The precarious rights of senior citizens, especially those who are highly educated and who are expected to counsel and guide the younger generations, has stimulated the creation internationally of advocacy associations and opinion leader groups. The strength of these groups, however, varies from country to country. In some countries, they are supported and are the focus of intense interest; in others, they are practically ignored. For this is reason we believe that the creation of a network of all these associations (...) is essential. The proposed network would act as a support for the already-existing policies of the United Nations’ High Commission for Human Rights, of independent experts, and of the Global Alliance for the Rights of Older People. All three have long ago recommended the creation of a recognized instrument for uniting presently scattered efforts. The proposed network, therefore, will seek to promote the international exchange of relevant expertise, and it will reinforce the commitments and actions that single countries are currently taking to meet these objectives. For example, informative public events can be organised to promote particular support initiatives and to provide an opportunity for new members of the network to be presented. The network will promote health for senior citizens, disease prevention, senior mobility, safe free time for seniors, alimentary education, protection against new risks and dangers, as well as equity in the services necessary for seniors to adopt new information and communication technologies. In the case of retired academic members, the network will promote equality with respect to continuing use of digital technologies (particularly email), continuing access to research libraries, and the guaranteed ability for seniors to fund their own research programs and to deliver free seminars. (shrink)

This paper examines the assumptions underpinning one of the constitutive elements of the modern concept of art: the idea of aesthetic autonomy. I argue that the orientation of recent art practice towards what has come to be termed ‘site-specificity’ is best understood as a progressive relinquishment of the principle of aesthetic autonomy. I develop this position through a close analysis of the work of Miwon Kwon. The paper is intended as a case-study that investigates the problematic relation between historical and (...) philosophical enquiry. CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 61.1 (2000) 115-132 [Access article in PDF] Schiller's Theory of Landscape Depiction Jason Gaiger This paper offers a critical discussion of the theory of landscape depiction which Friedrich Schiller developed in an important but neglected article on the work of Friedrich Matthisson, published in 1794. 1 The question of the value and status of landscape painting and poetry was far from settled (...) at the end of the eighteenth century, and Schiller's essay should be seen as making an important contribution to an ongoing debate. 2 The second half of the eighteenth century is marked by a profound ambivalence towards the natural world. On the one hand there is a remarkable "rediscovery" of nature, evidenced in such diverse but related phenomena as the vogue for English gardens and the appreciation of wild and "untamed places," such as the Alps and the Herz mountains. It is also the age of "sentiment," embracing a heightened sensitivity to all aspects of the physical world. And yet when we turn to the visual arts, we find landscape painting ranked far below history painting and portraiture. Precedence is given to the representation of human actions and emotions, and the depiction of the human figure remains the highest goal of ambitious art.The modern hierarchy of the genres was first established on a firm theoretical and practical basis with the founding of the French Royal Academy in the seventeenth century. The painter of living animals is ranked higher than the [End Page 115] painter of inanimate nature who depicts "choses mortes et sans mouvement." 3 The painter of human subjects, who imitates "the most perfect work of God," stands higher still. The highest achievement to which the artist can aspire, however, is history painting, the depiction of groups of figures in themes derived from biblical and mythical sources. To achieve this, the artist cannot depict what he sees but must employ both knowledge and imagination. The fundamental opposition here is between painting as a merely imitative or mechanical art, which is addressed to the eye alone, and painting as a work of "invention" or "imagination," which is addressed to the mind. Only the latter constitutes a properly liberal art, entitling the painter to stand alongside the poet as "un auteur ingénieux et savant" over and above the mere artisan or skilled laborer.The great popularity enjoyed by landscape painting in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was not met by any comparable elevation in its status as a fine art. Addressing students of the Royal Academy in London in 1770, Joshua Reynolds could continue to dismiss landscape and still-life as the "meaner walks of painting" which require only "mechanical" expertise. 4 For Reynolds the status of painting as a fine art is established through its treatment of the great subjects of history painting, that is, the depiction of human passions and the intellect. Only in tackling such themes does the artist succeed in addressing the imagination, which Reynolds describes as the "great end of art." 5 Although of comparatively recent origin, the genre of "landscape poetry" remained equally problematic and could not easily be reconciled with classicist ideals. New categories seemed to be required to comprehend the work of poets such as Albrecht von Haller and James Thomson, in which the varied and ever-changing aspects of the natural landscape were made the central protagonists of the poetic drama. While traditional forms such as the bucolic, the Arcadian, and the pastoral allowed the depiction of rural existence, the new "descriptive poetry" sought to celebrate the life of nature independently of man's intervening presence: it is nature itself rather than man's relation to nature which is made the poet's primary concern.Schiller's review of the third, expanded edition of Matthisson's poetry appeared in two parts in the Jenaer Allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung, 11-12 September 1794. While the second half of the review is given over to a detailed discussion of Matthisson's poetry, the first part is reserved for an extended theoretical discussion in which Schiller... (shrink)

This paper challenges the widely held assumption that paintings and other works of graphic art have a communicable rhythmic structure. I defend the view that although the experience of viewing a picture takes place in time, and thus is successive, it cannot be temporally structured in a sufficiently determinate manner to sustain the kind of attentional focus required for the communication of even simple rhythmic patterns. With reference to examples of both abstract and figurative painting, I argue that the graphic (...) arts—unlike music and poetry—are non-sequential and that this has important consequences for how a work of graphic art is perceived. In the concluding sections of the paper, I consider some recent empirical research that offers an alternative way of approaching these issues. (shrink)

Drawing on recent attempts to critically reconstruct the ideas of Heinrich Wölfflin, this paper argues that there is a specific ‘logic of depiction’ that is distinctive to visual as opposed to verbal forms of representation. The aim is to provide a set of objective parameters that can allow a comparative analysis of the formal organization of pictures despite differences in period, subject matter, format, etc. The paper seeks to show that such an analysis is possible and that it possesses explanatory (...) force. Its frame is a critical engagement with Richard Wollheim's theory of style. Wollheim holds that general style terms are merely tools of classification and that they are relative to the changing point of view of those who seek to understand the art of the past. However, the critical reconstruction of Wölfflin's fundamental concepts aims to identify necessary conditions for visual representation as such. The fundamental concepts function not as taxonomic categories but as ‘limit concepts’ that demarcate a scale of possibilities and thus enable meaningful comparison of artworks. (shrink)

This paper has two aims. First, I seek to show that Kendall Walton's analysis of the participatory character of our imaginative engagement in games of make-believe provides a powerful explanatory framework that can be used to address some of the central problems that still remain unresolved in contemporary accounts of living-presence response, including those put forward by David Freedberg and Alfred Gell. Second, I argue that Walton's focus on the activities of ‘appreciators’ prevents him from considering the possible application of (...) his theory to other kinds of activity, even where this would permit a genuine enrichment or extension of his position. Once we open up the field of enquiry to include the various ceremonial, civic, religious, and other functions that works of art fulfil, the analogy to the participatory character of games of make-believe becomes stronger rather than weaker. (shrink)

The emergence of Bildwissenschaft as a new interdisciplinary formation that is intended to encompass all images calls for an analysis of the grounds on which the claim to universality can be upheld. I argue that whereas the lifting of scope restrictions imposes only a weak universality requirement, the identification of features that belong to the entire class of entities that are categorized as images imposes a strong universality requirement. Reflection on this issue brings into focus the distinctive character of Bildwissenschaft (...) and the features that distinguish it not only from other related disciplines such as art history and visual studies, but also from recent work in the philosophy of the image. (shrink)

This reader, a companion to The Open University's four-volume Art of the Twentieth Century series, offers a variety of writings by art historians and art theorists. The writings were originally published as freestanding essays or chapters in books, and they reflect the diversity of art historical interpretations and theoretical approaches to twentieth-century art. Accessible to the general reader, this book may be read independently or to supplement the materials explored in the four course texts. The volume includes a general introduction (...) as well as a brief introduction to each piece, outlining its origin and relevance. (shrink)

O artigo tem como foco a participação das organizações operárias na formação educacional do trabalhador rio-grandense. Com base na análise de obras repertoriadas sobre o tema, identifica, de um lado, os aspectos em destaque na bibliografia e, de outro, as experiências operárias mais significativas para a formação do trabalhador. Centra-se na Primeira República, revisando a literatura e caracterizando as práticas pedagógicas e a influência das correntes anarquistas.

The emergence of Bildwissenschaft (image science) as a new interdisciplinary formation that is intended to encompass all images calls for an analysis of the grounds on which the claim to universality can be upheld. I argue that whereas the lifting of scope restrictions imposes only a weak universality requirement, the identification of features that belong to the entire class of entities that are categorized as images imposes a strong universality requirement. Reflection on this issue brings into focus the distinctive character (...) of Bildwissenschaft and the features that distinguish it not only from other related disciplines such as art history and visual studies, but also from recent work in the philosophy of the image. (shrink)

This paper addresses two key works in the eighteenth‐century debate on the problem of taste: the Abbé Du Bos's Réflexions critiques sur la poésie et sur la peinture and David Hume's ‘Of the Standard of Taste’ . A successful solution to the ‘paradox of taste’ should sustain the democratising impulse behind Du Bos's appeal to the judgment of the ‘public’ whilst, at the same time, acknowledging the role of learning and discovery which underpins Hume's recourse to the opinion of the (...) best qualified critics. This can be achieved, it is argued, by taking up a standpoint which is internal to our actual arguments or disputes about art, drawing upon and recommending a set of practices which allow for the development and revision of our judgments about works of art. (shrink)

The Afterword draws together the central arguments of the book by elaborating the concept of a ‘thread of recognition’, presented as a unifying yet plural framework for interpreting German aesthetics. It distinguishes three interrelated uses of the term: first, as a methodological device for tracing historical interconnections among ideas; second, as the relation linking artist, artwork, and viewer in aesthetic experience; and third, as articulating a broader philosophical inquiry into the relation between human freedom, art, and nature. The Afterword further (...) acknowledges persistent tensions that remain unresolved yet philosophically productive, and concludes that the continuing dialogue between past and present serves to sustain and renew philosophical inquiry. (shrink)

Chapter 2 advances the claim that Lessing’s Laocoön (1766) offers resources for a positive conception of imaginative freedom that is inseparable from the materiality of artistic media. The question whether Lessing upholds or rejects the transparency theory of art is a central interpretative dispute, reflected in the sharply contrasting positions advocated by David Wellbery and Anthony Savile. By examining these opposing lines of interpretation, the chapter foregrounds Lessing’s ambivalence and tensions within the text. It contends that Lessing’s reflections on the (...) ‘fruitful moment’ and the prolongation of aesthetic attention show that artistic media do not merely limit but actively sustain imaginative engagement. This allows imaginative freedom to be understood not as a release from material limitations but as responsiveness to them, a form of ‘answerability’ to the work. (shrink)

Chapter 7 examines Hegel’s contested legacy in art history and philosophy, focusing on debates about the continuing relevance of his Lectures on Aesthetics. It contrasts Gombrich’s influential Popperian critique of Hegel as a metaphysical system-builder who subordinates art to an abstract logic of spirit with recent non-metaphysical interpretations that foreground art’s historical contingency, social embeddedness, and constitutive role in the formation of modern subjectivity. The chapter situates these debates within the broader intellectual history of the discipline, while also examining the (...) impact of Hotho’s editorial interventions. Drawing on newly available student transcripts, the chapter challenges the authority of Hotho’s edition and demonstrates the provisional, experimental nature of Hegel’s lectures. By engaging both philosophical and art-historical perspectives, it argues that Hegel’s aesthetics, far from being exhausted or merely retrospective, provide a valuable conceptual framework for interrogating the unstable role of art in modernity and rethinking the philosophical foundations of art-historical inquiry. (shrink)

Chapter 1 reconsiders Lessing’s Laocoön (1766) by challenging the conventional view that it seeks to impose rigid boundaries between poetry and the visual arts. Tracing its reception from Goethe through Greenberg and Krauss, it argues instead that the text’s enduring significance lies in its account of how different media shape imaginative engagement. Lessing’s comparison of Virgil’s poetic description of Laocoön and his sons with the sculptural group demonstrates how temporal and spatial forms elicit distinct but complementary modes of aesthetic response. (...) By foregrounding imagination rather than constraint, Laocoön emerges as a resource relevant for contemporary debates about art. (shrink)

Chapter 3 argues that eighteenth-century debates on landscape painting exposed the limitations of the classical ideal of beauty, shifting aesthetic theory from objectivist models grounded in antique sculpture to subjectivist accounts privileging imagination, perception, and the indeterminacy of nature. It traces the Platonic and Neoplatonic roots of the classical ideal and its codification in academic hierarchies, and shows how landscape painting, with its inherent indeterminacy and demand for unity across diverse natural elements, increasingly destabilized these assumptions. Herder is identified as (...) the first philosopher to come to terms with these developments and to develop an account of the distinctive problems presented by the depiction of landscape. The chapter concludes by situating these eighteenth-century debates within current discussions of environmental aesthetics, where the problem of framing, the role of scientific knowledge, and the tension between subjective freedom and normative criteria continue to shape approaches to the appreciation of nature. (shrink)

Chapter 6 investigates Schiller’s reworking of Kantian aesthetics, particularly his conception of beauty as ‘freedom in visible form’. Schiller’s early reflections on tragedy framed moral self-determination as the triumph of reason over sensibility; yet his later writings advance a more reconciliatory account in which freedom emerges through the harmonious integration of reason and sensibility. Natural beauty, while not genuinely autonomous, is perceived as if self-determined and thus serves as a symbolic analogue of moral freedom. The chapter concentrates on Schiller’s 1794 (...) essay ‘On Matthisson’s Poetry’ in which he addresses the contested status of landscape poetry and painting. Responding to classical doubts about inanimate nature as a legitimate artistic subject, Schiller argues that this can be secured through its musical structure, whereby form communicates feeling independently of narrative content. This approach anticipates Romantic and modernist aesthetics, while also exposing the tension between freedom, necessity, and nature in Schiller’s philosophy. (shrink)

Chapter 5 offers a critical re-assessment of Kant’s Critique of the Power of Judgment (1790), contesting the dominant formalist interpretation that construes his aesthetics as narrowly preoccupied with sensitivity to form, but also raising a challenge to more recent attempts to integrate Kant’s theory of taste with his theory of art. Kant begins with a strict account of ‘pure’ judgments of taste, yet the introduction of the categories of free and adherent beauty complicates this position, acknowledging that conceptual and purposive (...) considerations may inform aesthetic judgment without effacing its distinctiveness. Central to Kant’s analysis is the free play of imagination and understanding as the ground of aesthetic pleasure. Although Kant subsequently reincorporates many of the features that he initially excluded, this can only be achieved at the cost of relinquishing the universalist claims that he set out to defend. The question of Kant’s real achievement therefore remains unresolved. (shrink)

Chapter 4 examines Hemsterhuis’ Letter on Sculpture (1769) as a formative intervention in eighteenth-century aesthetic theory. Hemsterhuis’ principle that beauty consists in apprehending the greatest number of ideas in the shortest span of time introduces a temporal dimension to aesthetic experience. By analysing his quasi-experiments with drawings and sculptures, the chapter foregrounds Hemsterhuis’ emphasis on the active role of the viewer in synthesizing multiplicity into coherence. Contemporary responses from Garve and Mendelssohn exposed both the originality and the limitations of this (...) approach, particularly the neglect of qualitative factors. The chapter argues that Hemsterhuis’ conception of aesthetic temporality cannot be assimilated within the framework of neo-classicism and that it raises enduring questions about the distinct temporalities of pictorial and sculptural viewing. (shrink)

This Introduction situates the tradition of German philosophical aesthetics within its historical and conceptual contexts, tracing a ‘thread of recognition’ between past thought and contemporary debates. It explores how reason, sentiment, and imagination shape aesthetic experience and argues for a historically informed yet critically engaged approach. Rejecting both purely historical and decontextualized interpretations, it argues for the need to engage philosophically with aesthetic texts by exploring their internal tensions and establishing their continuing significance for philosophy and art theory. It defends (...) a historically grounded yet critically engaged approach to aesthetics as an ongoing dialogue between past ideas and present concerns. (shrink)

This book examines the rich and complex tradition of German philosophical aesthetics, tracing the ‘thread of recognition’ that links the ideas of Lessing, Herder, Hemsterhuis, Kant, Schiller, and Hegel to ongoing debates about the nature of art, aesthetic experience, and the role of imagination. Rather than offering a straightforward history, the book engages with particular philosophical problems that continue to structure debates in aesthetics: the delimitation of artistic media, the relation between imagination and representation, the unity and indeterminacy of landscape, (...) the temporality of pictorial and sculptural viewing, and the moral and cognitive significance of natural beauty. The guiding concept of a ‘thread of recognition’ highlights how philosophical ideas are received, reinterpreted, and sometimes misrecognized, and how these processes themselves generate philosophical insight. The book emphasizes both the richness and the internal tensions of the German aesthetic tradition, arguing that recognition and misrecognition alike shape its legacy. Combining philosophical analysis with attention to art theory and practice, The Thread of Recognition situates aesthetics at the intersection of philosophy, art history, and environmental thought, and reasserts its significance for understanding art, nature, and human self-determination. (shrink)

Our research is based on a rather large "library" of various works by M. Drahomanov, which contains his views on religion. Among them: Paradise and Progress, From the History of Relations Between Church and State in Western Europe, Faith and Public Affairs, Fight for Spiritual Power and Freedom of Conscience in the 16th - 17th Centuries,, "Church and State in the Roman Empire", "The Status and Tasks of the Science of Ancient History," "Evangelical Faith in Old England," "Populism and Popular (...) Progress in Austrian Rus, Austrian-Russian Remembrance," "Pious The Legend of the Bulgarians "," The Issues of Religious Freedom in Russia, "" On the Brotherhood of the Baptist or the Baptist in Ukraine, "" The Foreword, " Shevchenko, Ukrainianophiles and Socialism "," Wonderful thoughts about the Ukrainian national affair "," Zazdri gods "," Slavic variants of one Gospel legend "," Resurrection of Christ ", etc. (shrink)