What Art Is
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- € 13,99
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- € 13,99
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What is it to be a work of art? Renowned author and critic Arthur C. Danto addresses this fundamental, complex question. Part philosophical monograph and part memoiristic meditation, What Art Is challenges the popular interpretation that art is an indefinable concept, instead bringing to light the properties that constitute universal meaning. Danto argues that despite varied approaches, a work of art is always defined by two essential criteria: meaning and embodiment, as well as one additional criterion contributed by the viewer: interpretation. Danto crafts his argument in an accessible manner that engages with both philosophy and art across genres and eras, beginning with Plato’s definition of art in The Republic, and continuing through the progress of art as a series of discoveries, including such innovations as perspective, chiaroscuro, and physiognomy. Danto concludes with a fascinating discussion of Andy Warhol’s famous shipping cartons, which are visually indistinguishable from the everyday objects they represent.
Throughout, Danto considers the contributions of philosophers including Descartes, Kant, and Hegel, and artists from Michelangelo and Poussin to Duchamp and Warhol, in this far-reaching examination of the interconnectivity and universality of aesthetic production.
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Bucking the critical trend, Danto, an influential critic and winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Encounters and Reflections, attempts to offer something like a succinct and clear definition of art that is capable of spanning historical, geographical, and cultural contexts. This latest work relies heavily on his accomplished career, recapitulating some of his dominant arguments while also occasionally revising them or departing in new directions. The conclusion he reaches that art is embodied meaning, and that the viewer adds to the creation of art through interpretation is elegant in its clearheaded take on an endlessly difficult question. This definition is secondary, however, to the route Danto takes getting there, and his asides and far-reaching rhetoric can variously please, illuminate, and frustrate. He s at his best when his attention is concentrated, such as with the extended consideration of the controversial restoration of the Sistine Chapel (he ultimately became a supporter of the process), and likewise at his weakest when he indulges in broad-stroked generalization, a tic that occasionally leads to unfortunate digressions on feminism and identity politics. As a critical memoir, however, tracing the particulars of a gifted mind s lasting focus, Danto s latest is a useful addition to a long career.
