Books About Aestheticism

[Amilcar Labrosse]

Iam totally new to philosophy (actually studying engineering) but the philosophy of aesthetics fascinates me.Which books should I start reading to study about the way socio-economic factors influence the concept of beauty?I heard that Kant is one of the first to write about it, is it beginner friendly?Edit: Thank you all guys for the responses, I will try to read as many books that you have recommended me as I can

One very good and non-technical introductory anthology of essays on the subject, edited by the novelist (See Foucault's Pendulum and Name of the Rose, both of which which I highly recommend) public intellectual and semioticist, is Umberto Eco's 2004 The History of Beauty -Beauty-Umberto-Eco/dp/0847835308. Here's a little blurb about the book:

Since you say you are "totally new to philosophy," I recommend you books that aim specifically at such a readership and present the key ideas and basic concepts clearly in a systematic manner. Otherwise, you may get the illusion that you have read and learnt a lot, while failing to grasp fundamentals.

One such good book I myself have read is Philosophy of Art:A Contemporary Introduction by Nol Carroll published in the Routledge Contemporary Introductions to Philosophy series (I recommend this series for other subjects as well.) The following is from the book description:

It introduces the techniques of analytic philosophy as well as keytopics such as the representational theory of art, formalism,neo-formalism, aesthetic theories of art, neo-Wittgensteinism, theInstitutional Theory of Art. as well as historical approaches to thenature of art.

Throughout, abstract philosophical theories are illustrated byexamples of both traditional and contemporary art including frequentreference to the avant-garde in this way enriching the readersunderstanding of art theory as well as the appreciation of art.

A good book to go to would be Routledge Handbook of Aesthetics. It covers various topics, written by the top scholars, and at the end of each section, they give a very good reference list for further reading.

a part of Western bourgeois society has produced something unheard ofheretofore: -- avant-garde culture. A superior consciousness ofhistory -- more precisely, the appearance of a new kind of criticismof society, an historical criticism -- made this possible. Thiscriticism has not confronted our present society with timelessutopias, but has soberly examined in the terms of history and of causeand effect the antecedents, justifications and functions of the formsthat lie at the heart of every society.

He explains that avant garde art "imitates" imitation, and kitsch imitates the "effects" of art. I'd gloss that as e.g., poetry that expresses the processes of writing poetry, rather than poetry's values. I suppose you could think of the former as something closer to the puzzled notes of engineers, as opposed to their expressions of success or failure.

Aestheticism (also known as the aesthetic movement) was an art movement in the late 19th century that valued the appearance of literature, music, fonts and the arts over their functions.[1][2] According to Aestheticism, art should be produced to be beautiful, rather than to teach a lesson, create a parallel, or perform another didactic purpose, a sentiment best illustrated by the slogan "art for art's sake." Aestheticism flourished in the 1870s and 1880s, gaining prominence and the support of notable writers such as Walter Pater and Oscar Wilde.

Aestheticism challenged the values of mainstream Victorian culture, as many Victorians believed that literature and art fulfilled important ethical roles.[3] Writing in The Guardian, Fiona McCarthy states that "the aesthetic movement stood in stark and sometimes shocking contrast to the crass materialism of Britain in the 19th century."[4]

Aestheticism was named by the critic Walter Hamilton in The Aesthetic Movement in England in 1882.[5] By the 1890s, decadence, a term with origins in common with aestheticism, was in use across Europe.[3]

Predecessors of the Aesthetes included John Keats and Percy Bysshe Shelley, and some of the Pre-Raphaelites who themselves were a legacy of the Romantic spirit. There are a few significant continuities between the Pre-Raphaelite philosophy and that of the Aesthetes: Dedication to the idea of 'Art for Art's Sake'; admiration of, and constant striving for, beauty; escapism through visual and literary arts; craftsmanship that is both careful and self-conscious; mutual interest in merging the arts of various media. This final idea is promoted in the poem L'Art by Thophile Gautier, who compared the poet to the sculptor and painter.[9] Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Edward Burne-Jones are most strongly associated with Aestheticism. However, their approach to Aestheticism did not share the creed of 'Art for Art's Sake' but rather "a spirited reassertion of those principles of colour, beauty, love, and cleanness that the drab, agitated, discouraging world of the mid-nineteenth century needed so much."[10] This reassertion of beauty in a drab world also connects to Pre-Raphaelite escapism in art and poetry.

In Britain the best representatives were Oscar Wilde, Algernon Charles Swinburne (both influenced by the French Symbolists), James McNeill Whistler and Dante Gabriel Rossetti. These writers and their style were satirised by Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera Patience and other works, such as F. C. Burnand's drama The Colonel, and in comic magazines such as Punch, particularly in works by George Du Maurier.[11]

Compton Mackenzie's novel Sinister Street makes use of the type as a phase through which the protagonist passes as he is influenced by older, decadent individuals. The novels of Evelyn Waugh, who was a young participant of aesthete society at Oxford, describe the aesthetes mostly satirically, but also as a former participant. Some names associated with this assemblage are Robert Byron, Evelyn Waugh, Harold Acton, Nancy Mitford, A.E. Housman and Anthony Powell.

Artists associated with the Aesthetic style include Simeon Solomon, James McNeill Whistler, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Albert Joseph Moore, GF Watts and Aubrey Beardsley.[4] Although the work of Edward Burne-Jones was exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery which promoted the movement, it is narrative and conveys moral or sentimental messages hence falling outside the movement's purported programme.

Government Schools of Design were founded from 1837 onwards in order to improve the design of British goods. Following the Great Exhibition of 1851 efforts were intensified and oriental objects were purchased for the schools teaching collections. Owen Jones, architect and orientalist, was requested to set out key principles of design and these became not only the basis of the schools teaching but also the propositions which preface The Grammar of Ornament (1856), which is still regarded as the finest systematic study or practical sourcebook of historic world ornament.

Jones identified the need for a new and modern style that would meet the requirements of the modern world, rather than the continual re-cycling of historic styles, but saw no reason to reject the lessons of the past. Christopher Dresser, a student and later Professor at the school worked with Owen Jones on The Grammar of Ornament, as well as on the 1863 decoration of the oriental courts (Chinese, Japanese, and Indian) at the South Kensington Museum (now the Victoria and Albert Museum), advanced the search for a new style with his two publications The Art of Decorative Design 1862, and Principles of Design 1873.

Ebonized furniture means that the wood is painted or stained to a black ebony finish. The furniture is sometimes completely ebony-colored. More often however, there is gilding added to the carved surfaces of the feathers or stylized flowers that adorn the furniture.[citation needed]

As aesthetic movement decor was similar to the corresponding writing style in that it was about sensuality and nature, nature themes often appear on the furniture. A typical aesthetic feature is the gilded carved flower, or the stylized peacock feather. Colored paintings of birds or flowers are often seen. Non-ebonized aesthetic movement furniture may have realistic-looking three-dimensional-like renditions of birds or flowers carved into the wood.

Contrasting with the ebonized-gilt furniture is use of blue and white for porcelain and china. Similar themes of peacock feathers and nature would be used in blue and white tones on dinnerware and other crockery. The blue and white design was also popular on square porcelain tiles. It is reported that Oscar Wilde used aesthetic decorations during his youth. This aspect of the movement was also satirised by Punch magazine and in Patience.

In 1882 Oscar Wilde visited Canada, where he toured the town of Woodstock, Ontario and gave a lecture on 29 May titled "The House Beautiful".[17] In this lecture Wilde exposited the principles of the Aesthetic Movement in decorative and applied design, also known at the time as the "Ornamental Aesthetic" style, according to which local flora and fauna were celebrated as beautiful and textured, layered ceilings were popular. An example of this can be seen in Annandale National Historic Site, located in Tillsonburg, Ontario, Canada. The house was built in 1880 and decorated by Mary Ann Tillson, who happened to attend Oscar Wilde's lecture in Woodstock. Since the Aesthetic Movement was only prevalent in the decorative arts from about 1880 until about 1890, there are not many surviving examples of this particular style but one such example is 18 Stafford Terrace, London, which provides an insight into how the middle classes interpreted its principles. Olana, the home of Frederic Edwin Church in upstate New York, is an important example of exoticism in Aesthetic Movement decorative arts.[18]

From a very early age, perhaps the age of five or six, I knew that when I grew up I should be a writer. Between the ages of about seventeen and twenty-four I tried to abandon this idea, but I did so with the consciousness that I was outraging my true nature and that sooner or later I should have to settle down and write books.

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