While refreshing my interest in the Philosophy of Art and Beauty: Aesthetics, from Plato to Osborne I am inclined to remember that artists are not so concerned with the philosophy of aesthetics but rather in the creation of their own interpretations of the beautiful and today of anti-beauty that we see from many parts of the globe. Truth and beauty have always been my “artistic banner,” and I avoid the other as it denotes the darker side of life and is as real as my own perceptions of life and beauty. But I can only attest that while the darker side seems most persistent and ever-present today, I see no reason to romance it while calling it “Art”; I find it offensive.
Many great philosophers beginning with Socrates through Plato’s Dialogues, Plato, Aristotle, Kant Nietzsche, Heidegger, Dewey, and many in between have wrestled with the concept of Aesthetics. Their many views and arguments are based on those who came before and on the trends of their time. Art has always preceded philosophers and would-be critics. Today the lines are as blurry as the many updated versions of Aesthetics. Let the art be true and let the critics ponder if the art is of any aesthetic value.
Contemporary art, some contend started in 1945 while others place the date in the 1960s and yet others affirm its beginnings in 1989. All these dates have global benchmarks, and while all are post-Avant-garde (Pre-war), the argument can remain with the critics and philosophers of the day. Contemporary art is not an art “movement” like Modern Art but expresses the art of the present living period in which it is created. In this, all three arguments, 1945, the 1960s, and 1989 are valid.
We live in the Postmodern era where “postmodernism allows anything to be interpreted as art and subsequently reduced art to a banal or null existence” (Baudrillard, 2005).
Who?
Jean Baudrillard 1929-2007, French socialist, philosopher, and cultural theorist.
Oh.
My art defines me (I hope) and stands as a journal of my perceptions of beauty and truth. I do not follow trends, I create from an inner vision, an inner standard, and a crazy-driven compulsion to create beautiful art. My view of aesthetics is the classical view that art must be beautiful.