aesthetics and critical t
Jan Knutzen
> I was wondering if anyone had read any works by one of the
> following authors, either on their own, or as part of a course's
> required (even if not completed =-) ) readings:
>
> Herbert Marcuse
> Jurgen Habermas
> Theodor Adorno
> Suzi Gablik
> Baildrillard (spelled incoreectly?)
> Jacques Derrida
> Michel Foucault
The answer is: yes.
And I could stop there. The compilation of names is
interesting, but it has no further questions. If you want
something to happen in rec.art.fine we will need a push in a
direction (or lack of it). At what kind of seminar have you bin?
But I will try to decompose a bit anway. I will put Adorno on
the top of the list. And I will add Walter Benjamin and Ernst
Bloch even higher. Then it will look like this:
Walter Benjamin
Theodor Wiesengrund Adorno
Ernst Bloch
...they are all of them capable of making essays that has a
smell of philosophy as well as literature. And they are germans
born to think & reflect between 1. & 2. WW.
Adorno is your joker, if you will go deeper into the list of
names. I think Michel Foucault comes closest to "critical
theory", as the dull definition of the Frankfurter School itself
addresses it - even if Foucault never joined this "group" of
German intellectuals that had one thing in common: a mailbox by
the name: "Institute of Social Research, Frankfurt".
To get more information an the subject Adorno and the
Franfurter School you should read the works of Martin Jay. You
can dig them up by search at Library of Congress or simply telnet
DRA.COM..:-)
Herbert Marcuse was a partner in what I call *the group*. His
aim is less complex, more in a political common sense of a
certain time. Eric Fromm is a member too, - to understand
"critical theory" fully, let us call them ambassadors. Because
they never argued deeper into to art, like Bloch, Benjamin &
Adorno. Bloch lost connection and is out in any discourse
nowdays. Benjamin is a kind of "engine" that lets Adorno drive a
lecture of modernity and modernism which I personally think is
more or less up to date.
Jurgen Habermas is a full time philosopher. In 1980 he would
not really accept that label of being closely connected with
Adorno. In 1968 both Habermas and Adorno was confronted with the
student revolte in Frankfurt. The inferno was more complex, but
less exotic - than that of The Latin Quarter in Paris. I will not
comment more on Habermas, because the I will have to read Max
Weber, and the subject is sociology :-)
Jean Baudrillard is a wellknown french sociologist, that
usually is being mixed up with postmodernism. I think this
*effect* occurs when he essayistically talk in the terms of
"critical theory". A typical "Baurillard effect" is that of
leaving Michel Foucault in the past by saying "Oublier Foucault"
- that is "forget Foucault". This essay is not a discourse, but
simply a show for the audience to come. Baudrillard likes
dropping bombs that implode. He likes the effect of "spiralling
negatively" and that of wandering/driving on a path/highway
shaped like a moebius band. Hyperreality takes over in his texts
where Adorno stiil after his dead has got no good answer to the
id>a of "duck into the structure of modernism".
Suzi Gablik askes: "Has modernism failed?". I found this book
under the table where my computer is running at night as well as
springtime. This is a book that loves the art of dropping names.
The pity is that many of the names are lacking. Where were they
dropped? Gablik is absolutely moving around as if the past is a
playground for comments - meaning that Suzi is in the business.
But it suffers - first of all - from small talk.
Now I could make a tree structure of modern aestetics. But it
will be delayed - due to the fact that I need some more
echo from Internet to let it happen...
...Jan K.
Jan Knutzen, jan....@sx.gar.no, jan.k...@thcave.no,
d_knu...@kari.uio.no, Skjerstadveien 2c 0378 Oslo Norway - Art
Pepper tried the art of adding eleven west coast artists to play
cool. The result was the sound of west coast - not that from
Hawaii or Vladivostok, but that of the cool - which was imported
from...NO CARRIER
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Vance Bell
>vb...@mail.sas.upenn.edu (Vance Bell, Jr.) writes:
>
>> I was wondering if anyone had read any works by one of the
>> following authors, either on their own, or as part of a course's
>>
>> Jurgen Habermas
>> Theodor Adorno
>> Suzi Gablik
>> Baildrillard (spelled incoreectly?)
>> Jacques Derrida
>> Michel Foucault
>
> The answer is: yes.
>
> And I could stop there. The compilation of names is
>interesting, but it has no further questions. If you want
>something to happen in rec.art.fine we will need a push in a
>direction (or lack of it). At what kind of seminar have you bin?
My effort was to assertain if anyone had any knowledge of their collective
works do that possibly we could have a discussion of their "better" points
in reference to the visual arts. Most of these intellectuals are not
primarily concerned with the visual arts. Adorno, I believe uses music
(atoniality) in the discussion of aesthetics. Marcuse was largely
concerned with the emancipatory power of art in the face late capitalist
alienation. I think much of his thought is applicable to today's world as
it was in the 60's. Intrestingly, you left out Derrida in your discussion
of these individuals. Did you just forget, or was the deletion purposeful?
> Suzi Gablik askes: "Has modernism failed?". I found this book
>under the table where my computer is running at night as well as
>springtime. This is a book that loves the art of dropping names.
>The pity is that many of the names are lacking. Where were they
>dropped? Gablik is absolutely moving around as if the past is a
>playground for comments - meaning that Suzi is in the business.
>But it suffers - first of all - from small talk.
However the value of this book and her latest work, "The Reenchantment of
Art," is not properly measured in relation to the males of modern
aesthetics. They are not critical discourses in the philosophical sense,
but introductions to the fields of deconstruction, feminism, ecology, etc.
as it relates to contemporary art and the art world. It is much more
approchable than say Derrida, and thus as aimed at a wider audience.
I think that her second book takes as much from Fritof Capra as Habermas
and Foucault. What this means is that her work is the least academic but
easiest to use as a springboard to other studies.
Vance Bell, Jr.
University of Pennsylvania
Vance Maverick
|> [re: criticism of "Has Modernism Failed?"]
|>
|> However the value of this book and her latest work, "The Reenchantment of
|> Art," is not properly measured in relation to the males of modern
|> aesthetics. They are not critical discourses in the philosophical sense,
|> but introductions to the fields of deconstruction, feminism, ecology, etc.
My take on the older book (haven't read the new) was
that she had rightly identified some things in the
modern art world which are irritating or unpleasant,
but that she couldn't say why; couldn't tell you
what "modernism" had failed *at*, or why the other
things she likes better are right and good. My
copy's at home, or I'd substantiate this a bit.
Vance