison as when a cloud
looks like a camel, but are fused in such a way that each of them acquires a fresh
expressive personality in the new entity which is brought into being. I have always
regarded T.S. Eliot's "damp souls of housemaids/sprouting despondently at area
gates" as an exemplary instance of this. Apparently fine metaphor cannot be
achieved by logical calculation or by the deliberate manipulation of likenesses but
comes into being only through the "creative leap" of inspired imagination. An
analogous creative combination of forms which do not ordinarily "belong"
together may occur in visual art - which is not the same thing as combining
representational allusions for the sake of ambiguity or shock. Visual metaphor may
be seen at its best in many of the later paintings of Picasso from the years 1964 to
1972. In music it is not possible to speak of metaphor in this sense. But in a good
Air and Variations a theme recurs with changing expressive personality or
sometimes a melody acquires a new personality by a change of rhythm and tempo
as Bach's conversion of the lively dance tune Sellenger's Round into the solemn
hymn tune "Valet will ich" - an example used by Vaughan Williams in his lectures
at Cornell University published as The Making of Music(1955).
There are examples in literature which do not merely display the result of
metaphorical imagination but reveal the creative activity itself. Of Rimbaud's Les
Illuminations Archibald MacLeish once wrote:

The Illuminations are not visionary poems of the sort with which literature is elsewhere
familiar - descriptions of visions, recollections of visions, accounts of visions. They are the
visions themselves: the images and rhythms and dislocations in which the visions present
themselves. 19

An analogy to this may be found in the drawings of Henri Michaux and the "delires
organises" - as Michel Seuphor called them - of Wols.

19. Archibald Macleish, Poetry and Experience (1960), p. 167.

134

The production of metaphor belongs to the creative act of the artist. But to savour
and appreciate metaphor in its full richness demands both an alert responsive
imagination and a wide stock of sensitively realised experience.

Pleasure

In one form or another hedonistic assumptions have dominated aesthetic theory

from classical antiquity until today. The Greek name for what we call the fine arts
was "the pleasure-giving crafts" and this attitude has persisted. It was the aim of
the eighteenth-century English and Scottish philosophers in the field which we now
call Aesthetics to investigate what, in the words of Hume, "has been universally
found to please in all countries and all ages. ,,20 Burke wrote in his Enquiry:

On the whole it appears to me, that what is called taste, in its most general acceptation, is
not a simple idea, but is partly made of a perception of the primary pleasures of sense, of
the secondary pleasures of the imagination, and of the conclusions of the reasoning faculty
concerning the various relations of these .... 21

The survival of this outlook is evidenced by the assimilation of such terms as

"pleasure", "enjoyment", "satisfaction", "admiration", "gratification," etc.
into the language of aesthetic philosophy and criticism. G.E. Moore was in line with
this practice when he used "aesthetic enjoyment" and "appreciation"
interchageably. Liking and dislike are central to Urmson's definition of elementary
aesthetic reaction. Hepburn uses such words as "enjoy" and "admire" as synonyms
for aesthetic approval and the practice is quite general. It is characteristic of this
hedonistic outlook to make pleasure an essential element in the definition of
aesthetic experience and also at the same time the criterion for assessing the relative
aesthetic value of the objects of that experience. Thus Monroe C. Beardsley wrote:

The amount of aesthetic value-possessed by an object is a function of the degree of aesthetic

gratification it is capable of providing in a particular experience of it. 22

20. David Hume, "Of the Standard of Taste" (1941).

21. Edmund Burke, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin oj Our Ideas oj the Sublime and Beautiful
(1957).
22. Monroe C. Beardsley, "The Aestetic Point of View."Reprinted in the selection by that name edited
brMichael J. Wreen and Donald M. Callen (1982), p. 23.
 135

Concurrently with this has been a disposition to find aesthetic value in certain
objective properties of things. The Greeks had their canons of beauty which, they
thought, were objectively valid both for nature and for art. The concept of
symmetry has had a long history from antiquity until today.23 From the Middle
Ages attention has been directed upon such properties of the world as order,
harmony, completeness, unity and complexity, fitness, appropriateness, etc. While
hedonic theories are incurably subjective - people like different things, it is as simple
and as inescapable as that - theories which correlate aesthetic excellence with
objectively discernible properties may aspire to intersubjective validity. But the
question inevitably arises: what do we mean when we assert that the possession of
such and such objective properties constitutes the possessor beautiful? For we
obviously mean more than the tautological affirmation that it does indeed possess
the properties named. The answer usually given is that because of these properties
the object is capable of giving satisfaction or pleasure when contemplated
aesthetically. And so we make full circle to the hedonic criterion.
Faced with this dilemma Kant excluded sensuous pleasure and occurrant emotion
from his definition of aesthetic response, adopting as his criterion of aesthetic value
a mental pleasure deriving from the harmonious interplay of perception and
imagination in the contemplation of an object possessing what we would now call
organic unity. His precise meaning is still disputed. His followers today discriminate
aesthetic pleasure not as the subjective pleasure afforded by the exercise of a trained
faculty but as pleasure deriving from particular sources in the object of attention.
Beardsley, for example, writes:

Gratification is aesthetic when it is obtained primarily from attention to the formal unity
and/or the regional qualities of a complex whole, and when its magnitude is a function of
the degree of formal unity and/or the intensity of regional quality.24

What is not sufficiently realised is the difficulty of putting this principle of

discrimination precisely into practice. And this for two reasons. (a) Pleasures - or
at any rate the pleasures attendant upon any absorbed activity - differ from feelings
and sensations in that they tend to be impervious to awareness until they are over.
If temporarily you deflect your attention from a pain and no longer feel it, then
someone asks: does it hurt? the pain is back. But if, when you are wrapped up in
aesthetic contemplation someone asks: are you enjoying it? concentration is
disrupted, attention is deflected from the object to your own feelings and the
enjoyment is gone. Pertinently, if in a different connection, J. C. B. Gosling has
said:

23. See my article "Symetry as an Aesthetic Factor" in the journal Computers and Mathematics with
Applications (1985).
24. Loc.cit., p. 22.
136

Whereas pains attract attention to themselves, it is characteristic of pleasure that attention

be attracted to that in which pleasure is taken ... the person who is enjoying a ski-run, a
Mozart symphony, a beef-steak must at least be attending to the skiing, the symphony, or
the steak. If his attention is distracted, his enjoyment is interrupted. 25

(b) As works of art carry other values than aesthetic values, so they offer occasion
for many pleasures other than aesthetic pleasures. When contemplation is over,
however, it is not necessarily possible afterwards to analyse and parcel out the
remembered pleasure, except sometimes very crudely, among the diverse sources.
Nor is it possible to attend to formal order without attending to the "content"
which is ordered and unified and which is likely itself to contain sources of non-
aesthetic pleasure. The experience of a work of art is holistic and cannot in practice
be dismembered in the way suggested.
The criterion of aesthetic excellence must, 1 believe, be sought in the quality of
the experience itself, in its intensity and its depth. At best pleasure is a subsidiary
factor. When percipience is exercised and enhanced, when perception is enlarged
and animated above the ordinaty, that is our standard of assessment. Kant himself
used the words Erweiterung and Erlebung. Beyond that we do not need to go.
Having formulated these general principles, which 1 believe to be valid, 1 must,
however, immediately introduce qualifications.
(I) 1 do not believe that we can go all the way with Kant in his exclusion of
sensuous pleasure from the scope of the aesthetic or that it would be sensible to do
so. Although this does not directly affect the sonorous structure which we call a
musical composition, we take pleasure in the "good tone" of a noble violin played
by an expert. We enjoy the sheer vocal quality of a Caruso, Chaliapin, Michaeloff,
Pol Plancon. We delight in the strange harmonies derived from Scriabin's chord of
superposed fourths. Despite Stravinsky's warning against regarding orchestration
"as source of enjoyment independent of the music," we are moved by the
"vibrating transparancy"(Eric Satie's phrase) of his orchestration in Le Sacre du
printemps and by the new sonorities initiated by Edgar Varese. We delight in the
light which floods Vermeer's interiors, in the quality of Frans Hals's texture, so
different from that of Seurat, Soutine, Poliakoff and Vieira da Silva. We have
intense satisfaction in the draughtsmanship of Ingres, whose maxim was "Le dessin
est la probite de l'art," in the quaity of line displayed by early drypoints of Picasso
and - too often overlooked -by Andy Warhol's drawings of fancy shoes. Although
they demand a measure of trained sensivility, all these things are sensuous pleasures.
Yet it would smack of the eccentric to disbar them from the scope of aesthetic
experience.
(II)Altough there is truth in Gosling's account of pleasure, yet taken alone

25. J.e.B. Gosling, Pleasure and Desire (1969), p. 57.

 137

without qualification it is too downright. The human mind is a complicated machine

which can work in different ways simultaneously and manages to contradict most
of the rules laid down for its behavior. We do in fact often conciously enjoy
particular features in a 'f'ork of art and can do so without stultifying the act of
appreciation, whether it be of music, painting or poetry. Only as we come to know
a work better through repeated appreciative contacts with it do the incidental
delights tend to merge into our absorbed enjoyment of the whole. But however this
may be, in the long run it remains true that it is the richness and intensity of the
perceptual experience that is our criterion for judging aesthetic excellence rather
than an accumulation of particular felicities.
(III) Finally, the idea that the criterion of aesthetic evaluation is simply the degree
of pleasure derived from successful exercise of a cultivated skill - in this case skill
in the field of sensibility and percipience - is too introverted to be plausible. When
a philosopher or a mathematician is said to enjoy the practice of his craft the
enjoyment is indeed pleasure in the exercise of an intellectual skill, as a cricketer or
a footballer finds pleasure in the depolyment of a skill which is his. But perception
is outwardly turned and subjectively the pleasure taken in successful contemplation
is experienced as pleasure bestowed by the object of contemplatioin. Subjectively
we enjoy the felicities of works of art in the same manner as we enjoy natural
beauties.
The question remains whether, as is so often assumed in aesthetic theory, pleasure
is a necessary constituent of aesthetic experience, i.e. whether it is rightly made part
of the definition of such experience. Certainly no one would doubt that pleasure is
an usual concomitant of successful aesthetic experience and this is held to be so even
when the object of experience, as in some drama, is fraught with pain. The theory
of emotional detachment is invoked to explain how it is we can enjoy the
contemplation of aesthetic presentations of painful things. But just as certainly
there is no logical necessity why aesthetic experience should always be pleasant.
Imagine a man who could rival a sensitive connoisseur or critic in his discriminating
appreciation of a work of art but took no pleasure in doing this. We might well say
that he was a rara avis, an unusual sort of fellow, but I do not believe that we should
have grounds for denying that his experience was aesthetic. I think that such persons
de exist, though because of the difficulties of communicating aesthetic experiences
I cannot prove this. And there are interesting indications from other fields. A skilled
wine taster does not derive the same pleasure from the wines he tastes as that of the
connoisseur of wines who follows his lead. An expert in descriminating and
combining odours does not take the delight in them that is experienced by
purchasers of the perfumes he has created. Is pleasure an invariable concomitant
without which an experience would not be properly called aesthetic?
Pleasure is neither a necessary concomitant of aesthetic experience nor a
practicable criterion of aesthetic excellence.
138

Aesthetic solitude

We have our private feelings, moods and sensations. But the bulk of our lives is
lived in a public world, stamped and circumscribed by the forms and traditions of
the society to which we belong. Through language we are integrated into the life and
thoughts, the hopes and aspirations, the prejudices, assumptions and fears of those
with whom we have to do - and the rapid technolofical advances in communication
media are continually widening the circle of those who constitute the "society" of
each one of us. All our overt thinking, whether shared through spoken language or
verbalised internally within ourselves, is carried on in terms of concepts, which are
public objects, common coin. Once experience has been conceptualised by putting
it in language, it is public, but at the same time it is shorn of immediacy and reduced
to those features which are common to a whole class of experiences. By the clothing
of language, experience is etoilated, bleached and diminished, transmogrified into
the intellectual counters of discursive discourse which, like monetary instruments,
are voided of intrinsic value. Our mental world is a public, social world to an extent
which we seldom realise. Even our daydreams and private recollections don this
public attire.
From this immersion of the individual into the social context aesthetic experience
offers a way of escape. Through it a man may find a path leading back into himself.
In contrast to our public personalities it is minted from impressions which are
private to each one of us, not transmuted into public, intersubjective categories. It
cannot be verbalised. It can be communicated to others only with the imprecision
of gestures, though it is the most concrete and precise of all experiences. The
reactions of other people may be similar to ours or different, but they are in either
case irrelevant at least until we pass again into the public, social world of linguistic
expression and deprived experience. Aesthetic engrossment creates a world of its
own, and it is a realm of solitude. But this solitude is not loneliness, not isolation
in the midst of a shared world. It is a solitude that is integral to each man's concern
with his own spiritual development and in this respect it has something in common
with induced meditation and the cultivation of religious experience. By sharpening
sensibility and expanding awareness aesthetic experience resists the encroachment of
socialisation, combats the tendency to superficiality which lurks in all of us, enlarges
self-knowledge and activates the deepest levels of our individual contacts with the
evironment amidst which our lives unroll.
 139

ESSAY TEN

CONTROVERSY ABOUT AESTHETIC ATTITUDE:

DOES AESTHETIC ATTITUDE CONDITION AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE?

Bohdan Dziemidok

The origin of the notion of aesthetic attitude is usually derived from I. Kant and
English eighteenth-century philosphers (A. Shaftesbury, E. Burke and others).
Historians of philosophy, however, have discovered that the first one to use the
notion of aesthetic attitude was Arthur Schopenhauer in his work of 1818, Die Welt
als Wille und Vorstellung (Book III, paragraph 38). Characterizing aesthetic
experience, Schopenhauer came to the conclusion that it is a contemplation in which
the subject concentrates exclusively on what stands in front of him, getting
immersed in the object of contemplation and leaving behind his ordinary practical
attitude. The experiencing subject's state of mental surrender to an object
Schopenhauer labelled contemplation, aesthetic enjoyment, (aesthetisches
Woh1gefallen), i.e., aesthetic attitude (aesthetische Betrachtungsweise). Even
though there has never been a unanimity among the twentieth-century theoreticians
as to the precise meaning of this notion, it has become a popular claim that
"aesthetic attitude" is a key notion for aesthetic considerations and that it may
become an efficient epistemological tool to separate aesthetic phenomena and define
their specific nature.
All attempts to separate and characterize the aesthetic sphere in a purely objective
way (firstly in terms of beautiful objects and later of aesthetic objects) have so far
appeared futile. It appeared impossible to find common and specific characteristics
of such diverse objects as a sonnet, a sonata, a gothic cathedral, a realistic
landscape, an ornamented chest of drawers or a film tragedy (to confine oneself to
works of art only). Thus the uniqueness of aesthetic phenomena began to be
searched for in the sphere of experience. It was thought that the sole feature all these
objects had in common was their ability to generate experiences, different from the
cognitive, religious or sexual ones. Yet this method of reasoning proved
unsuccessful. Experiences taken as aesthetic proved so diverse that no one managed
to find such a set of charcteristics which could be common to all aesthetic
experiences exclusively, while being different from all non-aesthetic ones. Then
some theoreticians came to believe that there exists a specific attitude which enables

Mitias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility of the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht
140

the subject to undergo these experiences, and that the attitude in question is the
feature common to all aesthetic experiences. The definition of this specifically
aesthetic standpoint was not only to help distinguish between aesthetic and non-
aesthetic experiences but was also meant to be a starting point for discerning the
actual objects of aesthetics.
In the present work I will make an effort to find an answer to one of the major
problems of the theory of aesthetic experience, which may be formulated as the
question of whether the aesthetic attitude is a necessary subjective condition of
aesthetic experience. I hope that at the same time I will manage to analyze two other
important issues: (1) of the role which aesthetic attitude plays in aesthetic situation
and especially in aesthetic contact with a work of art; (2) of whether, and to what
extent, the notion of aesthetic attitude may be epistemologically useful when
analyzing aesthetic phenomena in general, and in the theory of aesthetic experiences
in particular. The work is of theoretical-historical character. My endeavour to find
solutions to these questions is founded on a systematic presentation of major
approaches and takes into account the arguments of both the adherents to and
opponents of the theory of aesthetic attitude.

I. The meaning of "atitude" in the expression of "aesthetic attitude"

A glance at the literature devoted to our problem convinces us easily that the notion
of "attitude" belongs to the most ambiguous and even obscure terms. The situation
is furthermore complicated by the fact that the term in question is in current usage
not only in aesthetics but also in psychology and sociology. In order to determine
the uniqueness of the aesthetic attitude assumed towards a work of art and to
distinguish it from other attitudes we have to solve the following basic problem in
the first place: what is to be understood by the concept of attitude? Aesteticians,
psychologists and sociologists all differ in their understanding of attitude as an
element of the above mentioned category. When analyzing the concept of
"attitude" I believe we should answer the following questions: (1) Does the attitude
mean a readiness to perceive in a certain way, or does it imply a readiness for a
certain reaction? Or does it denote an actual relation of the experiencing subject to
the object of the experience or to the experience as such? (2) Is the aesthetic attitude
meant to be a definite (more or less complicated) state of mind or only a mode of
perceiving (looking, hearing) various phenomena (objects, situations)? (3) Is the
attitude a more or less constant disposition to react to some stimuli, or it is a
changeable, even momentary relation to certain phenomena?
The above enumerated questions imply that the notion of "attitude" is capable
of bearing six major, related yet different, meanings. It would require an effort not
to notice that the term is being used by aestheticians in all six meanings; it happens
that one and the same author uses it in various meanings in the same work, which
leads, mildly speaking, to a terminological horror.
 141

The word "attitude" is understood by aestheticians either as readiness to receive

certain experiences or as an actual relation between the subject and the object of
experience. S. Ossowski was aware of this already in 1932. He himself was apt to
take the aesthetic attitude as a relation to an object. It seems worthwhile
maintaining his opinion while labelling this readiness as "aesthetic set." A similar
opinion among Polish aestheticians was voiced by J. Segal as early as 1911. Similar
distinctions can be found in the works of some psychologists (e.g., F. H. Allport,
E. Hilgard, K. Obuchowski) who take "set" as an organic readiness towards a given
action or experience, and "attitude" as a relation to an object or situation. Such
distinctions are not commonly accepted or possible in all languages. In Russian, for
instance, the word ustanovka (Polish nastawienie) embraces both meanings. In
consequence, using the term "esteticheskaya ustanovka" some Soviet aestheticians
take it exclusively as readiness towards a definite experience (e.g. L. Stolovich),
whereas some others treat it as a relation to an object (M. S. Kagan). It appears
though that it would be more advantageous for aesthetics to accept this distinction
wherever possible, instead of using one word in a double meaning or employing the
notions of aesthetic set and aesthetic attitude interchangeably as it was even done
by so prominent a theoretician as Roman Ingarden.
This distinction should allow us to make the concepts less ambiguous and help
solve the remaining problems, mentioned above, by virtue of linking "aesthetic
attitude" with a definite way of perceiving an object and an actual relation to it.

II. Major approaches to the definition of "aesthetic attitude"

There is no unanimous opinion among the authors who deal with the aesthetic
attitude as to whether it is both necessary and posssible to provide its definition.
Various approaches to that problem may be, I believe, classified into some basic
groups.
1. The first group comprises authors who believe that to define the aesthetic
attitude is both necessary and possible.
2. The second group embraces those theoreticians who claim that the notion of
"aesthetic attitude" is necessary and endeavour to separate it from other kinds of
attitudes and provide its complex characteristics. However, they resign from
providing a definition of this notion.
3. The third approach is represented by those authors who, although they do not
question the necessity of separating aesthetic attitudes from non-aesthetic ones,
reject, at the same time, the existence of a uniform and universal aesthetic attitude.
They claim that there exist various equally justified aesthetic attitudes.
4. Finally, the last group comprises those aestheticians who question the need
to define the aesthetic attitude because in their opinion there is nothing like a
separate aesthetic attitude.
I will discuss the four approaches distinguished by me in an order different from
142

the one signalled above. Having shortly discussed major monistic concepts of the
aesthetic attitude I will present their criticism first and only later will I present the
views of those theoreticians who resign from defining this category, as well as of
those who represent the pluralistic approach. The diversion from the order of
presentation results from the fact that the criticism of the theory of the aesthetic
attitude concerns almost exclusively monistic conceptions whereas the existence of
other approaches to that question is ignored by the theoreticians negating this
theory.

A. Monistic conceptions of aesthetic attitude

Among the adherents to the conception of the aesthetic attitude there are numerous
theoreticians who claim that the notion of the "aesthetic attitude" may be defined
by pointing to a single most essential and constitutive feature of that attitude. In
the definitions they attempt to define the aesthetic attitude by virtue of a single
notion which should help discern its essence. The notions which are most often used
are the notions of "disinterestedness" (disinterested approval), "contemplation"
(also disinterested or non-intellectual contemplation), "concentrated attention"
(also concentration and intransitive attention), "an interest in the look",
"distance" and "isolation." At present the conception of empathy, so popular at
the beginning of the twentieth century, has only a few supporters.
It seems to me to be useful to provide concise characteristics of the most
important monistic conceptions of the aesthetic attitude and to signal some doubts
which they evoke.

1. The conception of disinterestedness

Since Kant it has become almost an aesthetic axiom that the aesthetic attitude and
the aesthetic experience as well is disinterested and fully non-practical. It is therefore
not surprising that many of the twentieth-century aestheticians define the aesthetic
attitude as a "disinterested contemplation" (Roger Fry), "disinterested attention"
(J. Stolnitz), and the like. The conception of disinterestedness had also many
opponents and was criticised many a time. First of all, the very notion of
"disinterestedness" is ambiguous. Even with Kant the notion of "disinterested
satisfaction" is variously understood. Kant's formulations are not clear enough and
unequivocal, and the explications provided by him do not coincide. As it has been
noticed by S. Ossowski, the term "disinterested satisfaction," as used by Kant,
f~nctions in three basic meanings: (a) the satisfaction independent of the conviction
as to whether the object exists or not; (b) the satisfaction without the desire to
possess; (c) the satisfaction without personal motivations. The opponents of the
conception of disinterestedness (among others W. Witwicki, M. Wallis, and G.
Dickie) did not confine their criticism to showing the ambiguities of that notion.
They also questioned the interpretations according to which complete
 143

disinterestedness, the absence of utilitarian colouring and complete detachment

from practical life are the most important features of that attitude. They pointed
to the fact, for example, that aesthetic satisfaction, use or practicality do not
exclude each other. Some objects (e.g., garments, furniture, buildings) are both
beautiful and useful. At the same time their purposeful form is responsible for the
fact that we find even more satisfaction in them. They also stressed that aesthetic
satisfaction does not exclude desires and wants of the subject. It is a rule that people
want to possess objects which they like. Aesthetic satisfaction does not have to
exclude erotic experience which can hardly be called disinterested, impersonal or
desireless. An intensive sexual desire destroys aesthetic experience. This last one,
however, may quite harmoniously go together with erotic fascination. The criticism
of the conception of disinterestedness of the aesthetic attitude resulted in the
rejection of inappropriate interpretations of disinterestedness. This does not,
however, mean that the theory in question should be completely disqualified. Its
adherents sometimes intend only to say that the aesthetic experience makes an aim
in itself and that simultaneous intensive desire or considerable engagement into
practical affairs exert a destructive influence upon the aesthetic attitude and the
aesthetic experience. The theories of disinterestedness were quite often treated
together with the conception of contemplation.

2. The conceptions of contemplation

The theory of contemplation is one of the oldest and most popular theories of the
aesthetic attitude and aesthetic experience. It was initiated by A. Schopenhauer. o.
Kiilpe, J. Segal, C. J. Ducasse, S. Ossowski, P. Haezrahi, J. Stolnitz and E. Vivas
count as the best known representatives of the theory of contemplation. The notion
of contemplation is equally ambiguous as the notion of disinterestedness. An
insightful analysis of the notion of contemplation made by M. Wallis proved that
the notion functions in at least four different meanings: (a) completely passive and
inactive perception of an object (e.g., J. Segal, H. Elzenberg, P. Haezrahi); (b)
direct observation (that is how the notion in question was understood by Ingarden
and Blaustein who, however, did not support contemplationism); (c) passionless
perception (L. Chwistek's criticism of contemplationism); (d) longer and complete
focussing of one's attention on the object (e.g., M. Wallis, E. Vivas, and J.
Stolnitz). Not all proponents of the theory of contemplation chose one of the above
mentioned meanings. C. J. Ducasse, for example, was of an opinion that aesthetic
contemplation is "listening" or "looking," with our capacity for feeling. In other
words, contemplation is the perception of objects which allows us to read the
feeling-import embodied in them. For Ossowski the "contemplative experiencing of
the here and now" is the feature of all aesthetic experiences.
The proponents of the theory of contemplation, when speaking about the
aesthetic attitude, used as a rule the notion of contemplation in the first and the
fourth meanings. The version of the theory of contemplation which is most often
criticized is the one whose proponents advocated the view that the aesthetic attitude
144

may be reduced to a completely passive and inactive perception. The theory was
opposed by all those who held that the aesthetic experience in general and the
aesthetic experience evoked by a work of art in particular is very active, or at least
contains phases of psychic activity of considerable power. This view was opposed
by the authors and followers of the theory of empathy (Th. Lipps, J. Vol kelt , V.
Lee, and others), by I. A. Richards, the author of the theory of synaesthesis, by
phenomenologists (R. Ingarden and L. Blaustein), by J. Dewey and those American
aestheticians who were inspired by him: M. C. Beardsley and A. Berleant.
The theory of contemplation was thus criticised from various positions and for
various reasons. Its criticism proved that contemplation in the first meaning cannot
be accepted as a universal model of the aesthetic attitude. The conception of
contemplation could only be defended within the framework of the pluralistic
theory of the aesthetic attitudes or when one accepts with Ingarden and Rader that
the contemplation in this meaning can be treated as one of the phases of a complex
and heterogeneous psychic process of the aesthetic experience.

3. The theories oj distance and isolation

A fairly large group of aestheticians support the concept of distance and isolation
in their understanding of the aesthetic attitude. These theoreticians (they are called
"isolationists" by M. Rader) hold that the specificity of the aesthetic attitude and
experience may be best characterized using the notions of distance and isolation,
understood, it should be added, quite often differently.
The concept of "psychical distance," which first appeared earlier, was given its
classical formulation in 1912 by a British psychologist and aesthetician Edward
Bullough in his paper "Psychical Distance as a Factor in Art and an Aesthetic
Principle." Bullough views the psychical distance as a very important feature of the
aesthetic attitude and a necessary condition of the aesthetic experience. The distance
can be reached when we look at things "objectively," interpreting even our very
subjective emotions as features of the object. The distance has its negative and
positive aspects. The negative aspect consists in "putting the object out of gear with
the practical sides of things and with our practical attitude to them" while the
positive aspect makes possible "the elaboration of the experience on a new basis
created by the inhibitory action of Distance." The degree of the distance depends
on both the objective and subjective factors. However, the maximal distance does
not create the best conditions for the aesthetic experience to take place. Optimal
conditions are met when "the distance is smallest but still present," i.e., when the
distance goes hand in hand with the maximum of personal involvement. This is the
essence of Bullough's principle of the "antinomy of distance."
The American aesthetician of German origin, Hugo Miinsterberg, is considered
to be one of the proponents of the isolation concept which he first employed in his
book Principles oj Art Education when characterizing the specific nature of
aesthetic contemplation.
Among the proponents of both theories as well as among the authors employing
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this notion only in order to characterize various phases of the aesthetic experience
no unanimity can be found on two basic issues.
1. To what elements of the aesthetic experience do distance and isolation
pertain? Is distance supposed to characterize the relation of the subject to the whole
object of the experience (e.g. Blaustein), or of the subject to only one aspect of the
object (e.g., only the stratum of represented objects, according to I ngarden) , or,
finally, should the subject relate from a distance to his own experiences evoked by
the object? Should the object be isolated from the practical needs and goals of the
subject (Bullough) or from the real world (Miinsterberg), or should the aesthetic
experience and not the subject, be isolated from the needs and aspirations of
everyday life (Hospers), or, finally, should the isolation be perhaps treated as
twofold in that both the object and the subject would be isolated: the first one from
reality and the other from his own memories and desires connected with reality
(Wallis)?
2. Should distance and isolation be complete (J. Ortega y Gasset) or only partial
(S. C. Pepper)? Should they be permanent or intercepted by periods when personal
involvement dispels both distance and isolation while the subject is no longer a
spectator but becomes a participant (E. Kris and S. Lesser)?
The theory of psychic distance has, up until now, quite a number of proponents
who defend it against the attacks of G. Dickie (A Casebier, R. Cormier, S. Pandit,
K. Price and others).

4. The theory of interest in the look

In the 1930s one of the versions of this theory was proposed by a Polish psychologist
and theoretician of painting, Wladyslaw Witwicki. He thought that the aesthetic
attitude consists in a readiness for a direct interest in the look of the object and in
the emotional reaction to that look.
At the end of the 1950s an American theoretician, Vincent Tomas, and a British
aesthetician, Frank Sibley, became proponents of a different version of this
conception. They were both of an opinion that the interest in the looks of objects
is a necessary, though not sufficient, condition for the aesthetic experience to take
place. Their ideas differed basically a~ to the question of the reality of objects whose
looks evoke aesthetic interest. Tomas claimed that the problem of the real existence
of these objects is irrelevant, while Sibley was trying to prove otherwise, since the
question of whether objects exist or not may, in many cases, be of importance for
our aesthetic reaction to their looks.
The universal character of Witwicki's, Tomas's and Sibley's conception may
easily be questioned. Readiness for the looks of objects of the aesthetic attitude
cannot be treated as an important feature of the aesthetic attitude since not all
objects of this experience have looks. The key argument against the theory in
question is literature, and prose in particular.
This conception, like the conceptions discussed before, contains some truth and
may be defined as one of the conceptions which are possible within the framework
of the pluralistic theory.
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B. The criticism of the conceptions of the aesthetic attitude

Doubts and criticisms as to the conception of the aesthetic attitude could be heard
as early as in the 1920s and 1930s. As far as I know, the first to criticize not only
the theory of the aesthetic attitude but also of the concept of the aesthetic experience
sui generis was a British theoretician, 1. A. Richards, who, in his well-known book,
Principles of Literary Criticism (1925), questioned the commonly accepted
assumption that there exists a special kind of psychic attitude or psychic activity
which could be called aesthetic. In his opinion particular experiences treated as
aesthetic differ from each other quite considerably. On the other hand, it is difficult
to spot a difference between them and those experiences which are not labelled
aesthetic. Richards called the problem of the aesthetic attitude the "phantom
problem," and treated the very conception of the aesthetic attitude as a myth. Ten
years later a similar severe criticism of that conception was offered by a Polish
educationist and philosopher of culture, B. Suchodolski, who in his work Wielkosc
sztuki a odrodzenie kultury (Greatness of Art and the Revival of Culture), protested
first of all against creating an opposition between the aesthetic attitude and the
practical attitude, and called the conception in question "a harmful myth
scientifically codifying the removal of art from life."
Richard's and Suchodolski's criticisms, however, did not exert any visible
influence upon the theories in aesthetics.
It was only in the sixties that a very severe and thorough criticism of the theory
made by American aestheticians met with a considerable response and diminished
considerably its popularity. The criticism was offered by the representatives of then
the most influential current of analytical-linguistic aesthetics, anti-essentialism. The
first ones to start the criticism were Marshall Cohen and Joseph Margolis, but the
most consistent, most radical and stilI active critic of this conception has been
George Dickie. It was his criticism which made some theoreticians working
intensively on the problems of the aesthetic experience (e.g. M. C. Beardsley) give
up this notion (or speaking more precisely, this expression, since instead of
"aesthetic attitude" Beardsley now uses a related expression "aesthetic point of
view" or "aesthetic interest" 1.
M. Cohen in his 1959 paper "Appearance and the Aesthetic Attitude" criticized
one of the monistic versions of theory of the aesthetic attitude which reduced it to
focussing attention on the looks of objects (V. Thomas and F. Sibley). However,

1. It is worth noting that Beardsley who has accepted Dickie's criticism and no longer uses the
expression "aesthetic attitude," when enumerating five basic features of the aesthetic experience
still lists as the first three of them the features which are commonly ascribed to the aesthetic attitude:
1) object directedness of attention,
2) feeling of liberation from the contingencies of the past and the future,
3) emotional distance.
Cf. M. C. Beardsley, The Aesthetic Point oj View. Selected Essays (Ithaca: Cornell University
Press, 1982), p. 288.
 147

he did not restrict his criticism to questioning the view that the aesthetic attitude thus
understood is the necessary condition for the aesthetic experience since he closes his
paper with a more general remark: "The aesthetic attitude is an illusion and art a
reality." Some years later, in 1965, in his article "Aesthetic Essence" he launched
a general attack against all essentialist conceptions of the aesthetic attitude and
experience. In his opinion, the view that there is an important feature which
separates aesthetic experience from non-practical or intellectual (cognitive)
experience cannot be sufficiently justified. He questioned all conceptions of the
aesthetic attitude claiming that there are some specific mental states or kinds of
psychic activity which are the necessary condition of the aesthetic experience. Cohen
did not negate the fact that some attitudes may make it difficult or even impossible
to experience art. He also admitted that in order to experience some particular
works of art some specific conditions would have to be fulfilled. For example, a
condition of that sort may be a certain amount of knowledge about the history of
literature or, for that matter, patience, which may appear to be the condition for
finding satisfaction in reading Marcel Proust's novels. It does not mean, however,
that it is possible to detect empirically which kinds of sensations, emotions and
attitudes may be evoked by all existing and possible works of art. Concluding,
Cohen says that in his opinion there exists neither a special type of activity (like,
for example, contemplation) nor a mental state (like keeping the aesthetic distance)
which would be necessary for the aesthetic experience. 2
In 1964 G. Dickie published his perhaps best known paper "The Myth of the
Aesthetic Attitude" in which he put forward a thesis that the aesthetic attitude is
a myth which is not only no longer useful but which is harmful for the aesthetic
theory. To justify his thesis Dickie criticized three versions of the monistic
conceptions of the aesthetic attitude: the theory of psychical distance (E. Bullough
and S. Dawson), the conception of disinterestedness of J. Stolnitz and E. Vivas, and
the theory of interest in the looks as defended by V. Tomas. Dickie criticized the
terminology of particular theories, the arguments employed by their authors and the
usefulness of the examples which they use. As the next move, he endeavoured to
prove that the theory of the aesthetic attitude bears some additional theoretical
difficulties and results in wrong conclusions, thus leading the aesthetic theory in the
wrong direction. In order to justify this view, he focussed his attention on providing
that the thtOreticians of the aesthetic attitude (represented exclusively by Stolnitz
and Vivas) commit a three-fold mistake as to (1) the way in which the limits of
aesthetic relevance are established; (2) the characteristics of the relation of the critic
to the work of art they provide; and (3) the way in which they understand the
question of the relation between morality and the aesthetic values. In principle
Dickie is right in his criticism of Stolnitz's and Vivas's solutions to these questions.
Neither excessive separation of the critic's attitude from the attitude taken by an
"ordinary" beholder of art nor the treatment of the aesthetic values of the work

2. M. Cohen, "Aesthetic Essence," in: M. Black, ed., Philosophy in America (London, 1965), p. 120.
148

of art as if they were completely independent of the moral content which finds in
them its expression is appropriate. Do the facts that moral visions expressed in the
work may have aesthetic relevance and that a critic differs from an ordinary
beholder of a work of art mainly because of his own specific motives and iIltentions
and not because of a totally distinct way of the work's experiencing entail that the
aesthetic attitude is myth?
Dickie continued his criticism of the theory of the aesthetic attitude in his books
and in particular in his first work Aesthetics: An Introduction (1971). There he
made three conceptions the objects of his criticism: (1) the conception of aesthetic
distance; (2) the theory of disinterested attention; (3) the conception of "seeing-as,"
inspired by Wittgenstein and represented by V. Aldrich in his Philosophy of Art
(1963). In Dickie's opinion, the theory of the aesthetic attitude has three basic aims:
(1) to separate and characterize the psychic factors constitutive for the aesthetic
attitude; (2) to develop the conception of the aesthetic object as the object of the
aesthetic attitude; (3) to provide a characteristics of the aesthetic experience
congruent with the earlier interpretations of the aesthetic attitude and the aesthetic
object. Dickie thinks that the conceptions chosen by him fail when confronted with
the actual aesthetic experiencing of art. To make his task easier he ascribes
subjectivism to all proponents of the aesthetic attitude. He suggests that all
theoreticians who employ that category think that the aesthetic attitude is the factor
constitutive for the sphere of aesthetic phenomena.
In their opinion - as interpreted by Dickie - the aesthetic attitude is allegedly the
only one, i.e., necessary and sufficient, condition for any object to become an
aesthetic object.
Dickie's criticism brought to light many weaknesses of some theories of the
ae~thetic attitude and has been of inspiring value for the whole of aesthetics. For
some principal reasons, however, it is difficult to accept the view that its author did
manage to prove that the aesthetic attitude is a myth and that there is neither a need
nor a possibility to separate this attitude from other kinds of attitudes towards
works of art. It is also difficult to agree with him that employing this notion in the
theory of the aesthetic phenomena is not only useless but even harmful. Firstly,
Dickie's criticism does not pertain to all theories of the aesthetic attitude, since some
of them were ommited by him. That is why my discussion with Dickie will start with
the presentation of these theories.

C. The proponents of the theories of the aesthetic attitude who do not provide
unequivocal definitions of the notion

Not all proponents of the conception of the aesthetic attitude claim that it is
necessary and possible to characterize the essence of this attitude by means of one
single notion and an unequivocal definition of this category. They think that the
attitude of this kind, like other categories concerning art and aesthetic phenomena
 149

is something more complex and multifaceted. They attempt to separate the aesthetic
attitude from other kinds of attitudes towards art and provide its universal and, in
their opinion, exhausting characteristics. The representatives of this approach are,
for example, R. Ingarden, J. Hospers, H. Osborne, and R. Scruton.
Ingarden characterizes the aesthetic attitude towards the work of art by means of
comparison with the existential attitude, on the one hand, and with the non-
aesthetic attitudes towards art, on the other hand.
A direct comparison and separation of the aesthetic attitude from the existential
one was done by him in 1937 in his book 0 poznawaniu dziela Iiterackiego (On
Cognition of the Literary Work). The "existential attitude" which is typical of
practical life is an attitude towards facts and things existing within the real world.
The most characteristic feature of this attitude is "the conviction as to the existence
of the real world within which we exist, too." The aesthetic attitude, on the other
hand, is not a disposition towards real facts but towards "purely qualitative
entities." It is "a disposition towards direct (naoczne) contact with qualitative
entities. ,,3
The conviction as to the existence of the real world which is so important for the
natural, existential attitude "is neither invalidated nor removed from the sphere of
our existential convictions but becomes ... pushed into the peripheries of
consciousness and damped.,,4 This damping of the conviction as to the existence of
the real world holds also for the direct attitude towards qualities themselves. "We
begin to be disposed not towards the fact of real existence of some qualities but on
these qualities themselves (towards "the content" of these qualities, if one may be
allowed to use this expression).,,5 The actual existence of these qualities in a real
object becomes then irrelevant for us.
Characterizing the proper aesthetic attitude towards the work of art, Ingarden
separates it from both the inquiring attitude and various existential attitudes, such
as among others, the attitude of aesthetic consumer. In this last attitude, as in other
kinds of existential attitudes (e.g. political or religious) the work of art is treated
as a means to achieve some aim external to it. The aim of the attitude of the aesthetic
consumer is to achieve pleasant experiences. In the aesthetic attitude proper the
work of art is not a means to achieve some external aim. It is the only attitude in
which the work of art may reveal its essence and aim. This attitude makes it possible
to activate the aesthetically relevant qualities of the work of art and to come into
direct contact with it. The concretization of the work of art which is a schematic
entity may also take place in other attitudes (e.g. in the inquiring attitude), but it
is only the aesthetic concretization, i.e. the concretization realized in the aesthetic
attitude, which may result in the constitution of the aesthetic object together with

3. R. Ingarden, 0 poznawaniu dziela literackiego (Warszawa: PWN, 1966), p. 136.

4. Ingarden, ibid., p. 137.
5. Ibid., p. 136.
150

the aesthetic values proper for it. Only in the aesthetic attitude can we enjoy a direct
contact with aesthetic values and know them.
lngarden firmly rejects the contemplationist interpretations of the aesthetic
attitude, reducing it to a purely passive perception. The aesthetic experience taking
place in the aesthetic attitude is not uniform in this respect. Only the last phase of
the aesthetic experience, which consists in the contemplative and direct grasping of
the already constituted aesthetic object, is of passive and purely receptive character,
whereas the whole phase of concretization and constitution of the aesthetic object
is a period of very active, intensive and creative experience of the subject.
Ingarden holds then that the most relevant features of the aesthetic attitude are
those which separate it from both the existential attitude and other, non-aesthetic
attitudes towards a work of art. The aesthetic attitude is directed not towards real
facts but towards qualities. It makes it possible to reveal the essential aspects of the
work of art and to grasp directly the work as a qualitative entity equipped with
specific values founded upon these qualities. An isolation of the subject from the
surrounding world and the damping of impressions and psychic states connected
with the real life as well as some distance characterizing the relation of the subject
not to the whole work but to the objects and events presented in the work are the
further features of this attitude. The distance does not exclude the possibility of the
subject's engagement in the events and situations presented in the work; it blocks,
however, the way to treat them as a real world.
On the other hand, neither complete disinterestedness and the lack of any desires
nor pure contemplation (understood as a passive perception devoid of any active
elements) are essential and specific features of the aesthetic attitude towards a work
of art, says Ingarden. In this respect the aesthetic attitude is not homogeneous, but,
even though in some moments the contemplative character and disinterestedness are
actually characteristic of this attitude, still they cannot be regarded as its most
relevant features 6
John Hospers is another representative of the approach in question as far as the
problem of how to define the aesthetic attitude is concerned. He claims that the
major conceptions which define the aesthetic attitude in terms of empathy, distance,
isolation, contemplation, synaesthesis and the like, pay attention to only some
aspects of the aesthetic experience and do not always exclude each other. He does
not provide a definition of the notion of the aesthetic attitude because he thinks that
it is not possible to define it. However, in his opinion there is a certain kind of
attitude which is of fundamental importance for all experiences classified as
aesthetic. This fundamental attitude consists in isolating the aesthetic experience
from the needs and aspirations of everyday life, and from practical affairs in

6. A much fuller reconstruction and analysis of Ingarden's views as to the aesthetic attitude may be
found in my article "Roman Ingarden's Views on the Aesthetic Attitude," in: P. Graff and S.
Krzemien-Ojak, eds., Roman Ingarden and Contemporary Polish Aesthetics (Warszawa: PWN,
1975), pp. 9-31.
 151

particular. In his opinion the aesthetic attitude is a specific way of viewing the
world, a specific mode of perception. The essence of this specific mode of viewing
consists in perceiving for the perceiving's sake. 7
Also a British aesthetician, R. Scruton, refrains from providing a classical
definition of the aesthetic attitude. However, in his opinion, the aesthetic attitude
may be characterized by enumerating its three conditions. (1) the aesthetic attitude
aims at enjoyment of (and satisfaction with) an object; (2) its common feature is
an attention focussed upon the object for the object's sake, and (3) it is normative,
since it contains the feeling of what is right and appropriate. 8
Does the criticism of the aesthetic attitude conducted by Dickie pertain also to the
theories put forward by Ingarden, Hospers and Scruton? I think it does not. If
Dickie does not want to give up the conviction that the category of the aesthetic
attitude should be removed from aesthetics he should broaden his criticism so as to
encompass these much more complex theories of the aesthetic attitude as well.

D. Pluralistic theories of the aesthetic attitude

A prominent historian of aesthetics, philosophy and art, Wladyslaw Tatarkiewicz,

was one of those who initiated and later consistently advocated the theory of
aesthetic pluralism. In his theory of the aesthetic attitude, as in some other essential
problems of aesthetics (e.g., in the theory of values and aesthetic experiences) he
represents the view that no monistic approach is capable of providing a satisfactory
solution to the problem.
Tatarkiewicz turned his attention to the problem of experiences and attitudes in
the 1930s, devoting to it two papers: "Postawa estetyczna, literacka i poetycka"
(Aesthetic, Literary and Poetic Attitudes) (1933), and "Skupienie i marzenie"
(Concentration and Reverie) (1934). The basic idea they propagate holds that the
hitherto existing aesthetic theories have failed because of the imperfectness of the
notions they employ. They have failed not only with regard to the aesthetic object
but also to the aesthetic experiences and attitudes. The notions of "the aesthetic
experience" and "attitude" appeared also to be indefinite, since they embrace too
many various and only seemingly similar phenomena; in fact, claims Tatarkiewicz,
they comprise three completely different classes of aesthetic experiences and
attitudes related to them.
The most elementary and easiest to define is the attitude which can be taken
towards a beautiful flower, a butterfly or a bird, towards beautiful tapestry and
pottery, towards some objects of technology and the works of architecture, some
pictures, sculpture and musical works.
Tatarkiewicz mentions the following constitutive features of this attitude: (1) we

7. Cf. J. Hospers, Meaning and Truth in the Arts (Chapel Hill, 1946).
8. R. Scruton, Art and Imagination. A Study in the Philosophy of Mind (London, 1974), p. 154.
152

assume it during the contemplation of a particular object when we are tuned to

observing these elements in the object which is directly given, Le., its look; (2) the
most important element in the look of the object is its form, Le., the arrangement
of parts; (3) it is of secondary importance whether the objects of contemplation exist
in reality or whether they appear only in our phantasies and visions; (4) even if the
experience resulting from this attitude is intensive it does not involve all of the
spectator's personality leaving some place for some "psychic distance."
It is precisely for this kind of attitude that Tatarkiewicz reserves the name
"aesthetic." Contrary to other kinds of attitudes taken towards works of art, in
which a considerable role is being played by intellectual and emotional experiences,
the aesthetic attitude so narrowly and precisely understood is determined by the
sensual factor.
The two remaining kinds of experiences and attitudes are characterized by
Tatarkiewicz jointly. His next step is to show the differences between them.
1. Contrary to the aesthetic attitude sensu stricto the contemplation is not the
only basis for sensations.
2. The source of enjoyment and satisfaction experienced by us in these attitudes
is not the look of the object but the images and thoughts associated with it.
3. The form is no longer the main and independent value but first of all becomes
the means to evoke emotions and reflections.
4. The existence of the object looked at or thought about does matter.
5. The experiences felt in this attitude are capable of involving the whole
personality of the subject.
In order to distinguish these kinds of attitudes commonly treated as aesthetic
from the attitude of the first kind, Tatarkiewicz suggests employing the expressions
"literary" and "poetic." Intellectual sensations dominate in the literary attitudes,
whereas emotions prevail in the poetic experiences.
The literary attitudes are most often evoked by novels which stimulate reflection
and help understand the world and other human beings. A similar influence is also
exerted by epic poetry and even by some genres of lyric poetry, by dramatic
performances, cinematic works and some works of visual arts.
The poetic attitudes which are most personalized, subjective and emotional are
usually assumed towards lyric poetry, musical works, but also towards some prose
works and paintings, and sometimes even towards views of nature.
Hence "the indefinite, popularly called "aesthetic," attitude comprises these
three attitudes: aesthetic, poetic, and literary ones.,,9
In his essay, "Concentration and Reverie," Tatarkiewicz suggested a different
definition of mental attitudes towards a work of art. He distinguished there "an
aesthetic concentration in the narrow meaning," "a literary concentration" and the
reverie attitude as three basic attitudes taken during commerce with art.
The theoreticians who consciously followed Tatarkiewicz's line of pluralism in the

9. W. Tatarkiewicz, Drogo przez estetyke (Warszawa, 1972), p. 86.1111 It

 153

theory of the aesthetic attitude were a psychologist, Leopold Blaustein, and a

historian and theoretician of art, Jan Bialostocki. Blaustein thought that we should
distinguish three kinds of perception in our aesthetic commerce with various realms
of art: perceptive, imaginative, and signitive ones. Each of these different types of
perception conditions a different, but at the same time appropriate for the given
realm of art, attitude of the subject towards the object of the aesthetic experience.
The contemplative attitude, treated by many aestheticians as either universal or
passive, is characteristic of only the perceptive perception in which the directly given
objects and their directly perceived looks are the objects of perception. On the other
hand, during imaginative (objective painting, dramatic performances, cinematic
works) and signitive (literature) perceptions of the work of art the subject of the
aesthetic experience remains active and engaged.
Similarly, Bialostocki continues Tatarkiewicz's idea that the category of aesthetic
attitude is "a conglomerate of various attitudes, depending upon objective and
subjective conditions." In fact, various realms of art demand various attitudes of
the subject.
On the one hand, pluralism in the theory of the aesthetic attitude may be treated
as a form of too early a surrender. The fact that no one has so far succeeded in
creating a satisfactory monistic conception of the aesthetic attitude does not justify
the conclusion that such a theory is not at all possible.
On the other hand, however, the proponents of pluralism have a very strong
argument to defend their view. It is a fact that various realms of art, and sometimes
even various artistic genres require diverse attitudes and evoke diverse experiences.
Tatarkiewicz and Blaustein are quite convincing in their arguments for this view.
However, they did not analyze some other phenomena which may as well be used
as arguments in defense of the pluralistic approach. Even if we assume that someone
could manage to construct a universal model of the aesthetic attitude for a given
historical period uniformly covering different realms of art, it still seems only
slightly probable that a model of this kind would finally sustain its universality after
a confrontation with other historical epochs and types of culture. The theoretical
possibility of constructing a general model of the aesthetic attitude does not imply
that there exists a universal and eternally fixed aesthetic attitude and that this
attitude remains unchanged even though art with its various schools, stylistic
conventions and artistic experiments changes ceaselessly.
It also seems unjustified to assume that people of completely different
personalities, various characters and temperaments, and unequal emotional
sensibilities could adopt a uniform attitude towards manifold artistic phenomena.
The proponents of pluralism in the theory of the aesthetic attitude, however, do
not negate the category of aesthetic attitude as useless and meaningless. What they
reject is its universal character. From the fact that a universal model of the aesthetic
attitude valid for all realms of art as well as for all historical epochs and types of
culture and art beholders is not possible, we cannot infer that it is not justified to
construct such models separately for particular realms of art in particular epochs
154

and cultures. The category of the aesthetic attitude not only does not lose its
epistemological validity for the aesthetic considerations, but it retains its
psychological validity as well. Aesthetic attitudes are not uniform in the same ways
as practical attitudes (and inquiring attitudes, either) are not uniform.
Notwithstanding all the differences between particular practical attitudes, they
remain sufficiently related and similar to each other to form a group, or, as
Wittgenstein's followers prefer to say, a family of practical attitudes, different from
the group (family) of such attitudes as inquiring, reverie, religious, or aesthetic ones.
Similarly, various realms of art and artistic genres require different aesthetic
attitudes from their subjects. But still, being aware of all individual features of
particular attitudes we do not have to reject the idea that there is an essential
difference between the proper aesthetic attitude towards the work of art and the
practical, inquiring, or religious attitudes towards the same work. At the same time
we do have to keep in mind that pure attitudes are possible only in theory while in
everyday life, and, in our case, in our commerce with works of art, the attitudes
assumed by art beholders are, as a rule, mixed, and may be characterized as an
aesthetic-cognitive, aesthetic-religious, or even aesthetic-erotic. Hence the aesthetic
attitudes are aesthetic to a lesser or greater degree; in other words, their aestheticity
may be graded.

III. The aesthetic attitude and non-aesthetic attitudes towards a work of art

The aesthetic attitude is in the first place opposed to the existential attitude and to
the cognitive-inquiring attitude, although to a lesser degree (c.f. e.g. R. Ingarden,
H. Osborne, S. Ossowski, S. C. Pepper, R. Scruton, W. Tatarkiewicz). Some
authors oppose it to the reverie attitude as well (e.g. D. W. Gotshalk, J. Hospers,
T. Munro, E. Vivas), while M. Wallis and K. Chvatik separate the aesthetic attitude
from the religious attitude. Let us shortly focus our attention upon the difference
between the aesthetic attitude assumed towards a work of art, for example a
painting, and the practical and cognitive attitudes. The following attempt aims at
an initial distinction.
The practical attitude towards a painting is assumed by one for whom the painting
is only a means of achieving some utilitarian objective, external in relation to the
work itself. In this attitude the painting may be of interest for us as an object to
buy, sell, steal, destroy, restore, hang on or take off from the wall. Moreover, also
the perception of the painting is only instrumental since it only serves the task of
recognizing the painting, assessing its value or destroying it.
The cognitive-inquiring attitude towards a painting is assumed by one who aims
at discovering by whom and when the painting was created, by means of what
technique, which artistic school and stylistic convention it represents, whether it is
an original or only a copy, etc. Here, too, the perception of the painting is only an
instrument to gain knowledge about the painting and the history of its origin.
 155

If, finally, the interest we take in the painting itself aims at neither cognitive nor
external and utilitarian aims but consists in perceiving and experiencing the elements
directly present in the painting such as the arrangement of colours, shapes and lines,
the composition of the whole, the looks of presented objects, and the like, then our
attitude is no longer practical nor inquiring but just aesthetic. Only in this attitude
does the perception of the painting become an aim in itself and is no longer an
instrument for something else.
The aesthetic attitude towards a work of art is an attitude in which the work of
art is treated by us as the work of art per se and not as a purely useful and applicable
object (a garment, a utensil, a piece of furniture, or a building), a commodity,
something requiring renovation or investigation, a source of information about the
past and the present, an object treated exclusively as an instrument to achieve some
economic, political, religious, or moral objective.
The aesthetic attitude towards a work of art is necessarily an open attitude, free
from a priori convictions and assessments, devoid of schematic and fixed habits,
flexible enough to accept even those works of art which astonish or even shock us,
and to let us surrender to the charm of the work and become fascinated by it. It
should also allow us to cut ourselves off from the problems of everyday life,
retaining at the same time the awareness of the difference between reality and the
work of art.
The aesthetic attitude should be flexible, since the works of art belonging to
various realms of art and different artistic styles, conventions, kinds and genres,
sometimes even most original works of particular artists, may require different
mental attitudes from the beholder of art. Different attitudes are required by Greek
tragedy and Chinese opera, Shakespeare's dramas and Ionesco's plays, music by
Mozart and Stravinsky, realistic pictures by Gierymski and objectless paintings by
Malewicz and Mondrian, Max Sennett's film comedies and films by F. Fellini. The
attitude (understood here basically as the expectation for stimuli of a certain kind
and the readiness for an appropriate reaction to them) towards the songs and operas
by Moniuszko is no longer appropriate for Penderecki's music. The novels by J.
Joyce cannot be properly received in the attitude appropriate for the novels by J.
London.
A limited scale of aesthetic sensibility, conservatism and fixed aesthetic habits as
well as the lack of sufficient experience in our commerce with art may be responsible
for the fact that a given beholder of art is not capable (does not endeavour hard
enough or is actually not able) to achieve an appropriate attitude towards a given
work of art. An inappropriate attitude towards the work precludes the subject from
achieving the aesthetic experience or in an essential way disturbs its course.
The aesthetic attitude so conceived is not a necessary and sufficient condition of
regarding any object as a work of art. It is, however, a necessary condition for an
object which does possess specific properties (qualities) to be regarded by us as a
work of art and as a work of art perceived and experienced.
An immense variety of artistic phenomena, characteristic especially of modern
156

art, strengthens our doubts as to whether there exists a specific and universal
aesthetic attitude and whether it is possible to define its specificity.
These doubts are not unjustified. To defend the conception of the aesthetic
attitude, however, we can argue that the appropriate attitude towards a work of art
should in any case be different from the purely practical, cognitive, religious, or
reverie attitudes, though, of course, some common elements shared by them may
be detected.
As we know from experience, an atheist may have an extremely intensive aesthetic
experience during a religious ceremony. Let us suppose that in the same temple and
at the same time there were present two people, brought up in the same culture and
having similar aesthetic sensibilities. Let us suppose further that the one who is a
believer does have two different kinds of experiences: the aesthetic one and the
religious, or at least religious-aesthetic one. Which factor, then, determines the
qualitative difference between their experiences? The visual and musical stimuli
which directly excite their psyches are identical. For one of our subjects the object
of experience will be identical with the object of perception and experiencing what
is directly perceived will make an aim in itself, whereas for the other the object of
his experience cannot be reduced to the object of direct perception and the
perception of what is directly perceived cannot form an aim in itself. The differences
between these experiences, I believe, are determined by the difference in both the
sets of the subjects prior to the experience and their attitudes assumed during the
experience.
However, even if the aesthetic attitude is not universal (which makes it very
difficult to define it), since, as it has been said earlier, aesthetic attitudes may differ
considerably (1) in different types of culture, (2) depending upon the realm of art
the given works of art belong to, and (3) in people of different personalities. This
does not have to imply that the aesthetic attitude is a myth, as G. Dickie attempts
to prove. The notion "aesthetic attitude" remains meaningful as long as we can
distinguish the aesthetic attitude from non-aesthetic attitudes in each individual
case.
Another problem is providing a definition of the notion. Therefore, Dickie's
argument that so far no one succeeded in supplying the definition of the aesthetic
attitude, proves only that to define this notion is a difficult task. Similar problems,
it should be mentioned, are characteristic of the attempts to provide definitions for
other basic notions of aesthetics. No one has so far supplied a fully satisfactory
definition of the work of art. Each of the hitherto existing definitions (including the
definitions provided by Dickie himself) may be criticized; this, however, has not
persuaded theoreticians to reject the notion of work of art as a myth, although,
taking into account the experience of conceptual art, such a rejection would be no
less justified than regarding the aesthetic attitude as a myth. The realm of art works
is as manifold as the realm of attitudes towards them. This fact, however, does not
hinder the appearance of not only new theories but also of new definitions of the
work of art - but no one has so far voiced the opinion that the category of the work
of art is useless in aesthetics.
 157

IV. On the role of the aesthetic attitude in the process of the aesthetic
commerce with the work of art. The usefulness of the notion of aesthetic
attitude in aesthetics

The characteristics of the aesthetic attitude would reamin incomplete without the
answer to the questions concerning the nature of the relations and interdependencies
occurring during the process of our commerce with the work of art between the
aesthetic attitude and all other elements of the process: the aesthetic experience, the
object of the aesthetic experience, and the aesthetic values. The problem is also of
importance since Dickie, while launching his criticism against the conception of the
aesthetic attitude ascribes the subjectivist conception of the aesthetic object to all
proponents of the theory in question. It is true that from the point of view of the
subjectivist theories the objects and values with which the subject enters into
commerce while assuming the aesthetic attitude become consequently aesthetic. Yet
not all theoreticians employing the category of aesthetic attitude represent the
subjective orientation. Ingarden may serve here as a good example.
For Ingarden the aesthetic attitude does not shape aesthetic phenomena, being,
on the whole, something secondary in relation to the work of art. He holds that the
aesthetic attitude towards the work of art if always caused by some of its properties.
He distinguishes two basic manners of assuming the aesthetic attitude towards the
work of art, viz. the natural and the artificial one. In both cases, however, the
primary stimulus evoking the attitude comes from the work itself. The natural
manner can be observed when some quality acts as a direct stimulus inciting the
initial sensation which, in turn, brings about the change of the existential attitude
into the aesthetic one. The artificial manner consists in the fact that the reader gets
ready for the aesthetic reception in advance, before the appearance of the initial
sensation, being influenced, for example, by the title of the work.
Although a work of art as a schematic entity is, within Ingarden's theory, a purely
intentional object, this does not mean that the aesthetic attitude is a necessary
condition for its existence. It exists as a schematic formation also for people who
assume other attitudes towards it, e.g., the inquiring one.
The aesthetic attitude is a necessary though not sufficient condition for the
development of a complete, multiphased aesthetic experience. It is not a condition
for the appearance of the initial aesthetic sensation which is the first phase of the
aesthetic experience. It is not a sufficient condition because the work of art and the
initial sensation it evokes must be given.
The aesthetic attitude does not condition the appearance of a work of art as a
schematic formation. It is a necessary but insufficient condition for the appearance
of the aesthetic concretization of a work of art, i.e., for the appearance of the
aesthetic object. It is only in the aesthetic attitude that aesthetically important
qualities of a work of art can be actualized and it is only in this attitude that the
concretization of a work of art can give birth to the aesthetic object. Again,
however, it is the initial sensation that appears to be a more important condition
158

and, as a rule, an earlier one. The aesthetic object is constituted not by the aesthetic
attitude but rather by the aesthetic experience developed after the attitude has been
assumed.
The interrelation between the attitude and aesthetic value should be elucidated,
too. In this respect we come across a few standpoints.
1. The subjectivist approach represented by those theoreticians who take the
aesthetic attitude as a necessary and sufficient condition for the aesthetic value to
appear. Thus the aesthetic attitude generates aesthetic value.
2. An intermediate point of view akin to relationism is represented by adherents
of the concept of the aesthetic attitude as a necessary but neither a sole nor sufficient
condition for establishing aesthetic value.
3. The concept of the aesthetic attitude may be employed by the objectivists as
well. With R. Ingarden the role of the aesthetic attitude brings about neither
qualities nor aesthetic values. However, it is necessary though insufficient condition
for:
3a. the actualization of aesthetically significant qualities of a work of art,
3b. the constitution of aesthetic values which are developed on the basis of these
aesthetic qualities,
3c. the subject's direct responding to these values.
Summing up, the aesthetic attitude cannot be regarded as the most important and
primary element of the aesthetic situation, as the only factor constituve for the
sphere of the aesthetic phenomena.
The epistemological question as to the utility of the term "aesthetic attitude" in
aesthetics is directly connected with the function of the aesthetic attitude in the
process of responding to a work of art.
Is the "aesthetic attitude" really a key notion in aesthetics as it is claimed to
separate aesthetic phenomena from non-aesthetic ones? Can we, by using this
notion, successfully distinguish the aesthetic experience from non-aesthetic
experience, aesthetic objects from other kinds of objects and aesthetic values from
other values? Does the knowledge of the essence of the aesthetic attitude ensure
knowledge of the essence of aesthetic objects and values?
The notion of the aesthetic attitude cannot be treated as the most important
category nor a fundamental notion because it is insufficient to describe and
differentiate aesthetic phenomena. For this very reason some over enthusiastic
theoreticians were disappointed in their hopes concerning this category. This should
not lead, however, to discarding the concept as utterly useless. It will remain one
of the basic concepts which can be used as an auxiliary means in defining the
uniqueness of aesthetic phenomena.
 159

ESSAY ELEVEN

MODE OF EXISTENCE OF AESTHETIC QUALITIES

Michael H. Mitias

In a recent study, "Expressiveness: Where is the Feeling Found?" Harold Osborne

argues that an aesthetic, or expressive, quality is, or exists, in the work of art; that
is, when we perceive a piece of music, for example, as sad the aesthetic quality of
sadness 'exists' in the musical piece: "we perceive the sadness 'in' the music and we
perceive this feeling directly and correctly as we perceive sadness in ourselves, not
as we infer feelings in other people." I It is, I think, normal for people to be sad,
to be conscious of themselves as sad, and to say that they experience at times feelings
of sadness; it is also normal to view the feeling of sadness as a dynamic mental state,
that is, as a mental event, as a mental process whose character of sadness can be
intuited and understood immediately. It is normal, in other words, to say that
human beings enjoy, or have, feelings of sadness. But it is not normal, even among
artists and aestheticians, to say that a feeling'exists' in a work of art or that a person
can, or does, experience a feeling in such a work, mainly because art works are not
sentient or conscious subjects; they are inanimate objects. We should, accordingly,
ask: what do we mean when we say that the aesthetic quality of sadness is
experienced in Sibelius's Valse Triste, for example? How are we to understand, or
explicate, the meaning of 'in' in this context? Put differently, what is the ontological
status of aesthetic, or expressive, qualities? In what follows I shall present a critical
evaluation of Osborne's view of the ontological status of aesthetic qualities. I shall
first consider the highlights of his position and then evaluate these highlights. The
premise which I shall defend is: although aesthetic qualities do not literally,
ontologically, 'exist' in a work of art, they nevertheless belong to the work. The
ontological locus of these qualities is what I call 'aesthetic situation', the event in
which the aesthetic object comes to life in the aesthetic experience. This is based on

1. H. Osborne, "Expressiveness: Where is the Feeling Found?" British Journal oj Aesthetics, Vol. 23,
1983. The same view was recently expounded in "Expressiveness in the Arts," Journal oj Aesthetics
and Art Criticism, Vol. ILl, 1982. Cf. also "The Quality of Feeling in Art," in M. Rader's A
Modern Book oj Aesthetics, 4th ed., ed. (Holt Rinehart, Winston, 1973).

Mitias, M.H. (ed.) Possibility oj the Aesthetic Experience

1986 Martinus Nijhojj Publishers, Dordrecht
160

the assumption that aesthetic qualities are not given in aesthetic perception as ready
made realities but as potentialities for realization. This realization takes place in the
aesthetic experience. Accordingly the affective character of an aesthetic quality
comes to life, it becomes actual, in the process of aesthetic perception. 2

Osborne makes, to begin with, a distinction between three types of aesthetic quality:
(1) descriptive qualities, which include "(i) simple emergent qualities such as
elegance, gracefulness, prettiness; (ii) 'formal' qualities such as regularity, balance,
(visual) rhythm; (iii) 'aspect' qualities such as those indicated by the adjectives
'dignified', 'solemn', 'sedate', 'pompous,;,,3 (2) evocative, or affective, qualities,
which include adjectives like" 'moving', 'charming', 'nice', 'disgusting'; and (3)
expressive qualities, which include adjectives like 'sad', 'joyful', 'gay', 'serene,.,,4
As far as I can see, none of these three types of qualities are given directly, as ready
made realities, ot or in aesthetic perception; consequently, one can in this context
raise the central question of this essay: what is the ontological status of aesthetic
qualities? But I shall not here raise this general question, and shall, like Osborne,
restrict myself to the third category of aesthetic qualities, viz., what is the
ontological locus of expressive qualities?
When Osborne speaks of 'aesthetic qualities' he does not mean 'emotional
qualities' but rather feelings and moods, for

emotions involve overt or tacit beliefs and inanimte things do not have beliefs. Nobody has
any inclination to ascribe sexual jealously to a work of art, though a work of art may express
feelings which are characteristic of that emotion. 5

Again, 'expressiveness' does not designate a relation, or an aspect, distinct from

'aesthetic quality' . Objects, or works of art express: aesthetic qualities are the means
and content of expressiveness. Art works are expressive in virtue of their aesthetic
qualities; they

2. A number of authors have, during the past few decades, dealt with the question of the ontological
status of aesthetic qualities. See for example: Bouwsma, "The Expression Theory of Art," in
Philosophical Analysis, ed. M. Black (Prentice-Hall, 1963); V. Tomas, "The Concept of Expression
in Art," in Philosophy Looks at the Arts, ed. J. Margolis (Temple University Press, 1962); R. W.
Hepburn, "Emotions and Emotional Qualities," in British Journal of Aesthetics, 1961; G. Sircello,
Mind and Art (princeton University Press, 1972); M. Beardsley, Aesthetics (Harcourt, Brace &
World, 1958); J. Hospers, "The Concept of Artistic Expression," in Problems in Aesthetics, ed.
M. Weitz, 2nd ed. (McMilIand, 1970); E. Hanslick, The Beautiful in Music (Library of Liberal Arts,
1957).
3. "Expressiveness: Where is the Feeling Found?" p. 1I4.
4. Ibid., pp. 1I5-116.
5. Ibid., p. 116.
 161

express the inner nature of their makers in the sense that we can make inferences about the
character of artists from their works as we can infer men's character from all that they
deliberately or spontaneously do. ,,6

Aesthetic qualities are the artist's contribution to the material which he employs in
the process of artistic creation. Possessing aesthetic qualities is, in short, what
makes an artifact a work of art.
Now when we say "an art work expresses sadness" we should mean that it, i.e.,
the work, expresses the quality of sadness; and if it expresses this quality, the
question arises: how? I disagree with Osborne that the whole question of the
ontological status of the aesthetic qualities is falsely conceived for two reasons: (1)
in speaking about art works aesthetically, or critically, we do use statements of the
form: "Sibelius's Valse Triste is sad." It is accordingly plausible, indeed intelligible,
to ask: what does it mean for an art work to be sad, especially when such an
attribution is ordinarily restricted to human beings? (2) When we say that a piece
of music is sad we assert, posit, the reality of something sad; this something is the
basis, raison d'etre, of the assertion. It is reasonable therefore to enquire into the
nature and relationship between the physical reality of the art work and the qualities
'expressed' in it, or by it. What makes this inquiry peculiar, if not paradoxical, is
that these qualities are not given as a part of the physical make-up of the art work.
But, for Osborne, even though they are not so given, they are nevertheless
experienced and acknowledged to be in the work phenomenologically:

we perceive expressive qualities 'in' the object of attention. We experience the sadness 'in'
the music we experience. As. O. K. Bouwsma once said, the sadness is to the music as the
redness to the apple, not like the burp to the sider. 7

How, or under what conditions, do we perceive the sadness 'in' the music? We raise
this question because when one asserts sadness of the music he in effect reports his
experience - yet, Osborne insists, in this very experience, though it is subjective, we
perceive the sadness in the music. This sort of knowledge is not inferential but by
direct acquaintance. The appeal in this line of reasoning is an appeal to immediate
cognitive experience;8 for example, it would be senseless to say that I am not sad
if I happen to feel sad or perceive sadness in me. Similarly, "it does not make sense
to say of the music that it is not sad though its demeanor is that of sad music or
that it is not sad though I perceive sadness in it.,,9 Thus if I experience sadness in
the music' 'nobody can pipe up and say: 'No, you are wrong. I am just plain bored.'
And nobody can tell me that the sadness I perceive is not in the music but in the

6. Ibid., p. 117.
7. Ibid., pp. 117-118.
8. Cf. "Expressiveness in the Arts," p. 23.
9. "Expressiveness: Where is the Feeling Found?" p. 118.
162

composer or in me or in the musician."!O Yet in spite of this awareness' 'we perceive

the sadness 'in' the music and we perceive this feeling directly and correctly as we
perceive sadness in ourselves, not as we infer feelings in other people."! We are
faced, as Osborne has pointed out, with a paradox, for, on the one hand, we
perceive sadness in the music and, on the other hand, we believe that the music as
a sonorous construct does not, and cannot, have feelings. How are we to solve this
paradox?

II

What does it mean to say that the feeling of sadness is in the music? Does the
percipient experience the feeling in the music, or does the feeling exist in the music
regardless of whether someone perceives it there or not? 1 raise the latter part of the
question because one can reasonably say that he perceives the sadness in the music
without necessarily claiming or implying that the feeling actually exists in the music,
and he may justify his statement on phenomenological grounds. For example,
having listened to Valse Triste, he could say that this piece is sad. "Do you mean
that the music itself is sad?" One might retort. "No," he can answer, "when 1 was
listening to the music, I experienced the music as sad. All 1 was aware of during this
experience is the sad melody; the melogy was the object of my aesthetic attention,
and 1 experienced this object as sad." Now if someone says, "I perceive the sadness
in the music" without necessarily implying or asserting that the music literally
possesses the sadness, he certainly reports a personal experience, a subjective
experience, and when questioned, he might explain the meaning of his statement by
saying that he felt the sadness as an aspect of the music, or that it appeared, or
seemed, to him personally that the sadness existed in the music. But, on the other
hand, when one says that the sadness is in the music he would certainly mean that
(1) he experiences this feeling in the music, (2) he asserts that the sadness is an
objective quality in the music, and (3) he believes that the feeling is an integral part
of the musical piece. The sadness is in the music regardless of whether someone
perceives it or not; whenever a musically sensitive person listens to the piece he
would necessarily perceive it as sad. This is, it seems to me, what Osborne means
when he says that "the feelings we perceive in works of art are phenomenologically
in the works and nowhere else. When we describe music as gay, sad, serene, we are
reporting qualities perceived in the music." 12
Now, how should we understand the claim that the feeling of sadness is in the
music? Osboirne avers that, as a physical event, the music cannot have or possess
feelings, mainly because feelings are mental events; they belong to an ontologically

10. Ibid.
11. llbid.
12. "Expressiveness in the Arts," p. 20.
 163

different order of reality. It would be absurd to hold or in any way imply that a
physical object (or event) has or can have feelings the way human beings have or
can have them. I do not think that the preceding statement would invite any
objection from artists, aestheticians, or even ordinary people. But if the feeling of
sadness qua mental event cannot actually exist in the music as a physical event, what
does it mean to say that phenomenologically I perceive the sadness in the music?
Next, in what sense is the feeling 'in' the music? What does in this context 'in'
mean? Is the relationship between the feeling and the music one of containment, the
way, for example, a person stands in a room? But if the feeling as something mental
does not actually exist in the music, what can the word 'in' mean?
I raise these questions, whose meaning might seem obvious or simplistic, only to
focus attention on the mode of existence of the expressive qualities, on where they
exist. But we cannot provide an adequate answer to these questions without a
plausible account of the identity, viz., the whatness, of these qualities, for how can
we seek the locus of something unless we know the identity of the thing whose locus
we are seeking? The paradox which we now confront is, to my mind, generated by
a vague and misleading use of the main concepts of our discussion, 'quality',
'feeling', and 'in'. We have seen that the aesthetic quality of sadness, that is, the
quality which we perceive in the music, is, for Osborne, a feeling; thus the meaning
of 'feeling' in the statement, "the feeling is perceived in the music," is uniquely,
generically, different from the meaning of 'feeling' in the following statement: "I
feel sad," or better, "I have a feeling of sadness in me." Why? Because the aesthetic
quality of sadness does not exist in the music as a ready made, or finally formed
feeling but as a possibility for actualizing this feeling in the aesthetic experience. To
use Osborne's expression, the feeling of sadness emerges in aesthetic perception, in
the perception of the musical piece, and outside this perception its ontological mode
of experience is the mode of potentiality. Put differently, the feeling of sadness
becomes actual and acquires its identity as a definite feeling in the experience of a
percipient. And since the music is the physical base, or vehicle, of the quality,
consequently of the experience itself, and since the percipient is the one who
actualizes the quality, he can certainly say that he perceives the quality in the music.
But what does it mean for someone to say, "I perceive the feeling in the music?"
Under what conditions can one perceive the quality in the music?
I raise the preceding questions because Osborne's manner of talking about how
we perceive the aesthetic quality suggests, thought he might not intend it, that this
activity is somewhat passive and that the quality is intuited immediately as a ready
made content. The first assumption with which he begins his essay states: "when
we speak of aesthetic interest we mean interest in perception or apprehension for
their own sake." And the corollary to this assumption asserts: "the kind of
cognition characteristic of aesthetic activity is knowledge by acquaintance not
knowledge that .... We are interested in how things look not in how they measurably
164

are." 13 I certainly admit that our knowledge of the aesthetic object in general, and
aesthetic qualities in particular, is knowledge by acquaintance. But the question
which demands explication from us is: how does this knowledge take place? If I
focus my perceptive attention, for example, on the red quality of the book which
now lies before me on the desk, and if I apprehend the redness of the book with
the full knowledge that I am apprehending the character of this quality, I can
without doubt claim that my knowledge of the quality is by acquaintance. In this
case, the redness of the book is given, i.e., qua red, to my eye. Redness is here a
publicly verifiable quality. But the feeling of sadness is not, as we saw, a publicly
verifiable quality; it does not, moreover, emerge by itself. It is not, in other words,
immediately given to sense perception the way 'red' is given to the sense of vision.
It is, I submit, an achievement. I say 'achievement' because the emergence, actual
reality, of the quality is the result of the cooperative effort of the art work as a
physical vehicle and the percipient. Aesthetic perception is not merely a sensuous
activity; it is essentially a creative act of imagination.

III

As feeling, aesthetic quality does not literally 'exist' in the art work which occasions
the aesthetic experience, nor does it exclusively exist in the perceiver in whom the
experience takes place, but in what I call the aesthetic situation. By 'aesthetic
situation' I mean the event in which the aesthetic experience takes place. This event
is composed of three basic elements: (1) an art work, (2) a perceiver, and (3) the
physical conditions under which aesthetic perception takes place, e.g., light,
distance, visibility, etc. In this sort of event, i.e., in an aesthetic experience, or more
accurately in the process of experiencing aesthetically, the perceiver is one with the
art work. The structure of the experience is in the final analysis constituted by the
structure, or form, of the object of the experience as a work of art, for the content
of the experience, or what the perceiver perceives, is exactly what the work offers,
and what the work offers is a significant form, a uniquely ordered whole.
The aesthetic situation is then made up of two basic elements: the formal structure
of the art work and the subjective consciousness of the percipient. The unity of these
elements in one event is what creates the aesthetic situation; the latter is a novel
reality which cannot be reduced to any of its constitutents, mainly because each one
of them acquires a new identity in the aesthetic process. How? (A) Prior to the
experience, the artistic character of the work, that is, the unity of its aesthetic
qualities, is not given as a ready made content but, as I indicated earlier, as a
potentiality awaiting realization. An aesthetic perceiver is required to actualize, or
give life, to this character. (B) Moreover, prior to the aesthetic experience, the

13. "Expressiveness: Where is the Feeling Found?" p. 112.

 165

consciousness of the percipient is, broadly speaking, indeterminate;14 it exists as a

possibility for intuiting a content of meaning. It becomes actual, i.e., active
consciousness, when it perceives an object. Its identity, or what it is at that moment,
is determined by the sort of object it experiences. The intelligible character of the
object is translated into a living meaningful content in the consciousness of the
perceiver. In the aesthetic situation the percipient and the object as a work of art
are fused into a distinct individual reality. This individuality is det~rmined by the
peculiar qualities of the object, on the one hand, and the depth, sensitivity, and the
constitutive powers of the perceiver, on the other. The aesthetic situation is, in a
word, the living stream of the aesthetic experience.
Though brief, the preceding account of the aesthetic situation merits the
following remark. The term 'objective' acquires a new meaning in aesthetic analysis.
The term does not necessarily refer to an object, relation, or quality which lies
outside the purview of the senses the way, e.g., the door is now exeternal to my sense
of sight. It may also refer to what phenomenologists like Husserl, Ingarden, and
Dufrenne have called 'intentional object'. According to this view, any object,
physical or imaginary (e.g., a literary work), can be experienced as objective
inasmuch as it is intended by a consciousness. The 'imaginary' object may, or may
not, be purposefully created by a creative consciousness. The art work which is
created by an artist and sought by the art lover or critic may be characterized as an
intentional object both from the standpoint of the creator and the perceiver. For
in producing a work of art the artist creates what Clive Bell has called a 'significant
form', a form expressive of aesthetic meaning. The vehicle in which this form is
'embodied' is the physical object which we usually call 'work of art'. But from the
standpoint of ordinary perception this object is, as Hegel said, a dead thing, void
of any spiritual content. The sensuous form imposed on it is the basis of the
aesthetic experience and consequently of the emergence of the aesthetic quality in
the experience. But the unity of the aesthetic qualities which the artist has created
are not simply given in the physical vehicle. This vehicle is only a possibility for
actualizing the aesthetic object created and intended by the artist. This is why we
can say, with Ingarden, that what the artist has produced is a schematic formation:

every work of art of whatever kind has the distinguishing feature that it is not the sort of
thing which is completely determined in every respect by the primary varieties of its qualities,
in other words it contains in its characteristic lacunae in definition, areas of
indeterminateness: it is a schematic formation. Furthermore not all its determinants,
components or qualities are in a state of actuality, but some of them are potential only. In

14. Consciousness is usually occupied with an object of some kind, mental or physical, trivial or
important. Thus when I say in this context that, prior to the aesthetic experience, it is indeterminate
I only mean that it is in a state of readiness to entertain another object as the content of its
experience.
166

consequence of this a work of art requires an agent existing outside itself, that is an observer,
in order - as I express it - to render it concrete. ,,15

What is concretized, or better what is brought into being, in aesthetic experience is

a thoughtfully created object. This object is as real as the paper on which I am now
writing this sentence. Accordingly my reference to it is, or can be, objective the way
our reference to a physical object is, or can be, objective. Thus we do not, for
example, need to say that the feeling of sadness is literally in the music in order to
safeguard the objectivity of the quality or our judgment of it, primarily because the
aesthetic quality which is intended in the aesthetic experience is as objectively real
as the organized sound which everybody hears when they hear the musical piece.
We should in this context ask: how is the potential being of an aesthetic quality
actualized qua feeling in the aesthetic situation? I cannot here discuss this question
in any detail, for the space here available to me is limited; but a remark is in order.
Although aesthetic quality, e.g., sadness, is the object we seek, intend, in aesthetic
perception the apprehension of this quality does not take place as an isolated event,
mainly because such a quality does not enjoy an independent existence. Its
emergence depends upon two basic factors: (1) its potential existence must be
pregnant in the physical aspects of the work' of art, in the dynamic inter-relatedness
of the sensuous elements which constitute its sensuous being. It is this sort of
relatedness which led thinkers like Diderot to define beauty as relation. We should
agree with Osborne that aesthetic perception is intuitive, holistic, in which we are
interested in how things look, not in what they are, but we should also recognize
that this very look is not simply given; it is, as I shall stress in the next remark, a
creatively formed object. We should underscore this aspect because the aesthetic
quality is a temporal, dynamic reality. Its tissue consists of feeling; but feeling is
a temporal process. Thus since it is not simply given its being consists in its being
formed (or in Berkeley's term perceived) in the aesthetic process. (2) The perception
of aesthetic quality is a creative, constructive, activity. I say, first 'creative', for in
this activity the structural elements of the sensuous aspects of the physical work are
somehow translated, indeed transformed, into a living reality: feeling, or meaning.
In the aesthetic experience the art work loses its character as a dead piece of matter
and acquires a spiritual character akin to the nature of the imagination which forms
and apprehends it. Hegel writes:

In art these sensuous shapes and sounds present themselves, not simply for their own sake,
and that for their immediate structure, but with the purpose of affording in that shape
satisfaction to higher spiritual interests, seeing that they are powerful to call forth a response
and. echo in the mind from all the depths of consciousness. It is thus that, in art, the sensuous
is spiritualized, the spiritual appears in sensuous shape. 16

15. R. Ingarden, "Artistic and Aesthetic Values," British Journal of Aesthetics, 1964.
16. G. W. F. Hegel, The Philosophy of Fine Arts, tr. F. P. B. Osmaston (G. Bell Sons Ltd., 1920).
(This passage according to the Bosanquet translation.)/1I1 It
 167

This is why in aesthetic perception one is not aware of the art work as an external,
alien, object but as an integral part of his experience. Second, I say 'constructive',
because the aesthetic experience of an art work is a complex perceptive process in
which the qualities which constitute the aesthetic being of the work acquire their
substance from the 'logic' of the work, according to which the various created
qualities interact to produce the symphony of the qualities which make up the
aesthetic object.
It should be clear from the preceding discussion that the actual being of the
aesthetic qualities resides not in the music but in the aesthetic situation, for it is in
this situation that it acquires its ontic sttus as a meaningful feeling. Thus when
someone says, with Osborne, "I perceive the feeling in the music," he could not
mean by feeling in this context what we ordinarily mean when we experience a
feeling of sadness in ourselves. His use of the term 'feeling' must be accepted in its
metaphorical sense. "But," my critic might object, "phenomenologically I perceive
the feeling in the music!" The word 'in' is, as I suggested earlier, here used vaguely,
for the feeling as a mental event does not actually exist in the music as a strand of
organized sound. What exists in the music in this state is the capacity of the art work
qua schematic formation to actualize the quality as feeling in the aesthetic situation.
The quality is, strictly speaking, grounded, it has its source, in the music. This is
why it is more appropriate to say that the quality belongs to the music but
onto logically exists in the aesthetic situation.
It might seem awkward to hold that the aesthetic object 'belongs' to the art but
actually exists in the aesthetic situation, but it is not, for two reasons: (1) as we have
seen, the quality acquires its structure in the aesthetic situation. It is, in other words,
a fact that in an aesthetic experience I directly, immediately, intuit the presence of
the quality; or, put differently, the quality reveals itself in the fulness of its being
in the said experience. (2) In the aesthetic experience the music is not alien, or
indfifferent, to the aesthetic experience; on the contrary, it is constitutive part of
the aesthetic experience, and in a sense the elan of its aesthetic character. It is a
fundamental ingredient of the aesthetic situation. Yet, in this event it does not exist
anymore as an external object to the perceiver but enters the domain of his
consciousness and assumes a new identity on the hands of the creative imagination
which 'squeezes' out the aesthetic meaning pregnant in it.
"I understand," my critic might here object, "what you mean when you say that
the feeling of sadness 'exists' in the aesthetic situation. But what does it mean to
say that it 'belongs' to the music; for it would be strange to say that a feeling exists
in a certain place and belongs to another!" When I say that the feeling 'belongs'
to the music I mean that the music 'possesses' the capacity of realizing the feeling,
and this capacity is inherent in the music qua significant form, in the way the sounds
are selected and ogranized. Accordingly when I say, for example, "Valse Triste is
sad," I mean that when I listen to this musical piece, or more accurately, when I
creatively respond to the mosaic of sounds called Valse Triste, I perceive in my
experience of the music a feeling of sadness. This feeling is not, as I insisted earlier,
168

given as a ready made reality; it is rather a novel creation, and the essence of this
creation consists in the feeling which I have when I intuit it. In this intuition the
quality is translated into a living feeling. I should here stress that the quality-as-
feeling, as living feeling, comes into being in and during the vent of aesthetic
perception. And when this feeling is not taking place it exists as a potentiality in the
music. This potential existence is exactly what defines the meaning of the term
'belong'. 'To belong' in this context means to be owned, to be the property, of this
piece of music: no other organization of sounds will, or can produce this feeling of
sadness. The music is the locus of this quality. This locus is the domain of its origin
and being; it is the domain in which it acquires its identity and living reality. That
is, what the feeling is, or is like, is in the final analysis determined by the formal
character of the music itself.
Thus when we say that an aesthetic quality 'belongs' to an art work we should
mean that it potentially exists in the work. The work has the capacity for actualizing
the quality; this capacity is pregnant in the significant form which the artist intended
and created when he produced the art work. This mode of existence, however, is
only potential. The aesthetic quality steps into actuality on the hands of the
consciousness which perceives it and transforms it into a living identity - the identity
of feeling. How this transformation takes place should be the subject of another
study.
 169

INDEX

Action Painting 37, 40ff. Casebier, A. 145

Aesthetic 5ff., I3ff., 27, 5Iff., 66, 88ff., Cassirer, E. 57
123ff. Chautik, K. 154
Aesthetic Attitude 43ff., 48, 93, 124ff., 139ff. Cohen, M. 145
Aesthetic Contemplation 43ff. Collingwood, R.G. 52
Aesthetic Perception 34ff., 55ff., 64, 95ff., Confucius 109
126, 164ff. Cormier, R. 145
Aesthetic Quality 52, 67, 124, 160ff. Croce, B. 52, 56
Aesthetic Situation 10 Iff. Curiosity 43
Aesthetic Solitude 138, 159ff.
Aldrich, Y. 148 Dawson, S. 148
Alexander, S. 57 Debussy, C.A. 126
Allport, G. 141 Descartes, R. 92
Architecture 21, 112 Detachment 120ff.
Aristophane 42 Dewey, J. 52, 56, 64, 79ff., 96, 98, 105, 144
Aristotle 91 Dickie, G. 4ff., 142, 145, 146ff., 150, 151,
Art 20ff., 35, 52, 88ff. I 55ff.
Art Work Iff., 15ff., 30ff., 39, 5Iff., 165 Disinterestedness 27ff., 43ff., 142ff.
Donoghue, D 27ff., 36ff.
Bach, J .S. 29, 30ff., 42, 108, 133 Dostoevsky, F. IOff.
Bacon, F. 95 Ducasse, C. 49, 143
Baumgarten, A.G. 13 Dufrenne, M. 57, 99, 165
Beardsley, M. 50, 118, 134, 143ff.
Beauty 8ff., 15, 52, 92, 119, 127 Eliot, T.S. 133
Beethoven, L. 51,107,108,112,113 Eliott, R.K. 132
Benjamin, W. 29 Empathy 98, 132
Bentham, J. 95 Expressiveness 124ff., 159ff.
Bell, C. 129, 165
Bergman, 1. 72 Feeling 14, 162ff.
Bergson, H. 97ff. Flaubert, G. 29, 30
Berleant, A. 144 Foot, A. III
Berkeley, G. 95, 166 Form 54ff.
Blaustein, L. 144, 153 Fry, R. 52, 122, 142
Bourget, P. 107
Bouwsma, O.K. 161 Gabo, N. 126
Brentano, F. 7 Gasset,O.Y. 145
Bruckner, A. 113 Gotchalk, D.W. 154
Bullough, E. 39, 118, 120, 144, 145 Goodman, N. 93
Burke, E. 134, 139 Gosling, J .C.B. 134, 136
Guardi, F. 104
Chopin 126 Guenther, H.Y. 6
Clark, R. 126 Guernica 37ff., 50ff.
Caldwell, S. 107, 108
170

Haezrahi, P. 143 Mill, J .S. 95, 97

Hals, F. 136 Mondrian, P. 155
Harris, J.C. 130 Moore, G.E. 8, 9, 134
Hauser, A. 27 Mozart, A. 13, 155
Hegel, G.W.F. 13, 14ff., 52, 165, 166 Munro, T. 154
Handel, G.F. 126 Munsterberger, H. 144, 145
Hepburn, R. 119, 121, 123, 126, 132 Mussgorsky, M.P. 126
Hilgard, E. 141
Hilton, T. 10 Nicholson, B. 128
Holiness 8[f. Nietzsche, F. 11, 93
Hospers, J. 47[f., 145, 148, 150, 151, 154
Hume, D. 95, 134 Obuchowski, K. 141
Husserl, E. 165 Organic 63
Huysmans, J.K. 107 Osborne, H. 53, 56, 148, 154, 159ff.
Ossowsky, O. 141, 142, 143, 154
Idealization 21
Imagination 129ff. Painting 22
Individuality 29ff. Pandit, S. 145
Ingarden, R. 141, 144, 149, 150, 165 Pater, W. 11
Pepper, S. 57, 113, 145, 154
James, W. 130 Picasso, P. 37ff.
Joyce, J. 155 Plato 91, 133, 136
Pleasure 48ff., 64ff., 134ff.
Kagan, M.S. 141 Poetry 22ff.
Kandinsky, V. 123, 126 Poliakoff 136
Kant, I. 4,7, 13, 14, 19, 36, 52,92, 170, 135, Powys, J.c. 11
136, 142 Price, K. 47, 145
Kierkegaard, S. 13 Proust, M. 148
Kipling, R. 107 Psychical Distance 93
Kris, E. 145
Kulpe, O. 143 Rader, M. 144
Reid, L.A. 92
Langer, S. 57 Rembrandt 33
Lee, V. 126 Renoir, P.A. 56
Leonhard, K. 126 Richards, LA. 143, 145, 146
Lesser, S. 145 Rimbaud, A. 133
Lipps, Th. 98 Rockwell, N. 112
Louis, M. 144
Locke, J. 95 Santayana, G. 52
London, J. 155 Scarlati, A. 126
Lowe, A. III Schiller, F.C. 14
Schonberg, A. 112
Malevich 126, 155 Schopenhauer, A. 3, 52, 93, 139, 143
Margolis, J. 146 Sculpture 21
Matisse, H. 10 Schumann, R. 108
MacLeish, A. 133 Scruton, R. 149, 151, 154
Mead, H. 49, 50 Segal, J. 143
Mendelssohn, F. 14 Sennet, M. 155
Merleau-Ponty, M. 99, 126 Sensation 13, 131ff.
Meyer, L. 27,41 Sense 17
Michaux, H. 126 Sensibility 14ff.
Michelangelo 29, 33, 104 Seurat, G. 136
 171

Shaftesburry, A. 92, 139 Tolstoy, L. 107, 108

Shelley, P.B. 130
Sibelius, J.J.C. 159, 161 Unity 99ff., 127ff.
Sibley, F. 145, 146 Urmson, J .0. 117, 123, 125, 134
Sophocles 111
Soutine, C. 136 Varese, E. 136
Sport 108ff. Vermeer, J. 136
Stern, I. 107 Vivas, E. 143, 147, 154
Stokes, A. 121 Volkelt, V. 144
Stolnitz, 1. 48, 142, 143, 147
Stolovich, L. 141 Wagner, R. 113
Strauss, R. 111 Wallis, M. 142, 143
Stravinsky, I. 136, 155 Warhol, A. 136
Sublime 7 William, V. 133
Suchodolski, B. 145 Witwicki, W. 142, 145
Wittgenstein, L. 154
Tatarkiewicz, V. 151, 152, 154
Tchaikovsky, P.I. 113 Zola, E. 107, 108
Tomas, V. 118, 145, 146
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