The Philosophy of Fine Art. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

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Название The Philosophy of Fine Art
Автор произведения Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Жанр Документальная литература
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Издательство Документальная литература
Год выпуска 0
isbn 4064066395896



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       Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

      The Philosophy of Fine Art

      Books

      OK Publishing, 2020

       [email protected] Tous droits réservés.

      EAN 4064066395896

       Volume 1

       Volume 2

       Volume 3

      Volume 1

       Table of Contents

THE IDEA OF FINE ART, OR THE IDEAL

       Introduction

       I

       II

       III

       IV

       V

       I. The Position of Art Relatively to Finite Reality, Religion, and Philosophy

       Subdivision of Subject

       Chapter I The Notion of the Beautiful in Its General Significance

       Chapter II The Beauty of Nature

       Chapter III The Beauty of Art, or the Ideal

      Introduction

      I

       Table of Contents

      The present inquiry1 has for its subject-matter Aesthetic. It is a subject co-extensive with the entire realm of the beautiful; more specifically described, its province is that of Art, or rather, we should say, of Fine Art.

      For a subject-matter such as this the term "Aesthetic" is no doubt not entirely appropriate, for "Aesthetic" denotes more accurately the science of the senses or emotion. It came by its origins as a science, or rather as something that to start with purported to be a branch of philosophy, during the period of the school of Wolff, in other words when works of art were generally regarded in Germany with reference to the feelings they were calculated to evoke, as, for example, the feelings of pleasure, admiration, fear, pity, and so forth. It is owing to the unsuitability or, more strictly speaking, the superficiality of this term that the attempt has been made by some to apply the name "Callistic" to this science. Yet this also is clearly insufficient inasmuch as the science here referred to does not investigate beauty in its general signification, but the beauty of art pure and simple. For this reason we shall accommodate ourselves to the term Aesthetic, all the more so as the mere question of nomenclature is for ourselves a matter of indifference. It has as such been provisionally accepted in ordinary speech, and we cannot do better than retain it. The term, however, which fully expresses our science is "Philosophy of Art," and, with still more precision, "Philosophy of Fine Art."

      Merely to maintain, in a general way, that mind and the beauty of art which originates therefrom stand higher than the beauty of Nature is no doubt to establish next to nothing. The expression higher is obviously entirely indefinite; it still indicates the beauty of Nature and art as standing juxtaposed in the field of conception, and emphasizes the difference as a quantitative and accordingly external difference. But in predicating of mind and its artistic beauty a higher place in contrast to Nature, we do not denote a distinction which is merely relative. Mind, and mind alone, is pervious to truth, comprehending all in itself, so that all which is beautiful can only be veritably beautiful as partaking in this higher sphere and as begotten of the same. Regarded under this point of view it is only a reflection of the beauty appertinent to mind, that is, we have it under an imperfect and incomplete mode, and one whose substantive being is already contained in the mind itself.

      And apart from this we shall find the restriction to the beauty of art only natural, for in so far as the beauties of Nature may have come under discussion—a rarer occurrence among ancient writers than among ourselves—yet at least it has occurred to no one to insist emphatically on the beauty of natural objects to the extent of proposing a science, or systematic exposition of such beauties. It is true that the point of view of utility has been selected for such exclusive treatment. We have, for example, the conception of a science of natural objects in so far as they are useful in the conflict with diseases, in other words a description of minerals, chemical products, plants, animals, which subserve the art of healing. We do not find any analogous exploitation and consideration of the realm of Nature in its aspect of beauty. In the case of natural beauty we are too keenly conscious that we are dealing