20 th Century Theories of Art

1. 20th Century Theories of Art R.G. Collinwood Imaginative Expression

2. 20th Century Theories of Art Clive Bell – Beauty Theory of Art Susanne Langer – Expressive Symbolism R.G. Collinwood- Imaginative Expression Morris Weitz- Wittgensteinian

3. What is Art? Part I: Art Expression Part II: Art and the Community

4. Part I: Art as Expression (1) Ordinary language: how do we use the word. (2) Definition: from an analysis of how the word is used we can derive a definition.

5. Definition To define something requires that we not only know how to use the word but also that we have an explicit consciousness of the word’s relation with other things so that we can clearly and intelligibly explain it (teach) it to others. Example: Notice the difference between knowing your house and knowing where your house is located.

6. What art is not. Crafts/techne Amusement Art Magical Art Not intentional but open ended. (What I mean is that it is not a case in which I have a preconceived notion of what I want to express then I express it.)

7. Techne/Craft Amusement and magical arts are forms of crafts. Means to end reasoning (intentional). Their purpose is to evoke emotions. “Expression is an activity of which there can be no technique.”

8. What is expression? 1. Expression as describing (language). 2. Expression through symptoms. 3. Expression with the intention of the audience feeling the same feeling. 4. Expression with the intention of the audience understanding what I feel. 5. Expression of an actual/possible specific feeling. 6. Expression of an actual/possible general feeling. 7. Expression as a form of discovering an actual possible feeling.

9. Art Proper Art proper is not about evoking emotions but rather about expressing emotions. Collinwood’s theory is not so much about expressing emotions as discovering emotions through artistic expression.

10. Art as Discovering Art is the expressing of emotions. One expresses emotions through language. Language is a form of art!

11. Art as Discovering “Until a man has expressed his emotion, he does not yet know what emotion it is.” Art, therefore, is a form of knowledge. I learn about my emotions as I express them. “The art of expressing it is therefore an exploration of his own emotions.”

12. Art vs. Crafts Art as a form of expression cannot be designed or known ahead of time. In this sense it is opposite of crafts which are intentionally designed with a very specific target and end (telos) Art, then, is not teleological.

13. Art and the overcoming of oppression Unexpressed feelings and emotions cause one to feel helpless and oppressed. Art as an act of expression always involves a cathartic feeling. Art, therefore, arouses a sense of alleviation and overcomes a sense of helplessness and oppression.

14. Art as Imaginative Imaginative means that it exists only in the mind. So art must exists only in the mind.

15. Part II: Art and the Community (1) Artist and audience (2) A refutation of individualism (3) Artists and other artists

16. Audience as Understander The audience’s imaginative experience of the work of art should be identical to the experience of the artists. There is never any assurance that such an experience of feelings and emotions can be repeated (or has been repeated) in a spectator. However, these experiences are all a matter of degree.

17. Collinwood “The imaginative experience contained in a work of art is not a closed whole. There is no sense in putting the dilemma that a man either understands it or does not. Understanding it is always a complex business, consisting of many phases, each complete in itself but each leading on to the next. A determined and intelligent audience will penetrate into this complex far enough, if the work of art is a good one, to get something of value; but it need not on that account think it has extracted ‘the’ meaning of the work, for there is no such thing.”

18. Audience as Collaborator The artists takes into consideration his or her audience as he or she produces the work. Art without a public is meaningless. “…he [the artist] undertakes his artistic labour not as a personal effort on his private behalf, but as a public labour on behalf of the community to which he belongs.”

19. Audience Can you have a play without an audience? “It becomes clear, then, that the aesthetic activity which is the play is not an activity on the part of the author and the company together, which this unit can perform in the audience’s absence. It is an activity in which the audience is a partner.”

20. Refutation of Individualism All artists are formed through and within a tradition. “The aesthetic experience is an experience of speaking.” An we learn to speak from other and within a community of speakers and listeners. (1) an artists is inseparable from other artists, (2) performers of his work, and (3) her audience

21. Performers “Every performer is co-author of the work performed.” An artists, therefore, can never shut herself off from future performers of her work. She ought to anticipate the collaborative relationship.