Kant’s Doctrine of Aesthetic Ideas: A consideration of their relation to Kant’s formalism and artistic creation

Abstract

Kant’s views on the fine arts, though they occupy a mere few sections of his Critique of the Power of Judgement, provide much insight into this field of human creative endeavour. The relatively short discussion of the fine arts, which is mainly confined to §§43 — 51 of the third Critique, occurs within the context of a wider investigation into the capacity of judgement. Specifically, Kant occupies himself in these sections of the work with the question of judgements of taste, or those judgements which affirm that a particular object is ‘beautiful’. Kant argues early on in the third Critique that judgements of taste are made about objects on the basis of our attendance to, and appreciation of, their spatio-temporal formal structure. While such a view may work in the case of beautiful natural objects, it runs into serious difficulties when applied to fine art works. This is due to the fact that our appreciation of art appears to hinge on the content presented. Indeed, it is by studying the content of a work that we may deem it to be both meaningful and beautiful. This thesis will examine how Kant deals with the ‘special case’ of fine art, the beauty of which cannot reasonably be regarded as being determined by a work’s spatio-temporal properties considered independently of its content. While some interpreters of Kant have attempted to read him as a strict formalist with regard to art, this thesis will contend that a more promising avenue is available to us. This more promising reading of Kant involves taking account of his remarks on the relationship between genius and taste in the production of fine art, and will rely heavily on his doctrine of aesthetic ideas which is developed on the basis of these remarks. This thesis will argue that while a reading of Kant’s theory of artistic beauty which foregrounds his doctrine of aesthetic ideas is to be preferred over one which attempts to interpret him as a thorough-going formalist, such a reading is not without its problems. Even so, it will be seen that despite the objections that may be posted against this interpretation, Kant’s theory of fine art offers a rich and illuminating discussion on the production and reception of fine art, making it a valuable resource for students of art and philosophy alike.