the experiential: re-reading aesthetics

 

Image: Alexander Baumgarten's 1750 'Aesthetica' which claimed that: "Aesthetics is the science of sensate cognition." Baumgarten further characterised aesthetics as an 'analogon rationis'. In Baumgarten's usage the term appears to cover the general range of sense-perception. Terry Eagleton has asserted in relation to Baumgarten's work that: "Aesthetics is born as a discourse of the body. In its original formulation by the German philosopher Alexander Baumgarten, the term refers not in the first place to art, but as the Greek Aisthesis would suggest, to the whole region of human perception and sensation, in contrast to the more rarefied domain of conceptual thought." (Eagleton, 1990, p.13) This is one of several competing accounts of aesthetics. This seminar series will examine several competing constructions of aesthetics.

 

Since Spring 2009, the group have examined texts including Plato, Aristotle, Sophocles, Nietzsche and Kristeller. See below for a comprehensive list of these along with a number of supplementary texts that participants have identified as pertinent to the issues raised in the seminars. The core reading for the next seminar, resuming on 27th January 2010, is Alain Badiou’s Handbook of Inaesthetics.

 

This seminar is convened by Clodagh Emoe, gradcam research scholar. Contact emoe(at)Ireland.com

 

spring semester 2010

 


Meetings take place fortnightly on Wednesdays 16:00-18:00 in John Street Dub. 8.
Spring and Winter 2009 meetings listed here.

  • 27/01/10
    First meeting of Spring 2010

    Chapter 1. “Art and Philosophy”,
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. The session will be in the form of a close reading of the text, this will be followed by a group meeting with dancer/choreographer Antje Schneider

     

  • 10/02/10

    16:00-18:00 Johns Street
    Chapter 2 "What is a Poem? Or, Philosophy and Poetry at the Point of the Unnameable",
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. The session will be in the form of a close reading of the text, followed by a practical experimentation in preparation for Re-public

     

  • 24/02/10

    Chapter 3, “A French Philosopher Responds to a Polish Poet”
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. The session will be in the form of a close reading of the text,

     

  • 26/02/10

    17:00 Temple Bar Gallery
    Please change to: “Inaesthethics” live drawing (John O’ Connoll and Kathy Tynster) in the gallery space of Temple Bar projected onto the street. Accompanying music composed and performed by Jonathan Hunter.

     

  • 03/03/10

    15.30 Johns Street, *Please note the time change.
    Format:
    Edia discusses her essay "The Event in Art: Inaesthetics"
    (you can find it on www.ACW.ie)
    Screening of drawing performancefrom Re : Public - John and Kathy
    Presentation on Alain Badiou’s public lecture, held at the Drawing Centre, New York, based on his essay “Fifteen Theses on Contemporary Art”, in relation to the work of Mark Lombard.

     

  • 24/03/10

    Chapter 4, “A Philosophical Task: To Be Contemporaries of Pessoa”,
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. The session will be in the form of a close reading of the text.

     

  • 07/04/10

    Chapter 5, “A Poetic Dialectic: Labîd ben Rabi’a and Malarmé”,
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. The session begins with a summation of the chapter, followed by a close reading of the text by the group,

     

  • 21/04/10

    Chapter 6, “Dance as a Metaphor for Thought”,
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. The session begins with a summation of the chapter, followed by a close reading of the text by the group.

     

  • 05/05/10

    Chapter 7, “Theses on Theater”,
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. The session begins with a summation of the chapter, followed by a close reading of the text by the group.

     

  • 19/05/10

    Chapter 8, “The False Movements of Cinema”,
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. The session begins with a summation of the chapter, followed by a close reading of the text by the group.

     

  • 02/05/10

    Chapter 9, “Being, Existence, Thought: Prose and Concept”,
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. The session begins with a summation of the chapter, followed by a close reading of the text by the group.

     

  • 16/06/10

    Chapter 10, “The Philosophy of the Fawn”,
    from Badiou's The Handbook of Inaesthetics. This session takes the form of a discussion as an overview of the book as a whole.

     

 

call for participation

 

This seminar series will begin with an investigation of the recent re-emergence of aesthetics as a critical discourse and examine its relevance to contemporary art. Through close readings of key texts participants will develop a greater understanding of the different definitions and uses of aesthetics and modes of aesthetic discourse. There are two key objectives addressed here:

  1. to explore how aesthetics has been historically defined and practiced; and
  2. to reflect upon the current - variously valorised and contested - role of aesthetics in the conception, creation and reception of art.

Participants are welcome from a range of disciplinary backgrounds including philosophy; contemporary art practice, theory, and criticism; curatorial studies; art history; cultural and intellectual history; cultural studies and the broader space of the humanities. The series is targeted at masters and doctoral level students and researchers interested in a contemporary re-reading of aesthetics which attends to both the historical and the contemporary in aesthetic discourse. We welcome other participants with a demonstrable engagement with these concerns.

 

recommended readings

 

BADIOU Alain, (2005) Handbook of Inaesthetics, California, Stanford University Press.

Cahn, Steven M. and Aaron Meskin (eds.) (2008) Aesthetics, A Comprehensive Anthology, Blackwell Publishing.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/reader/1405154357/ref=sib_dp_pt#reader-page

 

For additional information on the collaborating institutions consult www.dit.ie, www.ncad.ie, www.iadt.ie and www.ulster.ac.uk.