Imitation

Play

Expression

Empathy

Experience

FUNCTION OF ART

1. promote, revbeal, display value

instill morality

2. exists for its own sake

3. promote a new way of seeing or experiencing

JUDGEMENT CONCERNING ARTISTIC MERIT

1. individual- personal taste, experts

2. Objective standards- harmony, order technique/content/form

3. Objective relativism -there exists general standards e.g., structure&form

but art must be evaluated according to its ability to inspire aesthetic response

A. Objective Nature of Art inherent elements and qualities

Plato- critique of art as negative, anti-rational and disruptive

art as imitation, fiction,

1. art leads away from the truth , the ideal form

2. art incites the emotions, disorders the soal, disharmony

possible transcendent function

1. art reveals universal truths

2. art releases emotions,CATHARSIS, maintains proper internal order

listing of elements of tragedy- CLOSURE, UNITY OF PLOT,CATHARSIS

B. ART for ART's sake- ART has an intrinsic value

Ortega y Gasset

Oscar Wilde- ART expresses itself- art has an independent life

Bad ART returns to life and nature

LIFE imitates Art

Lying is the proper aim of ART

C. Subjective- effect upon observer

David Hume - a work of art is beautiful only if it evokes a certain kind of sentiment

beauty appeals to the "common sentiment", response should be universal to a observers with sound judgements. not all have such judgement because of being uneducated, inexperienced, confused or in poor health. Durable admiration may be an indicator of great art. Avoid caprices of mode and fashion and the mistakes of ignorance and envy.

art is the expression of feeling

the free play of imagination over the observation of formal

limits on artistic creativity

1. denies supremacy of reason in ART and life

acknowledges supremacy of imagination

2. promotes subjective experience over objective

LEO TOLSTOY's Religious Defense of ART

1. ART is a means to communicate feelings

2. purpose of art is to unite humanity through shared experience,

feelings- the UNIVERSAL in human experience

3. Religious justification is the highest understanding

4. the artist expresses and communicates moral and religious feelings

-infectiousness-infected by the author's condition of soul

individuality, clearness, sincerity

Herbert Marcuse:

the Reality Principle replaces the Pleasure Principle

this is through repression and sublimation

this is essential to civilization

repression goes beyond the necesssary to surplus repression

Social Function of Art:

TRANSCENDENCE-from the given social world to the possible future social order- LIBERATED

keep alive repressed dreams of Liberation-fuels revolutions

Paul Mattick --- public funding of the arts

pro 1. support for creativity, a national resource

2. preserve freedom of expression

vs 1. funding art is not a legitimate function of government

2.governement has responsibility to determine what type of art to fund

3.taxpayers are under no obligation to support works they find offensive or senseless

T.Wolfe ------ Social function of art

rejecting the world

legitimizing wealth : art as new Religion of the educated classes

Lawrence Wechsler -- confusion of art with life

performance art is it art?