Kant
Immanuel Kant, an 18th century philosopher was one the foremost in a series of philosophers that radically changed the thinking and philosophy of the time such as the value or greatness of humans and not being ashamed unlike previous thinkers like Milton in Paradise Lost where humans can achieve greatness only by following God and always paying for the sin of Adam and Eve among others. One of his major contributions was in the field of Aesthetics which can be said to have been started by him. Aesthetics differs from art and literary criticism which have existed for centuries in that along with attempts to explain why things are beautiful or not it also tries to explain the concepts and perception of beautiful and how they arise in us. …show more content…
Thus Kant focusses more on how art is created. Art can be tasteful but still be soulless (rather like an artificial version of a beautiful natural object). The ‘soul’ of art is an aesthetic idea. An aesthetic idea is an attempt to successfully exhibit rational ideas. It is thus the talent of the genius to generate aesthetic ideas. This is Kant’s great romantic ideas that art other than nature can be beautiful. Art refers to the activity of making according to a preceding notion. If someone makes a table, he must know what a table is. However in contrast to art a flower (nature) has no prior notion of opening before its opening. Art is also different from science. It is a skill distinguished from a type of knowledge. Art involves practical ability which cannot be reduced to determinate concepts, which is distinct from a mere comprehension of something. Science or knowledge can be fully taught, art however although subject to training, relies upon native talent. Art is also not for the payoffs which result. Art (like beauty) is free from any interest in the existence of the product itself. Aesthetic art is that in which the immediate object is merely pleasure itself. Kant also distinguishes between agreeable and fine art. Agreeable produces pleasure through sensation alone, the fine art through various types of cognitions. The aesthetic idea can be an impossibly perfect or complete presentation of a possible experience and its concept (eg. death, envy, love, fame). Here the aesthetic idea is not presenting a particular rational idea but rather a general function of reason: the striving for a maximum, a totality or the end of a series (as in the mathematical sublime). In either case, the aesthetic idea is not merely a presentation, but one which will set the imagination and understanding into a harmony, creating the same kind of self-sustaining and self-contained feeling of pleasure as the
Immanuel Kant, an 18th century philosopher was one the foremost in a series of philosophers that radically changed the thinking and philosophy of the time such as the value or greatness of humans and not being ashamed unlike previous thinkers like Milton in Paradise Lost where humans can achieve greatness only by following God and always paying for the sin of Adam and Eve among others. One of his major contributions was in the field of Aesthetics which can be said to have been started by him. Aesthetics differs from art and literary criticism which have existed for centuries in that along with attempts to explain why things are beautiful or not it also tries to explain the concepts and perception of beautiful and how they arise in us. …show more content…
Thus Kant focusses more on how art is created. Art can be tasteful but still be soulless (rather like an artificial version of a beautiful natural object). The ‘soul’ of art is an aesthetic idea. An aesthetic idea is an attempt to successfully exhibit rational ideas. It is thus the talent of the genius to generate aesthetic ideas. This is Kant’s great romantic ideas that art other than nature can be beautiful. Art refers to the activity of making according to a preceding notion. If someone makes a table, he must know what a table is. However in contrast to art a flower (nature) has no prior notion of opening before its opening. Art is also different from science. It is a skill distinguished from a type of knowledge. Art involves practical ability which cannot be reduced to determinate concepts, which is distinct from a mere comprehension of something. Science or knowledge can be fully taught, art however although subject to training, relies upon native talent. Art is also not for the payoffs which result. Art (like beauty) is free from any interest in the existence of the product itself. Aesthetic art is that in which the immediate object is merely pleasure itself. Kant also distinguishes between agreeable and fine art. Agreeable produces pleasure through sensation alone, the fine art through various types of cognitions. The aesthetic idea can be an impossibly perfect or complete presentation of a possible experience and its concept (eg. death, envy, love, fame). Here the aesthetic idea is not presenting a particular rational idea but rather a general function of reason: the striving for a maximum, a totality or the end of a series (as in the mathematical sublime). In either case, the aesthetic idea is not merely a presentation, but one which will set the imagination and understanding into a harmony, creating the same kind of self-sustaining and self-contained feeling of pleasure as the