- Title: Artistic expression as interpersonal communication: Social dimensions in Kant’s philosophy of art
- Date: May 13th, 2024
- Time: 16:00-17:30
- Location: Kromme Nieuwegracht 20 room T.0.05
- Abstract: Kant’s view of art is (in our current terms) an “aesthetic theory” of art, i.e., a view that art is defined by its purpose of creating something beautiful. Aesthetic theories of art like Kant’s may seem problematic, however, in that they ignore important social dimensions of art: its worldly presence as a social institution related to other social practices (e.g., religious or political), its cultural situatedness and variation, and, simply, its human meaning as an act of interpersonal communication. Drawing upon Kant’s “division” of the art forms in CJ §51, I will propose that Kant attributes to art a communicative and expressive (as well as aesthetic) aspect: that he takes fine art to be an act of communication, which deploys socially shared expressive means, and aims at interpersonal sociality. This communicative element in Kant’s theory can accommodate the social dimensions of art, and indeed brings out the ways in which Kant occasionally does situate art socially. This aspect of Kant’s view can be integrated (somewhat) into Kant’s aesthetic theory of art by understanding fine art to be a specifically aesthetic form of communication.
- Bio: Rachel Zuckert is professor of philosophy at Northwestern University. Her research focuses on Kant and his philosophical context, broadly understood: both his eighteenth-century contemporaries, and post-Kantian, nineteenth-century philosophy. She is espiecally interested in the Critique of Judgment, including work on Kant’s aesthetics, philosophy of biology, and questions concerning the possibility of empirical knowledge.
