Flame War Rant

[Robert Campbell]

I don't see any harm in an actual discussion of Kant's conception of the sublime.

It would give me an excuse to read more of The Critique of the Power of Judgment.

Most academic philosophers don't seem to pay attention to that book. I recall Jan Narveson objecting to anyone citing Religion within the Limits of Mere Reason in a discussion of Kant's moral philosophy—and throwing in Critique of the Power of Judgment for good measure.

After the Cambridge edition of the book came out, I read the section on the theory of fine art (not the same as the section on the sublime) and found it rather pedestrian. But there was nothing in it that would lend aid or comfort to modernist painting or postmodernist anything. The main impression I got from it was that Kant didn't know much about any fine art, with the exception of poetry, and that he was unmusical to boot. It would be interesting to know where Rand got the Kant-is-the-father-of-nonobjective-art riff from. If Leonard Peikoff was her source, he was commenting on a book that didn't much interest him.

Robert Campbell

[Newberry]

And, questioning motives is always a good practice.

Mike

Mike, thanks for the thoughtful note. Glad you enjoy painting and stuff and on my site.

Cheers,

Michael

[Rich Engle]

I do believe/We have reprieve. . .

I asked around. The opinion was nearly unanimous. . . There were a few good snippets. They mostly found very little of substance coming from o-world (most likely because it has a tendency to downgrade itself via many means).

But I got a few goodies out of it, and even thing to-point on J.'s trying to keep it to basics. I will paraphrase slightly, and no, I will not cite sources, other than to say there were 3 main ones. Meaning, I will attempt to cloud (and de-cloud) the Matter of Circumpection<tm> all at once, in a furty of Smoke, and Fire. In other words, I have listened, read, and will attempt to paraphrase. Isn't that what is writing is about, after all?

Yeah right . . . anyway, in my Own Words (Pay No Attention To The Man Behind The Curtain)

I remain (and might for sometime remain so) unsure about the deepest context of the debate, but I have poked around quite a bit and refreshed, and polled. I think, in short, it might be this way, some:

Burke had precious little to say about "the Sublime"--(that grand uplifted, high, lofty, elevated, exalted jive that excite Objectivists so).

Anyway. surely he (and others) spoke of the Sublime, but that also refers to a vast magnitude such as physical, moral, intellectual, metaphysical AND, yes, aesthetic.

It remains that Kant's works that are exhaustive, and far more embracing. And he was --and is--a much more popular philosopher; he covered more ground too, much more...and the effects were greater as a result. Burke is the father of conservatism...big fucking deal. ;]

I don't use "Sublime," being a, heh, "Religionist," and so. In our world, we call it many things. The Divine, The Sacred, All That Is...

But that is no matter.

Meanwhile, people continue to make things, despite these little snitty-poos.

rde

Playing with Grammy-Nominated Kat Epple (flute) at uucfm.org this Sun. 10:30 am.

Warm Blessings To All Of The OL Folks!

PPS what the #$%$ are these #%@ Hymns...crap.

rde

Anyone got something else today?

Edited August 12, 2010 by Rich Engle

[Philip Coates]

Ellen, your post is foolish on many different levels (and laughably spiteful with the sweeping attacks on what I've had to say over the years.)

Your pretty much across the board dismissal reminds me of that of a middle schooler.

So I won't bother to respond other than to say that I've had many, many compliments on lots of my posts over the dozen years since 1998.

Time to grow up, babe.

Edited August 13, 2010 by Philip Coates

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Michael,

I want to weigh in since I think I have some good thoughts. But the climate isn't right at the moment.

Michael

[Newberry]

I don't know about Jonathan and you, Michael, but there does seem to be some basic disconnect regarding esthetics--objective or subjective? In that context it matters not a whit whether he displays his work or not.

When artists say things that don't match up with my experience, it matters to me what they make. For example Rand's strange comment about Rembrandt in Romantic Manifesto, if she hadn't written Atlas Shrugged I might not have read past that passage. Primarily an artist's work tells me more about their views then their stated beliefs.

You also seem to be trolling for business to some modest extent. I don't see anything wrong with that, though.

The art stuff I share seems to be a good fit for the guidelines here.

This is from the OL Posting Guidelines:

1. Objectivist Living is a community of people with shared interests, people who are mainly interested in discussing Objectivism from all aspects...fine arts and creating works. Members also present articles and links to their own activities and items they find interesting to share.

You are a much more complete public package.

Thanks.

Jonathan is just his words.

Here, yes.

[Jonathan]

Burke had precious little to say about "the Sublime"--(that grand uplifted, high, lofty, elevated, exalted jive that excite Objectivists so).

Burke had quite a lot to say about the Sublime in his Inquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful, and his concept of it was not that it was "uplifted, high, lofty, elevated, exalted," but that it was based in pain and the power of destruction. It was the "terror that delights."

Anyway. surely he (and others) spoke of the Sublime, but that also refers to a vast magnitude such as physical, moral, intellectual, metaphysical AND, yes, aesthetic.

It remains that Kant's works that are exhaustive, and far more embracing. And he was --and is--a much more popular philosopher; he covered more ground too, much more...and the effects were greater as a result. Burke is the father of conservatism...big fucking deal. ;]

Kant may be more popular among philosophers, but Burke had more influence among creators. In fact, as I mentioned in this post, the Sublime Movement in the arts began around 1770, twenty years prior to the publication of Kant's views on the Sublime in his Critique of Judgment. Kant didn't lead everyone to the Sublime. He showed up after the party was in full swing and analyzed what had happened. He attempted to explain what Burke had been unable to.

J

[Newberry]

Please answer the following question with a simple, direct yes or no: Is it an example of fairness, good faith and reason for a person to write a negative review of an artwork after seeing only about one-fifth of it (along with a display of some of the props used in its filming)?

You have asked me that before and I have answered.

The impression that I get from you is that the artists and thinkers you villify should not exist. Why is it so upsetting to you that other people create and enjoy art that you dislike? Why do you need to publicly rant about it?

"Villify", "dislike", and "rant"?...Francis Bacon, Munch, Duchamp, Jenny Saville, Paul McCarthy...are artists and postmodern artists that convey either morbid themes, or anti-art methods--Saville and Bacon are great painters, I love their techniques, I love The Scream, and Duchamp and MaCarthy are incredibly clever cynics, in which anything and everything can be art. So you mistakenly, and often, attribute to me thoughts that I don't have and haven't expressed. I have made observations about their content and methods. You don't very well attribute a "pretty" painting designation to an intensely disturbing content of Bacon the Pope.

I have answered before why I lecture, and write on aesthetics.

You smear other artists and thinkers.

From the guidelines here:

Excessive profanity, trash talk, bigoted remarks and such should be avoided.

You seem to have no interest in correcting yourself when confronted with information that you hadn't been aware of and which refutes your position.

Asked and answered.

Maybe at least consider the idea of evaluating your own behavior?

Guidelines:

2. The practice of good manners is a value sought and encouraged on this forum. Obnoxious and offensive behavior is not welcome.

I think the best approach would be to try respond to the substance of my criticisms of your ideas rather than complaining that I'm a big nasty meanie. Maybe try setting aside your emotions for a while and actually using reason to consider some of the arguments that I've posted. Maybe go back and look at some of the information that I've provided in my disagreements with you and actually address the content of my arguments point by point. And consider the possibility of reconsidering your views accordingly.

Asked and answered.

This might be a good place to start reevaluating your views. It's a Wikipedia article on Romanticism. Read the first sentence in the second paragraph:

The movement validated strong emotion as an authentic source of aesthetic experience, placing new emphasis on such emotions as trepidation, horror and terror and awe—especially that which is experienced in confronting the sublimity of untamed nature and its picturesque qualities, both new aesthetic categories.

How do you think that squares with your previously expressed views on Kant and the Sublime and its being the "foundation" of Postmodern art? Don't you think that your opinions need to be altered?

You asked me a similar question before and I had answered.

I think you should try the opposite approach for once, which would be to assume that anyone who disagrees with your ideas isn't necessarily evil...

Guidelines:

trash talk

...(not that I don't have any respect for you now -- I've said many times that I think you're a talented artist and very knowledgeable about many aspects of the visual arts).

Noted.

In more cases that I can number I have answered your objections. You can't keeping saying I didn't answer, because you didn't like the response. Simply take note of them and move on.

Perhaps a little reminder might help you understand the situation a little better. My aesthetic thought, lectures, and writings have been the blueprints to my development as a painter. They are not exclusively ideas, rather they make up the foundation for my artistic development. One should consider that I am extremely prolific, and have the same excitement and joy, and sense of discovery in my painting now at 53, as when I was 17. It is an understatement to say I am on the right path. I think MSK was suggesting something of this on the other Authors Needed thread.

[Brant Gaede]

Jonathan: Michael should change.

Michael: not going to happen.

Brant

don't let me take the "B" out of my name!!!

[Brant Gaede]

Michael makes moral judgments about art and Jonathan makes moral judgments about Michael making moral judgments about art?

--Brant

rant

[Newberry]

--Brant

rant

now if we take the "r" out?

Edited August 13, 2010 by Newberry

[Rich Engle]

MSK-Slash-Maestro.

I said I heard the BFI truck a street-over . . .perhaps I anticipated you : we should be more together in things.

The amount of sword-fighting (and I'm not talking about using live blades; it is more intimate) going on is now up on the topic thread.

Some of these guys are too young (or maybe too old mentally) to recall how bad "Flame Wars" was in the green-screen days.,

I came from the Cleveland FreeNet (first free community computer system in the world, and, its associate, CWRUNET (Case Western Reserve University, University Center in OH, right by the CIM, right by CIA, and such. Call it the University Arts Circle.

At that time, with dial-in connections, someone, on a flame war, could punch right through your phone line, go in, and fry your PC.

Hateful thinking is just bad. At some point, this kind of extended thing looks like mental masturbation.

Keep at it, busy on other things..

rde

24 off

[Newberry]

I don't see any harm in an actual discussion of Kant's conception of the sublime.

I read the section on the theory of fine art (not the same as the section on the sublime) and found it rather pedestrian. But there was nothing in it that would lend aid or comfort to modernist painting or postmodernist anything. The main impression I got from it was that Kant didn't know much about any fine art, with the exception of poetry, and that he was unmusical to boot. It would be interesting to know where Rand got the Kant-is-the-father-of-nonobjective-art riff from.

Robert Campbell

Hi Robert,

Starting in my early 20's I have exhaustively read and reread the Critique of Judgement translation by James Creed Meredith, for a few reasons. One is that Rand pointed to it; I had wanted to know the root aesthetic justifications for such things as Duchamp's Fountain, Bricks exhibited in Museum spaces, etc.; and I hate going down blind paths, and like to understand as deeply as possible directions I can take as an artist. (My 3 years of college was primarily postmodern, very little technique and big on conceptual stuff (like finding junk from the street and re-arranging it, expressing some kind of idea.)

The big picture about aesthetics includes means, content, aim. It also includes refined examples which illustrate the furthest reaches of an artist's abilities and thoughts (I don't see anyway other than calling that the sublime.)

In my interpretation of Critique, Kant juxtaposes concepts of the sublime with concepts of beauty (his discussion of the nature of fine art). Like you mentioned above his take is kind of pedestrian, he identifies key components of fine art, but doesn't find it any more profound or meaningful than as a craft. But he does compare and contrast Sublime with Beauty through out the book. And his concepts of the Sublime are the antithesis of Beauty. Beauty deals with themes, craftsmanship, taught skills, sensuality, material, resolution. The other (Sublime) deals with genius (as defined as not knowing how it came about), concepts not necessarily connected to material, monumental beyond comprehension (like contemplating when numbers end, or the universe), and violent element (like safely contemplating your demise at the base of Niagara Falls, edge of cliff, witnessing a violent storm, etc.). Kant's stated belief was that the Sublime was not about art.

Herein lies a problem. Michelangelo, Beethoven, Hugo etc elevated their art way beyond craft. Yet they used the medium and craft techniques as a base, and added to it by profound themes, far reaching emotional states, and their exceptional human abilities (genius). Kant doesn't allow for this in that Beauty doesn't account for their kind of greatness, and his Sublime goes in a completely different direction.

No maverick artist worth their salt is going to be a tried and true traditional craftsman. They are going to reach for the sublime, i.e. the furthest reaches of their art. Kant's Sublime offers them an alternative that is a radical departure from art as we generally know it to a world of concepts unrestricted by material considerations; raging expression; genius as the given, no matter how unbelievable, etc.

This direction is a dead end for fundamental art forms: representational painting and figurative sculpture, symphonic music, epic literature, etc. In a sense, whether Kant intended it or not, his Concepts of the Sublime are the antithesis of art, an anti-art program.

There are in the last 90/100 years countless examples of esteemed non-objective art, anti-art, and postmodern art that can be realistically viewed as realization or variation of some or all of Kant's theories of the Sublime.

I have several articles and other things in which I cite art examples to his theories of the sublime.

Though Rand did not do any fleshing out and only pointed to Kant as the father of non-objective art, I am convinced that he is a major player when comes down to understanding the origins of postmodern art.

Anyone here is welcome to give alternative theories as to the aesthetic fundamental justifications for Creed's empty room, Duchamps toilet, McCarthy's installations, etc. I think I have done a pretty good job.

This issue has been personally important to me because the postmodern agenda, in part or total, is incompatible with my aims and objectives as a representational painter. Having thought my way through as given me freedom. I am not carrying a burden, that acts as a wrench in my engine. And I hope that for other artists that have struggled with these issues that might help them out.

[Ellen Stuttle]

Michael,

I think your above post is terrific. It clearly lays out your history in coming at the issue, your understanding of what Kant was saying, and the reasons why you think his message would lead to post-modernism.

I've never read Kant on aesthetics, so I have no first-hand basis for assessing the accuracy of your interpretation. Also, I mistrust the idea to begin with that a particular philosopher would result in a whole trend in art. I think there was a fair amount of discussion on that point on the "A Few Kant Quotes" thread, but I wasn't much following that thread (just a minor sub-subject where I got into a dispute with Dragonfly).

I'm immediately reminded of two things reading your post: Popper's opinion expressed in Unended Quest that Beethoven started the way to the deterioration of music with molding music as a means of personal expression. And a quote from Jung. This is from memory. It comes from one of his letters, which I don't have; I've just heard the quote many times in lectures: "To this day I think of 'God' as all which crosses my path violently and changes my life drastically for good or ill." Sounds sort of like your presentation of Kant's notion of the Sublime. Also, there's Jung's emphasis on the personal "daemon," which has resemblances to what you say about Kant's notion of "genius."

Thanks for writing the post. Maybe it will provide a clear foundation from which discussing can proceed.

Ellen

[Philip Coates]

> I mistrust the idea to begin with that a particular philosopher would result in a whole trend in art. [Ellen]

Today we live in a cacophonous world in which no single contemporary thinker is given as much respect as the classical philosophers were at one time. And it's been that way for our entire adult lives.

That probably makes it hard to grasp how influential Plato, Aristotle, and a handful of other men have been in either changing men's minds entirely or at least shifting the terms of debate. Kant has been singled out as enormously influential in other areas of philosophy, but I don't know whether that is true in esthetics.

One good way to check is if a generation of thinkers cited him frequently and if the next generation cited them. Another way is to look through a number of entries on esthetics in Cambridge, Oxford, Stanford, IEP and other respected dictionaries and reference works on philosophy.

Edited August 13, 2010 by Philip Coates

[Ellen Stuttle]

Kant may be more popular among philosophers, but Burke had more influence among creators. In fact, as I mentioned in this post, the Sublime Movement in the arts began around 1770, twenty years prior to the publication of Kant's views on the Sublime in his Critique of Judgment. Kant didn't lead everyone to the Sublime. He showed up after the party was in full swing and analyzed what had happened. He attempted to explain what Burke had been unable to.

Makes me wonder if Beethoven was influenced by Critique of Judgment. He was born in 1770, was starting to hit his stride by about 1790, though not fully until about 10 years later (the Eroica was written in 1803-04). He's said to have been interested in philosophy, and to have read Kant's works "hot off the press." Odd to think of someone's reading Kant's work as it was being published, like the way some of us were avidly reading each new work by Rand. Beethoven, like Rand, had an impetus to shock, to startle, to break molds. It can be difficult for people today to realize how shocking some of his music sounded to his contemporaries.

This might be a good place to start reevaluating your views. It's a Wikipedia article on Romanticism. Read the first sentence in the second paragraph:

The movement validated strong emotion as an authentic source of aesthetic experience, placing new emphasis on such emotions as trepidation, horror and terror and awe—especially that which is experienced in confronting the sublimity of untamed nature and its picturesque qualities, both new aesthetic categories.

I don't find that description good. "New emphasis [...] new aesthetic categories" compared to what? Compared to Enlightenment standards of form. However, there was plenty of "trepidation, horror and terror and awe" and confrontation with "untamed nature" (though I wouldn't say with "its picturesque qualities," instead more like with its cataclysmic destructive qualities) in Greek epic and drama. And there was Aristotle's theory of the drama providing "catharsis."

Ellen

[Jonathan]

Please answer the following question with a simple, direct yes or no: Is it an example of fairness, good faith and reason for a person to write a negative review of an artwork after seeing only about one-fifth of it (along with a display of some of the props used in its filming)?

You have asked me that before and I have answered.

No, you haven't answered, which is why I continue to ask again now and then. My question has been, and still is, whether or not you think that it was good and fair (and benevolent, reasonable, rational, etc.) of you to write a negative review of The Cremaster Cycle after having seen only one fifth of it. In the past, your non-answer response was to state that you saw the segment that you saw, and that you based your review on it. You completely avoided addressing the question of whether or not doing so was fair.

Is it really so difficult to answer with a simple yes or no? Isn't that what rational, objective men of integrity would do? I know that if someone were questioning my honesty, fairness and rationality in regard to a specific issue, I wouldn't hesitate to answer with "Hell yes, it was fair of me!" if I believed I was right, or "You're right, it was unfair of me," if I was wrong.

Anyway, obviously it is not fair or benevolent or "in good faith" to write such a review, and I think your refusal to own up to it says a lot about you.

The impression that I get from you is that the artists and thinkers you villify should not exist. Why is it so upsetting to you that other people create and enjoy art that you dislike? Why do you need to publicly rant about it?

"Villify", "dislike", and "rant"?...Francis Bacon, Munch, Duchamp, Jenny Saville, Paul McCarthy...are artists and postmodern artists that convey either morbid themes, or anti-art methods--Saville and Bacon are great painters, I love their techniques, I love The Scream, and Duchamp and MaCarthy are incredibly clever cynics, in which anything and everything can be art. So you mistakenly, and often, attribute to me thoughts that I don't have and haven't expressed. I have made observations about their content and methods. You don't very well attribute a "pretty" painting designation to an intensely disturbing content of Bacon the Pope.

Your listing of artists and artworks that you feel you have not smeared doesn't cancel out the fact that you have smeared other artists and artworks. Likewise, if a man were to be charged with assaulting several people, it wouldn't be an effective defense for him to say, "But take a look at this list of all of the people I haven't assaulted. You should focus on my positives rather than always needing to tear me down."

You seem to have no interest in correcting yourself when confronted with information that you hadn't been aware of and which refutes your position.

Asked and answered.

Could you point me to the answer? Could you give some indication of what it was? Could you share with us in what ways any of the information I've provided as changed your views?

I think the best approach would be to try respond to the substance of my criticisms of your ideas rather than complaining that I'm a big nasty meanie. Maybe try setting aside your emotions for a while and actually using reason to consider some of the arguments that I've posted. Maybe go back and look at some of the information that I've provided in my disagreements with you and actually address the content of my arguments point by point. And consider the possibility of reconsidering your views accordingly.

Asked and answered.

Again, could you point to some examples of where you've answered my information and the substance of my arguments point by point? I'd be especially interested in any answers you've given to my questions about why you still single out Kant as being responsible for proposing the concept of the Sublime as being based in terror and/or incomprehension. Upon what do you base your assertion that he changed the meaning of the Sublime to its opposite?

This might be a good place to start reevaluating your views. It's a Wikipedia article on Romanticism. Read the first sentence in the second paragraph:

The movement validated strong emotion as an authentic source of aesthetic experience, placing new emphasis on such emotions as trepidation, horror and terror and awe—especially that which is experienced in confronting the sublimity of untamed nature and its picturesque qualities, both new aesthetic categories.

How do you think that squares with your previously expressed views on Kant and the Sublime and its being the "foundation" of Postmodern art? Don't you think that your opinions need to be altered?

You asked me a similar question before and I had answered.

Here's where I previously asked the question. You did not answer.

In more cases that I can number I have answered your objections. You can't keeping saying I didn't answer, because you didn't like the response. Simply take note of them and move on.

I can and will say that you haven't answered my questions when you haven't answered them. The best way to get me to move on would be to answer them.

Perhaps a little reminder might help you understand the situation a little better. My aesthetic thought, lectures, and writings have been the blueprints to my development as a painter. They are not exclusively ideas, rather they make up the foundation for my artistic development. One should consider that I am extremely prolific, and have the same excitement and joy, and sense of discovery in my painting now at 53, as when I was 17. It is an understatement to say I am on the right path. I think MSK was suggesting something of this on the other Authors Needed thread.

It sounds to me as if you're now saying something which I've been saying all along, which is that you need to believe that certain things are true regardless of whether or not they are. You need Kant to be the enemy, and you need Rand to have been right about him. Believing such things keeps your fire burning?

And everyone's supposed to go along with the fantasy, otherwise it's not quite real enough to be effective? We're supposed to place your needs above our recognition of reality, and remain silent when you tell falsehoods?

In this post I wrote:

"Isn't Kant himself an example of the Sublime to you? Isn't the horror of the myth of the pervasiveness of his evil and influence something which allows you to delight in the satisfaction of your power to resist?"

You apparently took it to be a lighthearted comment. It wasn't. I think that you, Michael, are a living example of the importance and power of the Kantian notion of the Sublime. Believing in the myth of the terrible magnitude of Kant's destructive influence over the arts allows you to "feel your capacity to resist," and to "regard your estate as exalted above it." You are so dedicated -- one might even say addicted -- to experiencing Kantian Sublimity in Kant that you're unwilling to consider any facts which might burst the bubble.

As for your post # 38, it is so full of falsehoods about Kant that I wouldn't know where to begin to untangle them. Your views on Kant are almost completely fantasy.

J

Edited August 13, 2010 by Jonathan

[Jonathan]

Kant may be more popular among philosophers, but Burke had more influence among creators. In fact, as I mentioned in this post, the Sublime Movement in the arts began around 1770, twenty years prior to the publication of Kant's views on the Sublime in his Critique of Judgment. Kant didn't lead everyone to the Sublime. He showed up after the party was in full swing and analyzed what had happened. He attempted to explain what Burke had been unable to.

Makes me wonder if Beethoven was influenced by Critique of Judgment. He was born in 1770, was starting to hit his stride by about 1790, though not fully until about 10 years later (the Eroica was written in 1803-04). He's said to have been interested in philosophy, and to have read Kant's works "hot off the press." Odd to think of someone's reading Kant's work as it was being published, like the way some of us were avidly reading each new work by Rand. Beethoven, like Rand, had an impetus to shock, to startle, to break molds. It can be difficult for people today to realize how shocking some of his music sounded to his contemporaries.

I don't know about Beethoven's influences, but I think that creators are usually directly influenced much more by other creators than by philosophers. I think Objectivish-types tend to buy into the idea that philosophy drives everything. I don't know for sure about music, but my understanding of the history of aesthetics and the visual arts is that the opposite is usually true: Artists rebel and explore new effects and new ways of doing things, and then philosophers come along and analyze how and why the new methods affect us. It's the creators who primarily dictate the direction that art takes, and the philosophies of aesthetics which follow.

J

[kiaer.ts]

PS, do I have to waste a post explaining what "gotchaism" is so that no one ignores or evades it or pretends that its okay because others do it?

Oh, come on Phil! The word is gotchalism, rhymes with botulism. Can't you get anything right?

[Dragonfly]

I don't know about Beethoven's influences, but I think that creators are usually directly influenced much more by other creators than by philosophers. I think Objectivish-types tend to buy into the idea that philosophy drives everything. I don't know for sure about music, but my understanding of the history of aesthetics and the visual arts is that the opposite is usually true: Artists rebel and explore new effects and new ways of doing things, and then philosophers come along and analyze how and why the new methods affect us. It's the creators who primarily dictate the direction that art takes, and the philosophies of aesthetics which follow.

That's also my opinion. Throughout history artists have been pushing out boundaries, looking for new effects, often shocking to their more conservative contemporaries, especially when they became more independent and could follow their own impulses. The daring innovation of one generation becomes the commonplace style for the next generation and so on. Like scientific and technological innovation, and possibly influenced by it, this process accelerated in the 20th century, with the inevitable result that at last "everything" is tried, if only to generate shock value. This is a completely natural process, and it's complete bullshit to attribute it to Kant's influence. If Kant had never lived the result would have been the same, just as "corrupt" modern physics would have been the same without Kant. That some artists may look for justification of their ideas in some existing philosophies doesn't imply that their ideas are the result of those philosophies.

[Brant Gaede]

I don't know about Beethoven's influences, but I think that creators are usually directly influenced much more by other creators than by philosophers. I think Objectivish-types tend to buy into the idea that philosophy drives everything. I don't know for sure about music, but my understanding of the history of aesthetics and the visual arts is that the opposite is usually true: Artists rebel and explore new effects and new ways of doing things, and then philosophers come along and analyze how and why the new methods affect us. It's the creators who primarily dictate the direction that art takes, and the philosophies of aesthetics which follow.

There is reason to think that the leaders of the American Revolution were the guys with the guns headed to Boston and the politicians jumped on board to get a handle on the situation followed by the political philosophers who gave us the Constitution. This is an over-simplification of all the interlocking complexities of the time, but I think it's worth consideration. Conversely, one might posit that Atlas Shrugged was fifty years too soon to change the world then and there and that this time has become its time in some significant respects and that Rand's great novel had something to do with it, passage of time being a necessary ingredient plus things going really bad.

--Brant

Edited August 14, 2010 by Brant Gaede

[Ellen Stuttle]

That some artists may look for justification of their ideas in some existing philosophies doesn't imply that their ideas are the result of those philosophies.

I certainly wasn't suggesting that Beethoven got any *musical* ideas from Kant, just wondering if the shock-and-awe theme, if that's to be found in Kant's ideas of the "Sublime," gave a "hmmm..." sort of license to the strident departure from the era's notions of "Beauty."

Would you say that Haydn's and others' "Sturm und Drang" period had nothing to do with philosophic and literary influences?

Wikipedia description

Sturm und Drang (German pronunciation: [ˈʃtʊʁm ʊnt ˈdʁaŋ]) (literally "Storm and Urge", although usually translated as "Storm and Stress")[1] is the name of a movement in German literature and music taking place from the late 1760s through the early 1780s, in which individual subjectivity and, in particular, extremes of emotion were given free expression in reaction to the perceived constraints of rationalism imposed by the Enlightenment and associated aesthetic movements.

The philosopher Johann Georg Hamann is considered to be the ideologue of Sturm und Drang, and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was a notable proponent of the movement; though he and Friedrich Schiller ended their period of association with it by initiating what would become Weimar Classicism.

Ellen

[Newberry]

[My good buddy, and collector, and philosopher Stephen Hicks quotes other scholars, thinkers, and critics on Kant's connection to contemporary art below.]

The poet John Enright has a post entitled “Kant and Abstract Art,” in which he takes up the claim Rand made in The Romantic Manifesto that “the father of modern art is Immanuel Kant (see his Critique of Judgment).” Rand does not elaborate, and Enright notes that some people scoff at the claim.

Rand’s claim is a strong one, in part because it makes intellectual-causal connection across centuries. How does one establish a fatherly connection between an uptight eighteenth-century philosopher and a sprawling twentieth-century movement? And in part Rand’s claim is hard to wrap one’s mind around because Kant’s philosophy is known to be turgid, arid, and highly rationalistic while modern art is known to be wild, weird, and wacky. How on earth could the Prussian lead to Pollock?

Is Rand right, and if so what is the connection?

I’ve been working on and off toward an essay on the topic of Kant’s influence on modern and postmodern art. Huge topic, so let me here give only some preliminary scholarly props to Enright’s post in the form of a few quotations from recent thinkers.

What have scholars after Rand said about the connection between Kant and modern art?

In a scholarly collection of essays on Kant’s philosophy, Eva Shaper writes that Kant is “the father of modern aesthetics” (“Taste, Sublimity, and Genius: the Aesthetics of Nature and Art,” in Paul Guyer, ed.,The Cambridge Companion to Kant, Cambridge University Press, 1992, p. 368).

Harold Osborne, longtime editor of the scholarly British Journal of Aesthetics, writes of “Kant, who is rightly regarded as the founder of modern aesthetics” (Aesthetics and Art Theory: An Historical Introduction, E. P. Dutton, 1970, p. 153). And further Osborne claims of Kant’s analysis: “This theory is the most important anticipation of the modern aesthetic outlook in any philosopher before the twentieth century” (p.191).

Without the first part of Critique of Judgment, writes philosopher Roger Scruton, “aesthetics would not exist in its modern form” (Kant, Oxford University Press, 1982, p. 79).

Philosopher Arthur Danto agrees with influential modernist art critic Clement Greenburg on the centrality of Kant’s work to the modernist project:

‘“The essence of Modernism,” [Clement Greenberg in “Modernist Painting” (1960)] wrote, “lies, as I see it, in the use of the characteristic methods of a discipline to criticize the discipline itself, not in order to subvert it but in order to entrench it more firmly in its area of competence.” Interestingly, Greenberg took as his model of modernist thought the philosopher Immanuel Kant: “Because he was the first to criticize the means itself of criticism, I conceive of Kant as the first real Modernist.” […] I suppose the corresponding view of painting would have been not to represent the appearances of things so much as answering the question of how painting was possible”’ (After the End of Art, Princeton University Press, 1998, p. 7).

Kant scholars Ted Cohen and Paul Guyer note that in the Critique of Judgment Kant “is entrenching the assumption of the subjective character of aesthetic judgment so strongly that by our own time it has become virtually an (unargued) commonplace” (Essays in Kant’s Aesthetics, University of Chicago Press, 1985, p. 11).

And more sweepingly, Professor Denis Dutton, philosopher and author of The Art Instinct, writes that Kant’s Critique of Judgment is “the greatest work of philosophical aesthetics ever written” (Dutton’s website).

Enright notes that scholar Roger Kimball makes a point of connecting Kant and modernist art in an essay on Schiller.

So from Kant’s Critique to Christo — an interesting fill-in-the-blanks intellectual-history project awaits.

Stephen Hicks, Ph.D.

[Dragonfly]

Would you say that Haydn's and others' "Sturm und Drang" period had nothing to do with philosophic and literary influences?

Well, from the same wikipedia article from which you quote:

...Haydn never mentions Sturm und Drang as a motivation for his new compositional style,[9] and there remains an overarching adherence to classical form and motivic unity. Though Haydn may not have been consciously affirming the anti-rational ideals of Sturm und Drang, one can certainly perceive the influence of contemporary trends in musical theatre on his instrumental works during this period.

So there is no evidence that some particular philosophical theories directly influenced Haydn for his stylistic change. I think you've to think in more general terms, it was the "Zeitgeist", a change in thinking that cannot be attributed to one or a few particular thinkers but to a general evolution of society that does have a cyclic nature: periods of renovation, revolution, breaking with the past (Sturm und Drang, the roaring twenties, the revolution of the sixties) alternating with periods of consolidation, reaction, conservatism.

[Jonathan]

[My good buddy, and collector, and philosopher Stephen Hicks quotes other scholars, thinkers, and critics on Kant's connection to contemporary art below.]

Apparently the "flame war" as devolved into "My daddy can beat up your daddy."

Anyway, no one has denied that there may be connections between Kant and many different artists and movements. See, Michael, you've asserted that Kant's views on the Sublime are the foundation of Postmodern art. The fact that I judge your claim to be baseless is not the same thing as my saying that Kant's aesthetic ideas in their entirety (rather than just those on the Sublime) may have had influence to greater or lesser degree over various artists and movements.

[From here]

The poet John Enright has a post entitled “Kant and Abstract Art,” in which he takes up the claim Rand made in The Romantic Manifesto that “the father of modern art is Immanuel Kant (see his Critique of Judgment).” Rand does not elaborate, and Enright notes that some people scoff at the claim.

Is Enright being presented here as an implied expert on abstract art and Kant? All I know of him is that he has a passion for poetry -- and that, personally, he seems like a nice guy. I've never thought of him as being especially knowledgeable of the visual arts and its history, or worthy of being quoted on the subjects. Perhaps I'm wrong?

Here's what Enright wrote in the post that Hicks cites:

When Rand writes:

...the father of modern art is Immanuel Kant (see his Critique of Judgment).

People snort.

But when Roger Kimball writes:

It is not surprising that the Critique of Judgment became an important theoretical document for those interested in abstract art: in Kant’s view, the purest beauty was also the most formal.

People give him a respectful hearing.

I'm not saying Kant would have enjoyed abstract art.

But some of his ideas may have helped it get a start.

If all that's important is form and the medium,

then representation is truly tedium.

A couple of points:

People "snort" at Rand's assertion because she was suggesting that Kant was the cause of Modern art (and the implied destroyer of Romanticism and all other art ideas and movements that she liked). If people don't "snort" at Kimball, it's because his is a much more modest and reasonable proposal: that Kant's ideas on Beauty -- and, note, not his ideas on the Sublime -- were of importance to those who were interested in abstract art (which, again, isn't at all the same thing as asserting that the ideas are "the foundation" or cause of Modernist art, let alone of Postmodern art, which was a rejection of Modernist art ideas).

As for Enright's speculation on representation being tedium due to Kant, as I quoted Guyer in this post:

"Kant assumes that all works of art are mimetic, that is, that they have a representational content or theme" based on Kant's belief that "the beauty of art is a beautiful representation of a thing."

Rand’s claim is a strong one, in part because it makes intellectual-causal connection across centuries. How does one establish a fatherly connection between an uptight eighteenth-century philosopher and a sprawling twentieth-century movement? And in part Rand’s claim is hard to wrap one’s mind around because Kant’s philosophy is known to be turgid, arid, and highly rationalistic while modern art is known to be wild, weird, and wacky. How on earth could the Prussian lead to Pollock?

Is Rand right, and if so what is the connection?

I’ve been working on and off toward an essay on the topic of Kant’s influence on modern and postmodern art. Huge topic, so let me here give only some preliminary scholarly props to Enright’s post in the form of a few quotations from recent thinkers.

What have scholars after Rand said about the connection between Kant and modern art?

In a scholarly collection of essays on Kant’s philosophy, Eva Shaper writes that Kant is “the father of modern aesthetics” (“Taste, Sublimity, and Genius: the Aesthetics of Nature and Art,” in Paul Guyer, ed.,The Cambridge Companion to Kant, Cambridge University Press, 1992, p. 368).

Harold Osborne, longtime editor of the scholarly British Journal of Aesthetics, writes of “Kant, who is rightly regarded as the founder of modern aesthetics” (Aesthetics and Art Theory: An Historical Introduction, E. P. Dutton, 1970, p. 153). And further Osborne claims of Kant’s analysis: “This theory is the most important anticipation of the modern aesthetic outlook in any philosopher before the twentieth century” (p.191).

Without the first part of Critique of Judgment, writes philosopher Roger Scruton, “aesthetics would not exist in its modern form” (Kant, Oxford University Press, 1982, p. 79).

I hope that Hicks is not so unfamiliar with art history that he doesn't yet realize that there's a difference between what he means by "modern art" (as well as what Rand meant by it) and what others can mean by "modern aesthetics." Does Hicks not know that the terms "the modern world" in the arts, "The Age of Revolution," and "modern aesthetics" generally refer to the time period beginning with Romanticism, and that the people he quotes above may be talking about that period?

In saying that without Kant, aesthetics would not exist in its modern form, they might also mean that Rand's aesthetics would not exist as she presented them -- she would not have been influenced by the brand of Romanticism and the approach to aesthetic thinking that Kant influenced.

Philosopher Arthur Danto agrees with influential modernist art critic Clement Greenburg [sic] on the centrality of Kant’s work to the modernist project:

‘“The essence of Modernism,” [Clement Greenberg in “Modernist Painting” (1960)] wrote, “lies, as I see it, in the use of the characteristic methods of a discipline to criticize the discipline itself, not in order to subvert it but in order to entrench it more firmly in its area of competence.” Interestingly, Greenberg took as his model of modernist thought the philosopher Immanuel Kant: “Because he was the first to criticize the means itself of criticism, I conceive of Kant as the first real Modernist.” […] I suppose the corresponding view of painting would have been not to represent the appearances of things so much as answering the question of how painting was possible”’ (After the End of Art, Princeton University Press, 1998, p. 7).

In the above, Greenberg is not crediting the content of Kant's ideas on aesthetics as influencing him, but is taking Kant's method of approaching all of philosophy as being the model that he, personally, took as his model of thought.

[Edited to add:] If one is going to use Greenberg's comment to support the claim that Kant was the father of Modern art, one could use a similar means to declare that Rand was the mother of Postmodern art: Rand's approach to philosophy was to question the premises of everything, and to challenge cherished beliefs and traditions. Postmodernist artists also take the approach of questioning the premises of everything, and to challenge cherished beliefs and traditions. Therefore I conceive of Rand as the first real Postmodernist. QED.

And, again, I saw nothing about the Kantian idea of the Sublime in the Greenberg quote.

Kant scholars Ted Cohen and Paul Guyer note that in the Critique of Judgment Kant “is entrenching the assumption of the subjective character of aesthetic judgment so strongly that by our own time it has become virtually an (unargued) commonplace” (Essays in Kant’s Aesthetics, University of Chicago Press, 1985, p. 11).

And what role did that "assumption of the subjective character of aesthetic judgment" play in the emotionalism of Romanticism?

And more sweepingly, Professor Denis Dutton, philosopher and author of The Art Instinct, writes that Kant’s Critique of Judgment is “the greatest work of philosophical aesthetics ever written” (Dutton’s website).

Great, Dutton has a very positive view of the CoJ. Are we supposed to take his valuing it as evidence that Kant's ideas on the Sublime are the foundation of Postmonderist art and not of Romanticism?

Enright notes that scholar Roger Kimball makes a point of connecting Kant and modernist art in an essay on Schiller.

Again, a "connection" is not a "foundation," and Kimball's "connection" involves Kant's views on Beauty, not the Sublime.

So from Kant’s Critique to Christo — an interesting fill-in-the-blanks intellectual-history project awaits.

I hope that when the blanks are finally filled in, Kant's influence over Romanticism isn't conveniently ignored because its inclusion wouldn't support the goal of vindicating Rand. Beginning with the conclusion that Kant caused Christo because Rand made an unsupported assertion about Kant and "modern art," and then seeking to "fill in the blanks," is a very odd approach to history and ideas.

Stephen Hicks, Ph.D.

Is the Ph.D. in art history? No? Are there any degrees in art or art history in Dr. Hicks' CV? Any coursework in the visual arts at all?

J

Edited August 15, 2010 by Jonathan