Aesthetics at Large: Volume 1: Art, Ethics, Politics

Thierry de Duve's book "Aesthetics at Large" argues that Immanuel Kant's "Critique of Judgment" is as relevant to the appreciation of art today as it was to the enjoyment of beautiful nature in 1790. He challenges the idea that aesthetics is confined to a formalism isolated from worldly concerns and shows how Kant's guidance opens the understanding of art onto ethics and politics. De Duve's essays are essential reading for anyone with a deep interest in art, art history, or philosophical aesthetics.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 248 pages
Publication date: 27 February 2019
Publisher: The University of Chicago Press

Immanuel Kant's Critique of Judgment, penned by Thierry de Duve in the first volume of Aesthetics at Large, remains as pertinent to the appreciation of art today as it was to the admiration of beautiful nature in 1790. This provocative thesis, which already shaped de Duve's groundbreaking book Kant After Duchamp (1996), is further pursued in this text to demonstrate that Kant's guidance, far from confining aesthetics to a stifling formalism isolated from worldly concerns, urgently opens the understanding of art onto ethics and politics.

At the heart of de Duve's re-reading of the Critique of Judgment lies Kant's concept of sensus communis, which is ultimately interpreted as the mere yet necessary idea that human beings are capable of living in peace with one another. De Duve pushes Kant's skepticism to its limits by subjecting the idea of sensus communis to various tests, leading to questions such as: Do artists speak on behalf of all of us? Is art the transcendental ground of democracy? Or, as Adorno claimed, was no poetry written after Auschwitz?

Loaded with de Duve's trademark blend of wit and erudition and written without jargon, these essays radically renew current approaches to some of the most burning issues raised by modern and contemporary art. They are indispensable reading for anyone with a deep interest in art, art history, or philosophical aesthetics.

Weight: 386g
Dimension: 163 x 229 x 15 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780226546735