Contemporary aesthetics related to art and everyday - life: from autonomy to usage 3800-WER21-S
Reflection on the forming of the aesthetic field and perception of art in modern philosophy will constitute a preparation for tracking the stages of their reconfiguration in the times of classical avant-garde, neo-avant-garde, and post-artistic contemporaneity.
While analysing texts by philosophers and art critics, we will be subjecting to revision the traditional interpretations of aesthetic categories from the perspective of bringing back to art the critical potential
We will be analysing instances of both – autonomy as well as social instrumentation of creativity – and reveal its current interceptions by mechanisms of capitalism.
We will be analysing the arguments in favour of the necessity to make art autonomous from the achieved shape of political life in the name of anticipation of political life’s new configurations.
We will be subjecting to analysis various forms of art’s engagement; the discussion about art that is criticising, relational, or participatory, and the post-artistic activities undertaken towards solving local problems and global threat.
Proposed topics for seminar meetings (the given topic is planned for at least one three-hour meeting)
1. At the foundation of aesthetic autonomy: emancipation of aesthetics from everyday-life in modern philosophy
2. The beauty cult – critically; aesthetism, dandy-ism, and reflection on kitsch (Broch, Kundera, Adorno),
3. Creativity as a category of aesthetics and its interception by modern capitalism.
4. Experimental searches for beauty and subservient role of artists toward society (in the programs of, among others,: Arts and Crafts, Bauhaus, and in Polish avant-garde between the World Wars)
5. Architectural-urban planning programs in Modernism and architectonization of life.
6. The avant-garde criticism of art institutions in urban society and dialectics of the autonomy of the arts – theory of the avant-garde (Peter Burger)
7. Aesthetics of resistance (Th. W. Adorno)
8.Theory of the avant-garde (C. Greenberg) and the idea of political art by (H. Foster).
9. Social dimension and limits of provocation in art; between the avant-garde and democracy (C. Levine).
10. Nicolas Bouriand and his project of relational aesthetics (here also: art as amnesia, exclusion, social evil).
11. Participatory art (Claire Bishop).
12.Project by Rancierre – aesthetics as politics and art as criticism in Poland.
13. Affective potential of political impact of art (E. van Alpen)
14.The open aesthetic (W. Welsch) and the engaged (A. Berleant).
15. From art to life – engaged creativity in post-artistic epoch (S.Wright)
Type of course
Prerequisites (description)
Learning outcomes
Acquired knowledge: The student knows the philosophical and cultural premises of aesthetic autonomy. He/She has knowledge of the avant-garde reinstatement of relationships between art and reality. He/She critically analyses the category of beauty, aesthetism, and post-modernistic reinterpretations of sublimity. He/She gains knowledge about avant-garde searches for socially useful beauty in modernity, while simultaneously being able to subject to critical evaluation the modernistic projects of architectonization of life.
He/She knows the arguments formulated in the fields of philosophy and art criticism that speak for emancipation of art from life and is able to point to arguments that speak for the aesthetics of engagement and resistance that valorises acts of creative lack of consent to established reality.
He/She knows current discussions pertaining to relational and critical art, aesthetics as politics, limits of provocation in art, affective potential of art and impact of artistic intrusions into the social field. He/She is aware that current creative activities may extend beyond institutional limits of art.
Acquired skills: The student is able to indicate avant-garde sources of the stance of involvement in social matters and in the articulation of lack of consent to established reality that are undertaken by contemporary artists. He/She applies contemporary aesthetics theories to critical reflection on (subversive, affective) potential of art and other-than-artistic interferences in social life.
Acquired social competences: He/She, after the course meetings, is able to situate activities of modern artists in the wider cultural context and apply the acquired knowledge to critical analysis of strategies applied by them. He/She gains competences conducive to social activism. He/She also recognizes the utilitarian value of post-artistic, creative activities directed toward solving problems that are of local and global character.
Assessment criteria
It will be required, as part of the credit for this course, to develop and present at least one of the seminar topics (a paper to be graded) and to participate in discussions at seminar meetings.
Bibliography
Fragments of the following works:
I. Kant „Krytyka władzy sądzenia”, PWN, Warszawa, 1986; P. Bürger „Teoria awangardy”, Kraków, 2006; F. Schiller „Listy o estetycznym wychowaniu człowieka, „Aletheia”, Warszawa, 2011; J. Rancierre „Estetyka jako polityka”, Warszawa, „Krytyka polityczna”, Warszawa, 2007, tegoż: „Na brzegach politycznego”, „Korporacja Ha!art”, Kraków, 2008; tegoż: „Dzielenie postrzegalnego”, Korporacja Ha!art, Kraków, 2007; A. Żmijewski „Stosowane sztuki społeczne”; H. Broch „Kilka uwag o kiczu i inne eseje”, „Czytelnik”, Warszawa, 1998; C. Greenberg „Obrona modernizmu. Wybór esejów”, „Universitas”, Kraków, 2006; M. Kundera „Nieznośna lekkość bytu”, Warszawa, 1996; Th. W. Adorno „Teoria estetyczna”, Warszawa.1994; tegoż: „Minima moralia. Refleksje z poharatanego życia”, Kraków. 1999; P. Bourdieu „Dystynkcja. Społeczna krytyka władzy sądzenia”, Warszawa 2006; A. Berleant „Przemyśleć estetykę, „Universitas”, Kraków 2007, tegoż: „Wrażliwość i zmysły”, „Universitas”, Kraków, 2011; C. Levine „Od prowokacji do demokracji. Czyli o tym, dlaczego potrzebna nam sztuka”, Warszawa 2013; J-F. Lyotard „Odpowiedź na pytanie: co to jest postmodernizm”, [w:] R. Nycz [red.], „Postmodernizm. Antologia przekładów”. Kraków, 1998; tegoż: „Wzniosłość i awangarda”, [w:] „Teksty Drugie”, 2/3, 1996, tegoż: „Po wzniosłości: stanowisko estetyk”i, [w]: „Teksty Drugie”, 4, 1998; N. Bourriaud „Estetyka relacyjna”, Kraków 1998; C. Bishop „Sztuczne piekła. Sztuka partycypacyjna i polityka widowni”, Warszawa 2015; H. Foster, „Powrót Realnego”, w: tegoż, „Powrót realnego. Awangarda u schyłku XX wieku”, Kraków 2010; T. Pękala „Awangarda i ariergarda. Filozofia sztuki nowoczesnej”, Lublin, 2000; „Wieczna radość. Ekonomia polityczna społecznej kreatywności”, „Fundacja Bęc Zmiana”, Warszawa, 2011, U. Beck, A. Giddens, S. Lash „Modernizacja refleksyjna Polityka, tradycja i estetyka w porządku społecznym nowoczesności”, PWN, Warszawa, 2009; A. Rejniak – Majewska „Puste miejsce po krytyce? Modernizm i materialistyczna rewizja autonomii sztuki”, „Wydawnictwo Officyna”, Łódź, 2014.
Scope of the literature for this seminar will be specified after consultation with the participants.
Additional information
Additional information (registration calendar, class conductors, localization and schedules of classes), might be available in the USOSweb system: