Is Beauty in the Object or Subject?

Beauty in the Object for Some and in the Subject for Others

Henry Whittlesey (Schroeder)

[Abstract on relevance to perypatetik project: 

This paper argues that Kant’s division of beauty into concept-based and form-pleasing can be applied to pragmatists and romantics. Kant’s definition of concept-based is consistent with the values and norms of pragmatists (as defined in Peripatetic Alterity and refined in The Purpose of Literary Fiction in the 21st Century). Likewise, his explication of form-pleasing beauty aligns with central values and norms of romantics such as freedom and genius belief (fatalism).]

 

Person A reads the novel Shambolic and tells person B that its beauty lies in the application of a theory positing universal equality where certain types of people enjoy material advantages while others relish metaphysical or existential understanding. Person B reads the same novel, dismissing person A’s interpretation, as they staunchly defend the beauty of the novel on the grounds that the characters can be identified with, their experiences communicated, and the work itself is too idiosyncratic or original for classification.

Introduction

Beauty in Kant is divided into types that mirror two divergent, possibly opposing attitudes towards the arts. The first, beauty adhering to a concept, imposes restrictions in part by positing the beauty in connection with the end of the thing regarded as beautiful. In the second type, the thing, usually a work of art, lacks an end, thereby facilitating communication via form similar to nature’s effect on us. These two poles constitute the apprehension of something as object (the first case) and subject (the second).

The paper begins with a recapitulation of Immanuel Kant’s delineation of two types of beauty, concept-based and form-pleasing, that respectively align with beauty being in the object (former) and subject (latter). In section two, I argue that whether a thing is treated as an object according to concept-based beauty or as a subject consistent with form-pleasing beauty depends on the type of viewer. Section three raises the objection that the addressee attaching a concept to a work of art has erred in judgement, a position rebutted in section four. The paper closes with some remarks on extensions of this argument and its application to a broader duality in society.

1. Recapitulation

1.1 The beautiful good vs. beautiful art

In The Critique of the Power of Judgement, Immanuel Kant introduces his influential idea of (the free play of) understanding and the imagination. The powers of cognition are set into free (non-concept-restricted) play in the manifold by the representation of the imagination, which presents the object of intuition to understanding for the representation-based unity of the concept to be communicated universally (162-3). The understanding gives laws; the imagination is free (170). The pleasure (or displeasure) prompted by the object is perceived through sensation animating both imagination and understanding. In turn, this sensation (postulated by the judgement of taste) is universally communicable (163) on grounds of a common (sense) feeling (169). However, when the satisfaction from the beauty adheres to a concept, i.e., is ascribed to objects with a particular end like a building and is made dependent on the purpose of the object, the judgement of taste is restricted and the free play of the imagination and understanding ceases (166-7). In this case, beauty is used as a means to an end for rules applicable to the unification of taste with reason, that is, the beautiful with the good (167). Independent of reason, “beauty is the form of the purposiveness of an object, insofar as it is perceived in it without representation of an end” (167). Despite the lack of an end, beautiful art is purposive in itself and promotes the cultivation of the mental powers for sociable communication because it is perceived like nature (180): Beauty is what pleases neither in sensation nor through a concept (180): I do not need a concept of what sort of thing the object is supposed to be, i.e., its material purposiveness (the end) (183). The mere form pleases (183). We must seek a ground outside ourselves for the beautiful in nature (whereas in ourselves for the sublime) because nature has purposiveness (in contrast to the sublime in nature) (172).

1.2 Beautiful art as subject

Now art, Kant notes, presupposes rules (181). However, the concept of beautiful art does not allow the judgement concerning the beauty of its product to be derived from any sort of rule that has a concept for its determining ground (because then it would be a good) (181). Since a rule is necessary and cannot be thought up by art itself, nature must provide it by means of genius (181). “Genius is a talent for producing that for which no determinate rule can be given… [with] originality [as] its primary characteristic,” while the product must be exemplary and impossible to describe scientifically (181). The aesthetic idea produced by such art is a representation of the imagination, associated with a given concept, which is combined with multiple partial representations in the free use of the imagination without a determinate concept and animates the cognitive faculties (through feeling) (185). However, as opposed to the imagination being used for cognition and thereby subject to the constraints of understanding and the requirement of adequacy for the concept, the imagination in an aesthetic case is free for the animation of the cognitive powers and thus only accompanies concepts (186). Accordingly, genius finds ideas for a given concept and a means of expression that can be communicated to others (186). This is beautiful art with spirit (186).

2. The duality inherent in a work of art and a framework for type association

2.1 A work of art as object in the case of a concept-based purpose or a subject in the case of pleasing as form

It has been debated for ages whether a work of art should have a message or agenda. The tendentious approach to literary fiction ranges from W.E.B. Dubois’s open encouragement of propaganda in tandem with the search for the truth[1] to Bery Gaut’s prescribed responses in the context of judging the ethics of a given work.[2] By contrast, Clive Bell and other formalist critics such as the Russian Formalists around Shklovsky have preferred to judge a work of art according to formal criteria like provoking aesthetic emotion through significant or pure form in the case of the former[3] or defamiliarization in the case of the latter.

The reason the debate continues to rage is that indeed, as we see in Kant’s critiques of reason and beauty, a thing can generally be interpreted in multiple ways, especially when that thing is a work of art.

One approach is to effectively use the work of art as a means to an end. This restricts it in its purpose and ties the beauty of such a thing to its success in achieving the end. With literary fiction, examples of this range from Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin to the novel interpreted by person A in the prelude to this paper. In these cases, the work of fiction is treated as an object similar to a building: The free play of understanding and the imagination is constrained with respect to it because the end must unify reason and the good.

The alternative or second approach is to view the work of art without regard for its end. This turns, e.g., a work of literary fiction into something akin to nature. We communicate the beauty without a concept or end. It is solely the form that captivates. Where rules are required, genius provides them; where a concept is addressed, the imagination is combined with multiple representations (in part thereby preventing the emergence of a reason-based good). Finally, genius produces ideas for a concept and a means of expression for communication.  Exemplifying this quite clearly are the later works of Tolstoy who (arguably) tried to turn his novels into ideas on the concept of Christian morality,[4] but these ideas ended up being refracted in a kaleidoscope of multiple representations that facilitate communication through the beauty of form construed in the broadest manner possible – language, structure, poetic depiction, framing, fabula[5], syuzhet[6], staging to generate a response, to name but a few… In this case, the work of art becomes a subject; the beauty can be communicated thanks to the form; and the beautiful art is imbued with spirit.

2.2 Higher order thoughts (HOTs) as determining conscious apprehension of beauty

In “Explaining Consciousness,” David Rosenthal makes a distinction between access consciousness, which consists of general noticing or mental activity, and phenomenal consciousness or higher order thoughts (HOTs): “When a mental state is conscious, one can noninferentially report being in that state, whereas one cannot report one’s nonconscious mental states” (Rosenthal 410). The distinction can be elucidated in the following example: When we are driving a car, we are vaguely aware of the distance between us and the car ahead, the side of the road, possibly the cars in the rearview mirror, the landscape, etc. Many things are causing a mental state unconsciously or what Rosenthal calls access consciousness. Yet when one is singled out, like a flashlight suddenly switched on to illuminate a thing, we have a higher order thought (HOT).

Rosenthal’s model can be applied to the two approaches Kant has delineated for regarding a beautiful thing. Person A reading the novel Shambolic notices the numerous characters, scenes, ideas just as Person B. The words on the page can be assumed to cause identical underlying (physical) mental events for each respective case, that is, protagonist P causes mental state P1; scene S causes mental state S1, etc. P1, S1 and countless other – mostly unnoticed – mental events become the reader’s access consciousness. Which individual ones become higher order thoughts, however, depends on the reader. If such a reader gravitates toward concept-based judgements of beauty, they will have higher order thoughts that align with the mental states possessing the disposition for such HOTs. This would entail that the work of art is regarded as an object. By contrast, a reader with a preference for the unconstrained free play of understanding and the imagination will find their HOTs aligned with pleasing-form aspects of the work. Accordingly, such a reader regards the work as a subject.

3. Objection – A work of art judged as beautiful by concept would be a good rather than art

The crux of this “not-art objection” is that the reader attaching a concept to a work of art or viewing it as an object is misreading or, brutely put, wrong.

In The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, the protagonist Gregor wakes up one morning as a huge insect. His transformation from a human being to an insect also causes him to become separated from his previous human identity. While this example is far removed from beauty, it illustrates how a change can rule out certain attributes and give rise to new ones. This is exactly what happens when a concept is attached to a thing: If that thing was a piece of art, it metamorphizes into a good, at least according to Kant’s conception.

When the free play of understanding and the imagination are constrained in Kant, the thing regarded as beautiful no longer comes into question as art. It is a beautiful good. It is effectively given a law through the attachment of a concept to it. For example, when Shambolic is read as narrativized theory, it no longer becomes a work of art open to the freedom of the imagination. The “law” of the story is narrativized theory – the work should be read along these lines. The beauty of the narrative serves this “law” or rule, encouraging identification with the good in the mind of a reader. Furthermore, the work gaining its rule from the concept means that it no longer does so from nature by means of genius. This, in turn, acts as an additional constraint on the free play of the imagination since the work of art is no longer produced by genius.

4. Rebuttal – the addressee does not determine what is art

In the case of a novel, it is, obviously, a writer who produces the work of art. From their own perspective, a writer of literary fiction does not compose with their book anything other than a work of art. If critics acknowledge the novel as a work of art, even begrudgingly as was the case with American critics of Socialist Realist novels during the Soviet Union and age of Communism, the status of the written product cannot be changed by a reader attaching a concept to it (and all the attendant consequences).

The objection raised seems to have legitimate grounds, but it applies more to Kant’s conception than to the argument made here. It appears that Kant does imply the determination of a thing (as art or a good) by the addressee, which is controversial, if not outright objectionable in many cases. Ambiguous cases such as buildings or botanical gardens may be instances of things open to debate, but, surely, a piece of fine art or a literary fiction novel is art per se, whether the addressee apprehends it as an object or subject.

5. Aporia – extending the argument

5.1 Are there certain types of addressees prone to one type of interpretation over another with works of art?

While it has been left open whether a concept-based apprehension of beauty in art tends to be attributed to one character type and a form-pleasing orientation to another, it can be shown that pragmatists, as defined by Friedrich et al. in Peripatetic Alterity, will be more inclined to adopt the concept-based approach, while romantics, again as defined in the treatise by Friedrich et al., will embrace the pleasing-form, genius-produced beauty of art free to the play of understanding and the imagination.

5.2 How do Rosenthal’s higher order thoughts (HOTs) help explain why pragmatists prefer to attach concepts to art while romantics celebrate freedom?

Rosenthal’s higher order thoughts are shaped, in my mind, by the background and experiences of the person possessing them. Nobody is permanently fixed as a pragmatist or romantic. Identification is voluntary and may change over time, also across a spectrum. But when identifying with one pole or being closer to one pole than another, a person’s experiences and interpretation of their own background will be tinted, shaped, influenced by the values and norms associated with the given type.

In the case of pragmatists, a number of these values and norms are consistent with rule-governed and rule-governing concepts as well as a preference for morality and law over the free play of the imagination. One of the most prominent norms guiding pragmatists is a preference for obligations and activities in their leisure time. A core value is morally-tinged jokes, usually ironic ones, demonstrating in part affiliation to their group, but also gesturing at or virtue-signaling moral credentials.[7] Romantics, by contrast, want leisure to be free and relaxed, and prefer dumb jokes and humor merely for the sake of laughter or pleasure rather than for some purpose.[8] In addition to these traits, a pragmatist’s obsession with success will shape not only their mindset, but also their disposition, as the strain and pressure of achieving the desired ends comes as a trade-off for what romantics enjoy: the process of living and at least the intent to live in harmony with their personal nature (whatever that may be).[9]

Against this backdrop, certain higher-order thoughts arise from the access consciousness shared by both when each becomes the audience for a work of art. Obligations, activity, moral jokes, success as a general framework will surely prompt higher-order thoughts about a work of art to be consistent with the concept-based, object-oriented approach to beauty. Quite the opposite seems plausible when freedom, leisure, humor for the sake of fun, and immersion in the process of life and harmony with nature guide your everyday existence: The work of art and its beauty become the unique product of genius, produced freely and open to whatever pops into your mind – the imagination playing freely alongside the process of life. Finally, in the subject orientation towards art closely associated with romantics, genius produces beautiful art with spirit, and – surely not coincidentally – it is exactly the spirit or the metaphysical that is the essence of romantics’ being and the grounds on which they stake their claim to (at least) equality with pragmatists and the latter’s materialism.

 

Works cited[10]

Primary literature

Kant, Immanuel, Critique of the Power of Judgment, XXXX

Kant, Immanuel, “Morality and rationality” in Ethics: Essential Readings in Moral Theory. Ed. George Sher. New York and London: Routledge Group, 2012: 327-342.

Rosenthal, David M., “Explaining Consciousness.”

Secondary literature

Bell, Clive. Art.

Du Bois, W.E.B. Criteria of Negro Art.

Friedrich, Angelika; Smirnov, Yuri; Whittlesey, Henry. Peripatetic Alterity. New York: perypatetik, 2019.

Gaut, Berry. “The ethical criticism of art.”

[1] “Truth is the “great vehicle of universal understanding” (para. 24) for gaining sympathy and human interest. This pursuit of truth for Du Bois means that all art is propaganda (para. 26).”

[2] See Gaut, Berry. “The ethical criticism of art.”

[3] See pp. 9-10 of Art by Clive Bell.

[4] Incidentally, Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe was one of his favorite works.

[5] Chronological sequence of events in a story, roughly plot.

[6] Representation or way the events are told, e.g., often in a different order than chronological.

[7] See chapters 2, 3, 6 and 11 of Peripatetic Alterity.

[8] See chapters 2, 3, 6 and 11 of Peripatetic Alterity.

[9] See chapters 2, 3, 6 and 11 of Peripatetic Alterity.

[10] For the most part, I do not know where these texts were published.