Aesthetics – serie

In his Aesthetics Hegel gives full expression to his seminal theory of art. He surveys the history of art from ancient India, Egypt, and Greece through to the Romantic movement of his own time, criticizes major works, and probes their meaning and significance; his rich array of examples gives broad scope for his judgement and makes vivid his exposition of his theory.The substantial Introduction is Hegel's best exposition of his general philosophy of art, and provides the ideal way into his Aesthetics. In Part I he considers the general nature of art: he distinguishes art, as a spiritual experience, from religion and philosophy; he discusses the beauty of art and differentiates it from the beauty of nature; and he examines artistic genius and originality. Part II provides a sort of history of art, divded into three periods called Symbolic (India, Persia, Egypt), Classical (Greece), and Romantic (medieval and post-medieval up to the end of the eighteenth century). Part III deals individually with architecture, scuplture, painting, music, and literature.

In his Aesthetics Hegel gives full expression to his seminal theory of art. He surveys the history of art from ancient India, Egypt, and Greece through to the Romantic movement of his own time, criticizes major works, and probes their meaning and significance; his rich array of examples gives broad scope for his judgement and makes vivid his exposition of his theory.The substantial Introduction is Hegel's best exposition of his general philosophy of art, and provides the ideal way into his Aesthetics. In Part I he considers the general nature of art: he distinguishes art, as a spiritual experience, from religion and philosophy; he discusses the beauty of art and differentiates it from the beauty of nature; and he examines artistic genius and originality. Part II provides a sort of history of art, divded into three periods called Symbolic (India, Persia, Egypt), Classical (Greece), and Romantic (medieval and post-medieval up to the end of the eighteenth century). Part III deals individually with architecture, sculpture, painting, music, and literature.

The complex relationship between life and the arts has always been a crucial topic in philosophical discourse. The essays in this book discuss fundamental issues of modern and contemporary aesthetics, drawing upon the work of the French philosopher Jean- Pierre Cometti, a key figure in the studies of aesthetics, pragmatism, and Austrian philosophy.  The volume covers a wide-range of topics, from the examination of fundamental principles of art and literary criticism to a new understanding of the Modernist notion of art. It proposes an anthropological aesthetics using Musil’s The Man Without Qualities or the analysis of literary characters such as Tolstoj’s Hadji Murat and Cervantes’ Don Quixote as a tool to cast light on themes in Wittgenstein’s philosophy.  Editors Carla Carmona and Jerrold Levinson have brought together renowned voices in the field of philosophy to offer a window onto Cometti’s philosophical work, as well as an in-depth analysis of contemporary artistic and aesthetic practices, in an effort to overcome what can sometimes appear as a gulf between art and life.

In every psychic experience, even in the production of a work of art, there exists a nucleus that is impossible to transform. It resists any and every action against itself. We are used to dealing with these irreducible and radical othernesses by adapting them to our own way of knowing and our experience. In reality, they make up the ugly material of our living and, hence, of our humanity. We can, however, transform them in some way, without altering their substance, but rather organizing them in different configurations, which generate new forms. Psychoanalysis can aid in this difficult and risky process, providing resilient equipment, much like a sophisticated spacesuit, allowing one to travel the cosmic spaces of psychic life and of human reality without bursting into flames. In the actual world, we find ourselves having to deal with problems never before encountered, which eradicate old certainties – problems which feel uncanny compared to the known experiences of ourselves and others. We meet with disorganized and fragmentary conflict, to which psychoanalysis attempts to answer adopting an open, non-defensive procedure, aiming to widen the field of experience rather than reducing it, in accordance with the basis of its practice and theory.For this reason, the interweaving of various forms of knowledge is necessary in order to link the diverse aspects and levels of psychic and external reality. The author examines this theme through the psychoanalytic approach, as well as through philosophy, science and art, and using stories based on personal life and clinical experiences.

This book collects Adornian contributions on different trends, genres and artists belonging to the broad and complex and in-itself-articulated field of popular music.  On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Adorno’s death, this book aims to represent an important contribution for the international community of Adorno scholars and, additionally, for scholars of both philosophy and musicology in general, in order to assess and celebrate the persistent actuality of Adorno’s contribution to the understanding of popular music in the context of the dynamics and processes of the culture industry. But the book also aims to critically rethink some of the main concepts and themes of Adorno's influential philosophy of music and thus to develop it at a further level, also intersecting it with other philosophical perspectives or adapting it when necessary to the partially changed conditions of popular music in our time in comparison to his epoch.

This book introduces to the reader the subject of musical ontology by presenting it through different philosophical theories on the subject. By comparing these existing positions (such as mainstream ontological views, empirical stances, meta-ontolological reflections etc.), the book is an attempt to find what can be called a "reflective equilibrium" between the often conflicting intuitions in the studies and debates on philosophy of music. A balance which is ultimately able to respect both musical practice and ontological consistency.