A Theory of Art

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A Theory of Art
Inexhaustibility by Contrast

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Stephen David Ross - Author

SUNY Series in Philosophy

Price: $52.50
Hardcover - 246 pages

Release Date: June 1982

ISBN10: 0-87395-554-4
ISBN13: 978-0-87395-554-6

Price: $31.95
Paperback - 246 pages

Release Date: June 1982

ISBN10: 0-87395-555-2
ISBN13: 978-0-87395-555-3

Available as a Google eBook for other eReaders and tablet devices. Click icon below...

Summary

The richness of art is manifested in contrast: contrast with other works of art, other features of human experience, other times and places, and other forms of judgment and understanding. The possibilities of contrast are inexhaustible. Every being shares this inexhaustibility of openness to novel possibilities, although inexhaustibility is most fully realized in art.

The general theory of art and aesthetic value developed in this book is based on the notions of inexhaustibility and contrast and has important forebears in Kant, Coleridge, and Whitehead. The theory allows art to be located relative to otheR spheres of judgment--science, action, and philosophy. The theory allows a new perspective on interpretation and criticism. Ross presents and defines a new synthetic form of understanding works of art that offers an alternative to the skepticism that haunts so many theories of interpretation.

Stephen David Ross, Professor of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Binghamton, is the author of Transition to an Ordinal Metaphysics and Philosophical Mysteries, both published by SUNY Press.

Table of Contents

PREFACE

1. INTRODUCTION

2. THEORIES OF ART AS THEORIES OF CONTRAST
Imitation

Representation
The Embodiment of Ideals
Imitation of Feeling
Imitation of a Model
Truth

Appearance and Reality
Artifice and Nature
Beauty
Utility
Style
Subjectivity and Objectivity
Paradox
Unity and Multiplicity

3. THE THEORY OF CONTRAST

The Ordinal Theory
Prevalence and Deviance
Possibility and Actuality
Ordinality and Intensity of Contrast

4. CONTRASTS AND AESTHETIC VALUE: DIMENSIONS AND GENERAL TYPES

The Dimensions of Artisitic Value

Perfection
Invention
Celebration
Nature and the Dimensions of Contrast

General Types of Contrast

Traditionary Contrasts
Intramedial Contrasts
Intermedial Contrasts
Intermodal Contrasts
Intersubjective Contrasts

Integral and Scopic Contrasts

5. CONTRASTS AND AESTHETIC VALUE: SPECIFIC KINDS OF CONTRAST

Types of Contrast

Generality and Specificity
Simplicity and Complexity
Token and Type
Surface and Depth
Beauty and Ugliness
Space
Time

Important Contrasts in Art

Humor
Irony
Violence

Other Modes of Contrast

6. CRITICISM, INTERPRETATION, ILLUSTREMENT

Description
Criticism
Interpretation
Illustrement
Art and Query
Illustrement and Query

INDEX

Related Subjects

Art Theory
Philosophy

25368/24838(//)

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