Placing Aesthetics: Reflections On Philosophic Tradition (Series In Continental Thought)

433 Pages·2000·2.21 MB·English

by  Robert E. Wood


26
Examining select high points in the Western speculative tradition—from
Plato and Aristotle through the Middle Ages and German tradition to
W
Dewey and Heidegger—Placing Aesthetics seeks to locate the aesthetic con-
o
cern within the larger context of each thinker’s philosophy.It takes its point o
d
of departure from a phenomenological description of the major parameters
of the field of experience within which it attempts to locate the aesthetic in
general and the arts in particular.
In Wood’s study, aesthetics is not peripheral to the speculative tradition
P
but rather central to it and to human existence.In Dewey’s terms,aesthetics
is “experience in its integrity.”Its personal ground is in “the heart,”which is l
a
the dispositional ground formed by genetic,cultural,and personal historical
factors by which we are spontaneously moved and, in turn, are inclined to c
move,both practically and theoretically,in certain directions.The heart con-
i
stitutesthe personal filling of the empty space between the Now of biologi- n
cally mediated sensations and our founding reference to the Whole via the
g
notion of Being.The aesthetic both expresses and evokes the heart of human

experience.
A
Prepared for use by the student as well as the philosopher,Placing Aesthetics
aims to recover the fullness of humanness within a sense of the fullness of e
encompassing Being. It attempts to overcome the splitting of thought, even s
in philosophy, into exclusive specializations and the fracturing of life itself
t
into theoretical,practical,and emotive dimensions.
h
e
t
i
Robert E.Wood,chair and professor of philosophy at c
the University of Dallas, is editor of American Catholic s
Philosophical Quarterly and author of Martin Buber’s Ontol-
ogyand A Path into Metaphysics.
Placing Aesthetics
Series in Continental Thought,No.26
               
Ohio University Press                    
OHIO
ISBN 0-8214-1281-7
,!7IA8C1-ebcibh! Robert E. Wood
Cover art:Christus Africanusby Robert E.Wood
Cover design by Karol Halbirt
PLACING AESTHETICS

PLACING AESTHETICS
Reflections on the Philosophic Tradition
Robert E. Wood
OHIO UNIVERSITY PRESS
Athens
Ohio University Press,Athens,Ohio 
© by Robert E.Wood
Printed in the United States of America
All rights reserved
Ohio University Press books are printed on acid-free paper Ī
 
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wood,Robert E.,–
Placing aesthetics :reflections on the philosophic tradition /
Robert E.Wood.
p. cm.—(Series in Continental thought ;)
Includes bibliograhical references and index.
ISBN --- (alk.paper).
ISBN --- (pbk.:alk.paper)
.Aesthetics—History I.Title. II.Series.
BH.W 
'.'—dc -
CIP
Frontispiece. Christus Africanusby Robert E. Wood
To Sue,
who, given but half a life, died at peace
and to Jim,
who, given two-thirds of a life, lived enough for three.

Contents
Abbreviations xi
Preface xiii

I.Introduction: Fine Art and the Field of Experience

The Threefold Structure of the Field of Experience

The Manifold Forms of Art

A Preliminary Descriptive System of the Fine Arts

Phenomenological, Hermeneutic, and Dialogic Approaches

II.Plato

Art in the Purged City

The Center of Order

Mimesis

The Treatment of Art in the Republic

The Ladder of Ascent to Beauty Itself

Response

A Brief Excursus: Plato and Wright on Architecture

III.Aristotle

Meanings of the Term Art

Nature Illumined by Art: Plato and Aristotle

Art as Imitation

Division of the Performing Arts
fi 
The De nition ofTragedy

Response
Contents

IV.Plotinus and the Latin Middle Ages

Plotinus

Aquinas among the Latin Medievals

Response

V.Kant

Critique of Pure Reason

Critique of Practical Reason

Critique of Judgment

The Beautiful

The Sublime

Art and Genius

Nature’s Ultimate and Final Purpose

Response

Epilogue: Hume’s Notion of Aesthetic Community

Response

VI.Hegel

Hegel, Enlightenment, and Christianity

The Starting Point of the Hegelian System

The Development of the System

The Nature of Art

The Basic Stages and Forms of Art

Response

VII.Schopenhauer

A Synthesis of Kant, Plato, and the Indian Tradition

The World as Will and Representation

Aesthetic Experience and the Work of Art

The Forms of Art

Response

VIII.Nietzsche

Nietzsche’s Horizon

Nietzsche’s Aesthetics

Response

IX.Dewey

Overcoming the Platonic Splits
viii
Contents

Overcoming the Cartesian Splits
fi 
Further Modi cations ofTraditional Notions

Dewey’s Aesthetics

Response

X.Heidegger

Situating Heidegger

“The Origin of the Work of Art”

What Is a Thing?

Philosophy, Science, Art, and the Lifeworld

Response

XI.Conclusion

The Sensory Field

The Cultural World

Transcendence

Appendix: On Sculptural Production

Descriptions

Reflections

Notes

Bibliography

Index of Names

Subject Index
ix