Table Of ContentOana Șerban
After Thomas Kuhn: The Structure of Aesthetic Revolutions
Oana Șerban
After Thomas Kuhn:
The Structure of
Aesthetic Revolutions
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Contents
Introduction
Progressand Prediction in Science and the Arts: A Puzzling Problem 1
Chapter 1
ATheoretical (Dis)Agreement: Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions as a
Tool for Reshaping the Relationship between Aesthetics and the Arts 20
. A Scientific Appeal to Aesthetic Canons: Weakening the Incommensur-
ability between Paradigms 23
. Rational Models in Scienceand Arts: Paradigms and
Masterpieces 31
. Toward Aesthetic Incomprehensibility and Artistic
Incommensurability 35
Chapter 2
A Historical Undertaking: Kubler’s The Shape of Time as a Concurrent Pledo-
rary to Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions 43
. Artists and Scientists as Historical Beings 47
. Frontiers of the History of Art 53
. The Normative Structure of a Series 61
. Kubler’s Historical Disjunctions: A Problem for a Kuhnian Structure of
Aesthetic Revolutions? 68
. The Historical Recurrence of Forms and Meanings in Generating
Prime-Objects 79
Chapter 3
Kuhnian Premises for the Theory of Aesthetic Validity 86
. The Hafner Model: Similarities between Scientific and Artistic
Revolutions 91
. Common Revolutionary Patterns in Science and Art: the Kuhnian
Model 96
Chapter 4
“Good” and “Progressive” Art 103
. Linear and Cyclical Theories of Progress in Art: A Historical
Clash 109
. ATheory on Time Is not Enough: The Insufficiency of Progressin
Determining the Structure of Artistic Revolutions 128
VI Contents
Chapter 5
Aesthetic Validity and Its Discontents 135
. Conceptual Challenges: On the Rightness and Truthfulness of an
Artwork 135
. Hofstadter’s Theory on Aesthetic Validity asa Matter of
Transcendence 138
. Artistic and Aesthetic Properties in Conflict 143
. A Kuhnian Inheritance: Clignet’s Structure of Artistic
Revolutions 147
. “The Clignet Paradigm” 151
. The Test of Time for Validity Claims 164
. Habermas and the Pragmatist Turn of Validity: The Modern Legacy of
the Post-Frankfurt Account of “Artistic Truth” 181
Chapter 6
A Political Theory of Aesthetic Validity: Completing Kuhn’s Puzzle of
Revolutions 193
. Experimental Aesthetics and Political Movements: Genealogical and
Archaeological Considerations 194
. The Genealogical Recovery of Dada 200
. Engaging Temporality in the Structure of Cultural Revolutions: Pro-
grammatic (In)Validations Prescribed by Futurism 203
. How Long does a Paradigm Last? Avant-Gardes: A Political Recurrence
of Regimes of Visibility 209
. ATheoretical Model for a General Historical Validity of Avant-
Gardes 212
Concluding Future Pasts: Kuhn Looking at Contemporary Art 224
Bibliography 234
List of Figures 245
Index of Names and Terms 246
Introduction
Progress and Prediction in Science and the Arts:
A Puzzling Problem
Forreasonswhichwillappear,theproblemoftheavant-garde,aspresentedbyProfessor
AckermanandKubler,hascaughtmyinterestinunexpectedand,Ihope,fruitfulway.Gom-
brich’swork,whichtendsinmanyofthesamedirections,hasbeenasourceofgreaten-
couragement to me, and so is Hafner’s essay.Under these circumstances,I mustconcur
in its major conclusion: “The more carefully we try to distinguish artist from scientist,
themoredifficultourtaskbecomes.”Certainly,thatstatementdescribesmyownexperi-
ence.
ThomasKuhn,“TheNewRealityinArtandScience”(1969)
ThisargumentbelongingtoKuhnwasnotjustasimplestatement.Comingfrom
the author of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions,the bet on the commensur-
abilitybetween art and science,based on the similarityof their mechanisms of
paradigmshift,becameaserioustaskofpublicreflection:howmuchcanasci-
entistandanartistpretendthattheyarealike?Kuhn’schallengegoesbeyonda
reasonable,modest attempt tocommutepatternsofmethodologicalresearch in
the historyof scienceand the historyof art.The mere possibilityof commuting
the structure of scientific revolutions into the realm of art made history.
Unfortunately, Kuhn himself failed in succeeding to reach a final point for
theprojectofsynthesizingthestructureofaestheticrevolutions,albeitheunder-
stood the similarity and differences between the models of rationalityoperated
byeach ofthese two realms. Now, at the 100th anniversaryof Kuhn’sbirth and
the60thanniversaryofthepublicationofTheStructureofScientificRevolutions,
itistheperfectoccasiontotrackdownthehypothesesthatconvincedtheAmer-
ican philosopher thatparadigmshifts in the arts areworthyofmoresystematic
consideration. Not because it is a hermeneutical obligation occasioned by the
need to reconsider the Kuhnian works and their effects on domains other than
the canonical realm of philosophy and history of science, but mainly due to
the fact that the ageof contemporaryartconstantly undermined any normative
andideologicalconstructsthatusedtoquantifyandqualifyingenuity,creativity,
performativity, and social relevance for any artistic paradigm.
However,a(post‐)Kuhniantheoryonthenatureofprogressinartsandaes-
theticrevolutionsshouldrespectthefivestandardsoftheorychoice,asdesigned
by Kuhn. First, it should be accurate—that is, verifiable throughout empirical
stancesoftheartworld.Second,itshouldbeconsistent—thusperforminganin-
ternal logic that is compatible with an ideological background performed by
principles,values, and norms that can also be recognized as externally consis-
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110774696-001
2 ProgressandPredictioninScienceandtheArts:APuzzlingProblem
tentwithothertheoriesdevotedtoprogressandchangeinarts.Third,itshould
have a broad scope, without restricting its role and applicability solely to the
realm of arts. By this,we shall see that it will answer core-problems belonging
tothephilosophyofart,inpart,itwillevaluatepoliticalimplicationsofcultural
revolutionsandartisticmovements.Lastbutnotleast,itshouldbesimple—con-
sequently, easily formalized and fruitful—extending our knowledge on artistic
paradigms,aestheticrevolutionsandtheirintimateconnectionwiththemodels
ofparadigmshiftsprescribedbythehistoryofscience.ThisismyKuhniancom-
mitment in developinga theoryon the structure of aesthetic revolutions,which
will relyon a concept thatexplains the paradigmshift in art, namely, aesthetic
validity.Letmeexplainwhysuchatheoreticalmodelmightbeofanyhelpforan
arthistorianandwhatphilosophycouldpossiblygainfromitincaseaKuhnian
theory on the structure of aesthetic revolutions in modernity succeeds in being
provided by all means.
Haveyoueverwonderedforwhatreason,fromaneraobsessedwithperfec-
tion, perspective, symmetry, and mimetic canons, in which any artwork raises
from the intimacy of a metaphysical discourse and a mundane representation,
such as the Renaissance, we recognize and recall at a glimpse only the titans
—suchasdaVinci,Raphael,andMichelangelo—butwehavedifficultiesiniden-
tifyingaBronzino,aDelSartro,aLippi,oraMasaccio,althoughtheycreatetheir
artfollowingtheexactsamepatterns?WhyisitthatoutofalloftheMadonnas
weareabletonameaBellinioraPeruginowithouthesitation,butwithoutafor-
mal education in art we are unable to identify a Longhi? Kuhn would say that
only some of them managed to perform quite paradigmatic artworks belonging
to the paradigms they claimed to represent. Da Vinci might be as mimetic as
Lippi, but only the former invented the sfumato. George Kubler would argue
that they all lived in the same age, but the onlyones that count are those who
entered the historyof an artistic canon at the right time. Here we reach a gam-
blingpoint:whatelementsbelongingtoanartisticparadigmsucceedinpuzzling
arevolution,aflourishingspot,aboosterofculturalenergythathistorystillre-
gardsasastateofexception?KantwouldsayinhisCritiqueofjudgmentthatan
artistic genius is not an exception from the normal use of imagination, but the
culminationofacreativefaculty.Butnoinferenceshouldbedrawnofanything
otherthanrespectforthematterofanartisticrevolution:therefore,wemaywon-
derwhatdeterminesthedominanceofaparadigmandwhatleadstoitsexhaus-
tion? To get acquainted with the argument, let us go further in order to under-
stand why the topic of progress in the arts cannot be detangled from the
architecture of aesthetic revolutions and artistic movements.
From Ancient times to the Renaissance, the artworld quantified a visible,
powerful progress. All the formal ideals of Antiquity have been reinforced by
ProgressandPredictioninScienceandtheArts:APuzzlingProblem 3
theRenaissance,adding,asadistinctartistictrademark,thebirthofperspective.
Butdidartregisteragreatest,moreconvincingprogressduringthetimeofGiot-
to, who ingeniously performed new techniques of perspective, or rather once
Brunelleschi demonstrated his principles conciliating the illusion of space
with the proper mathematical calculations that made the visual rays possible?
For these kinds of dilemmas,the artworld should go back to Kuhn.
Whathavehistoriansofsciencetosaytoarthistorians?Thelatterhavemis-
understoodthesenseofprogressintheartworld.Thatbeforediscriminatingbe-
tweenalinearandadialecticalrepresentationofartprogress,forcingustotake
one side, just to dismantle Hegel’s End of Art thesis and to give a cause and a
purpose to the philosophy of art, as Danto generously did, we have to see if
there is anything revolutionary,prophetic,or messianic to be expected any fur-
ther from art.
Anthony Julius was right: in times of radical, compulsive transgression,
when“all boundaries have been crossed, all taboos broken, all limits violated”
(Julius 2003, p. 7), there must be something beyond scandal that makes us
scream an aesthetic Wow! Transgression became a cliché, nothing to object
against it,but all classics used to be marginal or hopeless detractors at the be-
ginning.WenolongerseemtoaffordPlato’sprivilegeofbanishingpoetsfroman
ideal society. Paradoxically,we have fewer ideals—after a centuryof vanguards
thattaughtushowtobereasonableidealistsandbearablerealists—andnopar-
ticulararttoexcludeorsanction.Suchcontextowesitsoriginmainlyduetothe
factthatwefacethevulnerabilityofdesignatinganartisticobjectasanartwork.
HaroldRosenberg(1983)usedtosaythatmodernity,withitstraditionofthenew,
performed anxious artistic entities: if an object with aesthetic pretentions had
consciousness and was asked if it recognizes itself as an artwork, it would not
know how to answer. Nowadays,when someone accidentally drops his glasses
in the cornerof a gallery, fifty visitors suddenly take a sloppygesture as a per-
formanceorasaworkofart.Post-andanticolonialreconsiderationsofartworks
create unprecedent gestures: Queen Elizabeth II’s portrait was pulled from Ox-
ford college whereas a replica of Michelangelo’s David was covered up due to
nudity concerns. We can easily observe how the artistic discourse goes back
afteraestheticideologies,inordertoresist,indulgeorovercomeformsoftrans-
gressions. The major problem is that, recently, art left the realm of aesthetics
wheninfact,bothconstitutiveandregulative,suchisolationhasneverbeenpos-
sible.Why should Kuhn be restoredto the heart of contemporary aesthetics?
4 ProgressandPredictioninScienceandtheArts:APuzzlingProblem
A Historical Task: (Re)Structuring Aesthetic Revolutions after
Thomas Kuhn
Kuhn’shypothesisthatthestructureofscientificrevolutionsmightbesuccessful-
lycommutedtothe structureofartistic revolutions,whoseannouncementcoin-
cidedwiththeexhaustionoftherevolutionaryenergiesofavant-gardes,became
not only a reliable source to explain modernity as the age of transitory and fu-
gitive cultural shifts, in the sense of Baudelaire (1863), but it equally reflected
a curious tendency of undermining the ideological potential of aesthetics, pro-
gressively subjected to arts. These contingent and divergent alternative pieces
that belong to“the puzzle” of the modern world—as Kuhn calls the attempt to
assambledifferenttraditions,conceptsandideologiesinordertoprofiletheau-
thentic spirit of modernity as awhole—reveal that genealogically, such similar-
ities can provide a more inclusive and reflective “world picture” on the edge of
modernity(Heidegger1977,p.115),whereasarchaeologically,modernitymustbe
trackedthrough the multiple ruptures that indicate, at once,the contradictions
ofthecultureasthesourcesofitsbreakthroughs.Thequestionofculturaldevel-
opment,raisedintheseterms,can beconceivedeitherlinearly,asitisthecase
of the history of science, or cyclically, as the nature of progress in the arts ap-
pearstobealike.Therefore,bywhatmeansistheidealofaccuratelyevaluating
the structural similarities of scientific, artistic, and aesthetic revolutions saved
fromautopianproject,iftheleadingassumptionisthatthehistoriesofeachdis-
ciplinaryfieldbyitselfcomportmutuallycontradictorypatternsofprogress?On
what historicalgrounds should such ambition be rooted,toraise philosophical
speculations combined with empirical observations on the nature of change as
paradigm shift, projected on a fertile domain of scientific impulses, aesthetic
concerns, and artistic expressions of our modern society? Indeed, are the clea-
vages between science, aesthetics, and art irreconcilable drifts, mostly main-
tained by the inner disciplinary vanities of each domain and its practitioners,
whosemajorhistoricaltendenciesweretoisolatescienceasarationalobjective
area, fromarts in their monopole on the sensible subjective realms of our exis-
tence?Whatif,onthecontrary,theyareco-dependentinthemoderntermsofa
coherentandunitaryprojectofknowledge,shapedbytheKantianIlluministap-
petite and its later partisans? These are legitimate questions that converge to-
ward a singular and uncomfortable task of explaining modernity as something
more than a historical consecution of universalized scientific rationality that
openedtowardtheeraof “ephemeral,fleeting,contingent”changes(Baudelaire
2010, p. 13), marked by non-rational, transgressive, avant-gardist trends. It
means that,by this critical inquiry,we chose to pass over the conventional de-
nominations of modernity as something that it is often “spoken of as an
