Module 2

1. Aesthetics: Philosophy of Art- Aesthetics is the study of beauty and art. Art does not imply the idea of beauty. They are very different things. In these videos and articles we study the philosophical side of art, and discuss beauty from many different points of view from many famous artists. Ideas of beauty occur through the senses. Plato did not trust many people, and believed they did not know about many things that they spoke about, as he thought philosophers knew more about reality. Aristotle rejected many of these ideas, wrote a book, and analyzed tragedy. He believed that beauty meant order, symmetry, and definiteness. Francis Hutcheson spoke about how there is no aesthetic delight without good, or moral pleasure without good as “beauty and good are one of the same.” He believed that humans had beauty and harmony. In order for an aesthetic response to occur, humans must have some education and knowledge. Kant thought that nature and freedom separated people apart. Moral freedom is made possible by the aesthetic experience because it does not have laws and is brought by imagination. Romanticists thought that art expressed what people were or may become and saw it as a spiritual action as it was a reflection of ideas. They did not think that we needed art any longer and that advances should not occur. Hegel rejected many theories.  Schopenhouer thought that art and the momentums were most essential to art. Although some rejected his ideas, he felt it was a key part to life and represented the will to live.  20^th Century Aesthetics was the expression theory, that art is the expression of emotion. Many movements changed the idea of art, and beauty was forgotten in the 60s. Things changed with artists like Andy Warhol. Boxes were being sold as “art” and it made people think about how making an object from everyday life into art. Mainstream culture took over, and music, films, comic, and science fiction are now acknowledged as art. We are surrounded by art even in our television, novels, and many other things that once were viewed as bad art, are now normal.  Aesthetics is linked to society, and art helps with that.

CARTA: Changeux and Ramachandran viewed art in relation to the human brain. Both of the speakers raised questions and points about the connection between art and emotion, and how we react when dealing with certain types of art. Changeux thinks that there is a genetic envelope to art and human aesthetic. This was found with the discovery of tools over two million years ago, as well as the discovery of symmetry. Another discovery was symbolism, and artistic composition with homo-spaiens. He felt that art is “a human production, artifact, used for communication. Uses non-verbal communication of emotional states, and an experience of knowledge with codes. Art has staggering effects on emotion and reason mobilizing conscious and non-conscious processes. Art is a constant revolution. Art is done by the human brain with many different processes. Our brain has many different pathways from the pre-frontal cortex and it allows us to process and view colors, emotions, etc in all different ways.

Ramachandran talked about the science of art. He said that he avoids the word art, but instead they are “visual aesthetics.” He talks about the 8 rules of art. He talks about how perception has to do with judgment. The brain has many different areas for vision, as art works because there are so many areas that process the image. The artist stimulates the brain and distorts the image.

CNN- The brain recognizes aspects of art and illusions are created to make art seem more real. The brain responds in certain ways to lines, for example, as they are traced back all the way to Egyptians, and monkeys too. There are not actually lines in the world outlining each object, but we are able to understand when we see a drawing. Drawing faces are the same way. When we make emoticons, they do not look like real faces, but the brain can find ways to see representations of faces. In regards to color, artists usually play with luminance to give three-dimensional illusions. Our brain does not notice when shadows are not realistically placed, as our brain doesn’t naturally calculate in that way. “There are certain aspects of art that seem universally appealing, regardless of the environment or culture in which you grew up.” Artists work with our brain, and can “hyperactivate” our neurons in order to draw us in to certain aspects of art. More and more studies are being done, and these works of art are being used to learn more and more about the brain.

2. Plato- In Plato’s Republic he said that art is simply is a copy of a copy. Plato did not trust poets because he did not believe that they truly know about what they were talking about. Their role as poets (teachers) were to educate the youth, but they did not know about what reality really was. Plato believes that beauty is an erotic reaction. For example, Plato talks about creating a bed in “The Republic.” Here he explains that making a bed from a picture or another bed is not original art. This “artist” is instead not creating something, but making a copy of a bed that already exists.  I appreciate the fact that Plato questioned, and wanted to find out true meanings for him. This shows that Plato did in fact see the importance of art as well as the potential it had on society to educate. He did not want people to be distracted from what art really is, and he challenged in order to be sure that the feelings we have with art are true and meaningful.

3. Changeux talks greatly about science with his research, and talks a lot about brain development, including how emotions and feelings all work together. I liked the part about the surprise of the brain imaging. He taught that when we are surprised, the prefrontal cortex is activated, and this can also be experienced when new pieces of art are viewed for the first time.

Ramachandran talked about science and art in relation to the brain. He was able to use humor to capture the audience, which is always helpful for long lectures in big groups. He was able to make his point about how human perspective differs and how we are biased toward certain artists and paintings. He showed two different pictures, and mentioned that many are drawn to the first photo because of the artist, when in reality it was the second picture that captured the most artist elements.

4. Aesthetics was mentioned in the video about how it attracts different people to what they think is “beautiful.” Aesthetics is mentioned in the text in regards to how we respond. The overall concept that I understand from the text and readings is that aesthetics can be understood in a different way for all different people. Senses can we aroused and feelings can be felt from different works of art. The same work of art can cause a deep aesthetic experience, and it can do nothing for someone else, again talking about how beauty can be attractive for different people.

“There are certain aspects of art that seem universally appealing, regardless of the environment or culture in which you grew up.” As mentioned in the CNN article, and this is exactly what our text discusses as “The human experience.” This concept explains that we can share different feelings and experiences when we view a work of art regardless of how, where, and when we grew up. Just being human allows you to feel certain emotions and experiences. Beautiful forms in art appeal to many regardless.

5. The article helped out a lot, and the videos completely lost me due to their length. The scientific video however did talk about how the brain is stimulated with different works of art. This helped me to understand why certain works are so appealing to us as human beings. As the Mona Lisa was referenced in the CNN article, the artist purposely painted the mouth in a certain way. The mouth can be seen as smiling depending on how the eyes and brain are looking at her. I must admit that I am by no means a visual learner, so I was able to get a lot more out of reading the article versus the video. I had difficulty understanding the accents as well, so reading the text instead of a lengthy video was very educational.