Outline of Monroe Beardsley, “The Aesthetic Point of View (=APV)” 1982
1. On Env. Aes: Conservationists promoting aes point of view toward nature
a. He believes one can take the aes point of view on nature and that conservationists use nature’s beauty as way of protecting it.
b. Can adopt APV toward mountains, sea shells and tiger
c. Conservationists trying to arouse concern for preservation of natural beauties, instead of automatically assuming they have lower priority than any other interest that happens to come up (installing power lines or slaughtering deer or advertising beer)
d. Folks trying to educate people to understand good design in order to produce people aware of growing hideousness of our cities and towns and troubled enough to work for change
2. APV is different from other points of view
a. Building can be looked at
i. Practically (does if function well for its use)
ii. Structurally (engineering PV): Is it structurally sound; will it last
iii. Aesthetically (is it visually attractive and cause delight in seeing it)
(1) Sweep and soar of the bridge are a joy to behold
b. Building can be g ood in some respects and not in others
c. PV used to exclude other considerations (bridge creates traffic jams; house has no door; bridge/house won’t last with winds over 100mph)
d. APV different, but related to other points of view
i. He quotes with approval in fn 7: “no work of architecture accepted/recognized as excellent from APV that is not also excellent from a technical point of view”
ii. One kind of value is necessary but not sufficient for the other
3. Def of work of art
a. “A work of art (in broad sense) is any perceptual or intentional object that is deliberately regarded form the aes point of view”
b. Makes nature work of art?
4. 1st Def of APV
a. “To adopt APV with regard to X is to take an interest in whatever aes value X may possess”
i. Note: APV is a searching, seeking, trying to realize aes value
ii. Sometimes it pays off (pleasure in listening to Beethoven sonata), sometimes it does not (novel is vulgar)
5. Def of aesthetic value
a. “AV of object is value it posses in virtue of its capacity to provide aes gratification”
6. What makes gratification aesthetic?
a. “Gratification is aes when obtained primarily from attention to the formal unity and or regional qualities of a complex whole.”
i. More formal unity and greater intensity of (regional) quality, the more the gratification
ii. Formal unity includes having harmony, order, balance, proportion
b. Argument for why this type of gratification is aesthetic is that paradigms of art provide this type of gratification
i. Artworks can do other things to you
(1) Inspire you, startle you, give you a headache
(2) These are not aes gratification
(3) Mountain’s capacity to inspire you not an aesthetic type of gratification/value?
c. (Ned’s language): Aes gratification comes from focus on aesthetic properties and these are limited to (degrees/intensity of) formal unity and quality of the aesthetic object
7. Capacity def of aes value
a. Such value not function of actual (e.g., average) degree of gratification
i. For this depends on qualifications of appreciators and circumstances of appreciation
b. Aes value depends on the highest degree obtainable under optimal circumstances
i. An ideal observer/appreciator view of aesthetic value
c. Art critics (e.g., movie critics) are judging aes value and they are estimating the capacity of artworks to produce gratification in (ideal and ideally situated) appreciators
8. Three problems for capacity def of aes value
i. Unrecognized masterpiece problem
ii. Illusory aes gratification problem (LSD problem)
iii. Devaluation (rejecting earlier positive aesthetic assessments)
9. One: Unrecognized masterpiece problem and can one ever be justified in asserting that aesthetic object lacks aesthetic value?
a. If aes value is a question of capacity (ability) to produce gratification
b. Things can have aes value and yet never in fact produce that gratification
i. Gems in ocean caves (not a problem)
c. Troubling case of difficult artwork that has the capacity to produce aes gratification but no one is sharp/sensitive enough to find it
i. Just because critics don’t find aes value, doesn’t mean it is not there (it might have that capacity)
d. But then are we never in a position to say that some aes object does not have aes value?
i. Beardsley thinks experienced critic often can have good reasons for confessing that he can’t find any value in artwork but also for the view that probably no one ever will find great value in it.
10. Two: Illusory aes gratification problem (LSD problem)
a. If someone gets aes gratification from something, it follows it has that capacity to produce aes gratification (thus it has aesthetic value)
b. But people might get aes gratification from anything, including a pile of garbage (especially if on drugs)
i. But it’s absurd to say these (all) things have aesthetic value
c. Beardsly modifies his definition to handle this:
11. New def of aes value of x is value x possesses in virtue of capacity to provide aes gratification when correctly (and completely) experienced
12. Three: Devaluation (rejecting earlier positive aesthetic assessments)
a. As a kid he liked Martian novels, got lots of aes gratification from them
b. How can he later deny that they have aes value (they did give him that gratification and so they had aes value)
c. Reply:
i. Range of aes experiences too limited (what you thought was a great novel is a lot less great when you read other–better-novels)
ii. Evaluation was based on non-asethetic qualities (liked Martian novels not because of “literary qualities” but for game-type pleasure)
iii. Need to experience the entire work in all of its dimensions (he was oblivious to faults of style in those novels and thus failed to judge whole novel)
13. Beardsley has strict (narrow) notion of aesthetic
a. supermarket novels not aesthetic
b. video games not aesthetic
14. What is aesthetically relevant?
15. Not relevant
a. Being a forgery is not relevant from APV as has no bearing on form or quality of the artwork
b. Information about circumstances of composition not relevant to consideration of work from aes point of view
i. E.g., that Schubert wrote Death and the Maiden on a rainy day when he was out of money (not relevant)
(1) That it was raining tells us nothing about the aes character of the music (its formal unity or qualities)
ii. That this information affects or increases our appreciation doesn’t show aes relevant
(1) A condition of appreciation is not necessarily a condition of value
(2) But increased appreciation seems like increased gratification and then seems a sign of aes value on his account
c. That a painting (artwork) is a accurate representation of reality and that the artist is very skilled
i. Are also not aesthetically relevant
ii. Admiring the artist is not to aes appreciate the artwork
16. Relevant features include
a. Form and color clearly relevant, as are “fascination of the image” (grotesque figures)
b. Harmonious design, good proportions, intense expressiveness
c. Subject (its about a seascape) is relevant only when this contributes to or detracts from degree of unity or qualitative intensity.
17. Camp and the dilemma of aesthetic education
18. Camp sensibility:
a. Finding aesthetic gratification in response to objects usually not thought to have aesthetic value
i. Perhaps comes from how sitting on the ground in a backpacking camp is comfortable and the (nasty) beans/hot dog taste delicious
b. “Camp is the consistently aes exp of the world”
c. Trivial, accidental, neglected and vulgar objects all take on new excitement
i. Auto graveyard, weed filled garden have own wild and grotesque expressiveness and symbolic import
ii. Enjoy nick-nacs, Christmas cards not for their beauty but bizarre qualities and reflection of social attitudes
19. Aesthetic education could go two ways:
a. One: Improve taste (our capacity to get aes gratification from increasingly subtle aesthetic objects) so we can better respond to beauty
i. And make us increasingly dependent on such beautiful objects
ii. So we work to change the world so there are more of them (more artworks, beautify the highways by shielding them from junkyards, billboards and providing more trees, flowers and grass)
b. Two: Develop camp sensibility and open up new fields of aesthetic gratification
i. Instead of eliminating the junkyard and slum it tries to see them as expressive and symbolic
ii. Useful if the environment keeps getting uglier and harder to escape this ugliness
iii. Take aes gratification in it
iv. Aestheticize everything
20. For a related discussion, see Carlson, Ch 9: “Environmental Education and the Dilemma of Aesthetic Education” in Aesthetics and the Natural Environment (Routledge, 2000), pp. 138-149
21. Conclusions
22. One: Occasions where wrong to adopt aes point of view because of a conflict in values and the values in peril are clearly higher
a. Aes values not necessarily overriding
b. Photo or movie of an accident victim lying in street bleeding and needing immediate attention
c. If someone refuses to aid this persona and does so for the highest aes motives in order to record the scene (with proper lighting and camera speed/angles)
i. Doubtful that picture could be so splendid a work of art to justify neglecting so strong a moral obligation
d. Fact he says doubtful suggests that artistic concerns can outweigh moral ones sometimes
23. Is it wrong to aestheticize degraded natural and human environments and seek aesthetic gratification in them?
24. Two: Nothing (no object/event) that is per se wrong to consider from aes point of view
a. To adopt the APV is simply to seek out a source of value
b. Can never be a moral error to realize value–unless conflict with other values
c. Some fear hyper aestheticism (taking the APV toward everything)
d. But adopting an aes point of view increases sensitization, produces fuller awareness, puts us in closer touch with env and concern for it
i. And this is good.
Detailed Notes on Monroe Beardsley, “The Aesthetic Point of View” 1982
1. The uniquely aesthetic component (in whatever is or is exp)
a. Candidates for basically and essentially aes
b. Aes exp, value, enjoyment, satisfaction, objects, concepts, situations
c. Can’t doubt that there is something peculiarly aes to be found in the world of our exp.
2. Conservationists and electric utility companies don’t just disagree but regard the proposed power plant along the river “from a different point of view”
a. Reading a book as history or as literature
b. Political or aesthetic view toward a Beethoven sonata
3. A peculiarly aesthetic point of view
4. Building example: is it a good building?
a. Commodity/function/practical point of view: is it good as a church or school
i. Functionally effective
ii. Is it a good machine for living
b. Firmness in construction; engineering point of view; does the building hold itself up
i. Structurally sound
ii. Is it a good structure
c. Delight; aesthetic point of view
i. Visually attractive
ii. Is it a good work of architecture
5. Could be good in some of these respect and not others.
6. Being good of a kind
a. Bridge is considered as belonging to species of aes objects (works of architecture)
7. When an object belongs obviously and notable kind, and judge it in relation to that kind, point of view language not nec
a. E.g., don’t say considering music from a musical point of view, as doesn’t occur to us to consider it from a political point of view
b. Natural to speak of considering whiskey form a medical point of view, but not consider penicillin from that point of view (as obvious)
8. PofV lang is implicitly rejective: device for setting aside consideration advanced by others (like bridge will fall) to focus on set of considerations we wish to emphasize (sweep and soar of the bridge are a joy to behold)
9. PofV broader than good of a kind
10. Can adopt APV toward mountains, sea shells and tiger
11. Some aesthetic athletes claim ability to adopt APV toward anything
a. A garbage dump
b. Murders of 3 civil rights workers in Mississippi
c. Conceptual art: “invisible sculpture” of Oldenburg: digging a grave size hole and filling it again
i. Everything is art if it is chose by artist to be art; good or bad, but still art
ii. Just because can’t see statue doesn’t mean not there
iii. Stretch the boundaries of concept art
12. 1st philo use of APV is to help mediate certain disputes by distinguishing between components
13. 2nd philo use of APV to provide a broad concept of art that might be helpful
a. “A work of art (in broad sense) is any perceptual or intentional object that is deliberately regarded form the aes point of view”
b. Regarded means: looking listening reading, and similar acts of attention and also exhibiting–pickup up an object and placing it where if permits such attention or presenting it to persons acting as spectators
III.
14. APV = to adopt apv with regard to X is to take an interest in whatever aes value x may possess
15. When take particular pv toward an object is to search for a corresponding value in the object and discover if any present and sometimes to go farther and cash in on that value, realize it, avail myself of it.
16. “Taking an interest in” involves this searching, seeking, and if possible realizing
a. Listen to Beethoven sonata with pleasure and sense of it as marvelous superhuman music is to seek and find aes value in it
b. Read a novel and judge it vulgar is to seek aes value in it and find very little
c. Find a building well built or delightful involves two points of view and two kinds of value
17. Strange that he quotes with approval in fn 7 this: “no work of architecture accepted/recognize as excellent from APV that is not also excellent from a technical point of view”
a. One kind of value is nec but not suff for the other
18. “To adopt an aesthetic point of view with regard to x is to take an interest in whatever aes value x may possess or that is obtainable by means of X”
a. Money can be a means to obtain aes value
19. Adopting APV includes activities like judging
a. To judge x from apv is to estimate the aes value of x
20. Need to define AV
21. “AV of object is value it posses in virtue of its capacity to provide aes gratification”
a. As distinct from aes exp or aes enjoyment
22. Kinds of gratification can be dist from each other only in terms of intentional object
a. Properties that pleasure is taken in or enjoyment is enjoyment of
23. What properties is aes gratification obtained from?
a. I worry that all aes judgments are positive? On this view?
24. Gratification is aes when obtained primarily from attention to the formal unity and or regional qualities of a complex whole.
a. Magnitude is function of degree of formal unity and intensity of regional quality
25. There exists this type of gratification and just for calling it aes is that clear-cut exemplars of artworks – poems, plays , music that are art if anything is–and the type of gratification characteristically and preeminently provided by such works is the above
26. This type of gratification has paramount claim to be called aes even though there are many other things artworks can do to you–inspire, startle you or give you headache (these are not aes responses)
27. Primary mark of aes: presence in object of notable degree of unity or intensity of regional quality–this indicates enjoyments/satisfactions it affords are aes
IV.
28. Capacity def of aes value
a. Not a function of actual degree of gratification (average or mean or total)
i. For these things depend on external considerations including qualifications of those appreciators and circumstances of their appreciation
b. Aes value depends on the highest degree obtainable under optimal circumstances
c. The amount of aes value possessed by an object is a function of the degree of aes grat it is capable of providing in a particular (ned: type) exp of it.
29. Critical eval of artwork (by art critic) is a judge of its aes value and the critic is estimating capacities (ned: for such ideal exp)
30. Critic who can back up judgment of art goodness by reasons is saying something about the relationship of the artwork to the exp of actual/potential appreciators
a. Not likely to be able to predict gratification of particular appreciators or groups of appreciators or appreciators with certain abilities, preferences or preparations (24)
31. Is capacity-def of aes value too weak as a report of what actually happens in art criticism.
a. Three problems:
i. Falsification (unrecognized masterpiece problem)
ii. Illusion (LSD problem)
iii. Devaluation (Edgar Rice Burroughs problem)
32. One: Falsification (unrecognized masterpiece problem)
a. One result of capacity def is that object may possess unrealized aes value
i. But this is not a problem: gems in ocean caves.....
ii. Many objects worth looking at can never be looked at
b. Another type of aes inaccessibility in highly complicated and obscure work that no critic can find substantial value in and it may still be there
i. Can’t be sure that artwork doesn’t have aes value just because one can’t find it there
ii. Capacity to provide aes gratification may still be there, though no one is sharp or sensitive enough to find it
c. Doesn’t want his def to entail that neg judgments of aes value can’t ever be in principle be justified
i. Doesn’t think it follows
ii. He seems to think that easier to affirm aesthetic value present than to deny its presence (for it might have capacity un-noticed)
(1) But value might be affirmed and yet be mistaken too
iii. Thinks experienced critic can have good reasons often for confessing that he can’t find any value in artwork but also for the view that probably no one ever will find great value in it.
33. Two: Illusion (LSD problem)
a. If aes value is a capacity to have aes gratification, it exists if someone actually has that aes gratification in response to an object, even a pile of garbage
i. Drugs can make one receive aes gratification from every object, but it is absurd to think all objects have positive aes value (and same amount)
b. Beardsly modifies his definition to handle this: aes value of x is value x possesses in virtue of capacity to provide aes gratification when correctly experienced
34. Three: Devaluation (Edgar Rice Burroughs problem)
a. If aes value are capacity to provide gratification, then if liked some books when young and uneducated and hate them later, can’t say that they lack aes value (can’t devalue them) as they did provide (and thus have the capacity) to provide that aes exp.
b. Upward reevaluation is not a problem, as have discovered that they do have greater capacity than I realized.
c. Easy cases of devaluation that don’t require revising def
i. Enlargement of range of aes exp (thought that book was great, but after reading much better book, no longer think it was so great
ii. Realizing evaluation based on nonaes or extra aes features (e.g., liked detective stories not because of “literary qualities” but more of game-type pleasure)
iii. Beardsley has strict notion of aesthetic
(1) supermarket novels not aesthetic
(2) video games not aesthetic
d. Revises def: provides aes gratification when correctly and completely experienced
i. So as a youth he may have loved the Martian novels and got lots of aes gratification, but he was oblivious to the faults of style in the novels and failed to really judge the whole novel
ii. Not really different from claim it must be correctly experienced.
V. (What is and is not aesthetically relevant)
35. A consideration about an object is relevant to APV only if it affects “the marks of aes gratification” that is, affects formal unity and intensity of regional quality present in the object
36. Not relevant from APV
a. Being a forgery
i. Not relevant as no bearing on its form or quality
b. Subject is relevant (its about a seascape) only when it contributes to or detracts from degree of unity or qualitative intensity.
c. Information about circumstances of composition not relevant to consideration of work from aes point of view
i. E.g., that Schubert wrote Death and the Maiden on a rainy day when he was out of money
(1) that it was raining tells us nothing about the aes character of the music
ii. That it affects or increases our appreciation doesn’t show aes relevant
(1) a condition of appreciation is not necessary a condition of value
(2) But increased appreciation seems like increased gratification and then seems a sign of aes value on his account
d. Images likeness to physical reality (representation)
e. Artists skill at depiction
i. Neither aes relevant
ii. Neither enter into the aes exp directly (just conditions of it)
iii. Admiring the artist is not to aes appreciate the artwork
37. Form and color clearly relevant, as are “fascination of the image” (grotesque figures)
VI. Discussion of camp and limits to adopting aes point of view
38. Justification for adopting APV and conflict with other points of view
39. Much effort spend in getting people to adopt Aes PV
a. Conservationists trying to arouse concern for preservation of natural beauties, instead of automatically assuming they have lower priority than any other interest that happens to come up (installing power lines or slaughtering deer or advertising beer)
b. Folks trying to educate people to understand good design in order to produce people aware of growing hideousness of our cities and towns and troubled enough to work for change
40. Camp sensibility
a. Great range of materials to which it can respond
b. Camp is the consistently aes exp of the world
c. Beardsley: an extreme consequence of trying to increase the amount of aes value of which we can take advantage
41. Dilemma of aes ed.
42. Central task of aes ed is improvement of taste; involves developing two dispositions
a. Capacity to obtain aes gratification from increasingly subtle and complex aes objects (forms of unity, response to beauty)
b. Increasing dependence on objects beautiful in this way (having harmony , order, balance, proportion) as sources of aes satisfaction.
43. This is impulse behind beautification (shielding the highways from junkyards, billboards and providing more trees flowers and grass
44. But what if env. Grows uglier, harder to escape, and find enjoy not in formal unity (beauty as above) but intensity of regional quality
a. Demands person makes on object affects aes gratification because intensity of regional qualities partly depends on its symbolic import
i. Individual can attend to object so features emerge
b. Whole new field of aes gratification opens up
c. Trivial, accidental, neglected and vulgar objects all take on new excitement
i. Auto graveyard, weed filled garden have own wild and grotesque expressiveness and symbolic import
ii. Enjoy Christmas card not for beauty but bizarre qualities and reflection of social attitudes
45. Dilemma of aes education; conflicting ways of redirecting taste
a. The way of love of beauty; limited range of enjoyment; seeks to reform the world to conform to this ideal
b. Aestheticizing everything; taking aes point of view whenever possible
(1) Ambiguous between aes eval everything and trying to find positive aes value in everything
ii. Widens enjoyment, but is defeatist
iii. Instead of eliminating the junkyard and slum it tries to see them as expressive and symbolic
iv. A result of tendency to extend aes point of view as widely as possible
46. But situations where morally objectionable to adopt aes point of view
a. Wrong to contemplate terrible events from purely aes points of view
b. Aesthetic revolutionaries who discuss riots as though they were folk songs or pieces of local theater (authentic, beautiful)
c. Utter absorption in aes point of view of photographer to whom every person and event is only a poss of new photo image
d. Carrying aes point of view pretty far
47. Two conclusions
48. One: Occasions where wrong to adopt aes point of view because of a conflict in values and values in peril are clearly higher
a. Aes values not overriding
b. Photo or movie of victim lying in street needing immediate attention
c. Someone for the highest aes motives refuses to aid a bleeding accident victim to record the scene (lighting and camera speed)
i. Doubtful that picture could be so splendid a work of art to justify neglecting so strong a moral obligation
ii. Fact he says doubtful suggests that artistic concerns can outweigh moral ones sometimes
49. Two: Nothing (no object/event) that is per se wrong to consider from aes point of view
a. To adopt the APV is simply to seek out a source of value
b. Can never be a moral error to realize value–unless conflict with other values
c. Some fear a serious and persistent aes interest leads to a hyper aestheticism
d. Seeing aes point of view increases sensitization, fuller awareness, closer touch with env and concern for it