The Aesthetic Contract: Statutes of Art and Intellectual Work in Modernity by He

Description: The Aesthetic Contract: Statutes of Art and Intellectual Work in Modernity by Henry Sussman "An extremely important work of criticism and historical synthesis. [Sussman's] deepest motivation is not just to get the story straight about Western culture since the sixteenth century, but to explain to himself and to his readers how we got to be the way we are today."—J. Hillis Miller, University of California, Irvine"A rare achievement in an age when critical endeavor is still being consumed by theoretically and historically driven polemics. . . . Sussman's The Aesthetic Contract does us a great service by demonstrating the significant level to which critical understanding can rise when it does not reliquish historical specificity in the name of textal astuteness but, through this conbination, seeks to uncover what our more limited modernities have refused to think. In this respect, [the book] makes an extremely strong and convincing argument for the pervasive operation of the aesthetic as both an historically and theoretically significant category. FORMAT Paperback LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Publisher Description Ambitious in scope and innovative in concept, this book offers an overview and critique of the conventions surrounding artistic creativity and intellectual endeavor since the outset of "the broader modernity," which the author sees as beginning with the decline of feudalism and the Church.As a work of intellectual history, it suggests that art and the conventions associated with the artistic constitute a secular institution that has supplanted pre-Reformation theology. From the perspective of the "subject," modernity has entailed a heightened sense of individuation, moral conflict, and pervasive loss and disaster. Yet the pitfalls that have earmarked personal experience have taken on positive value in an artistic enterprise that aspires to be a salutary replacement for externally imposed theological dogmas.Beginning with Luther, Calvin, and Shakespeare and culminating with the Kantian notion of the artist as an "original genius," the author reconstructs the steps by which art and creative activity were installed as the redemptive values of a modernity in which human beings were forced to define knowledge and establish authority according to their own devices. In the process, the author reads passages from Plato, Proust, Donne, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, Kleist, Rousseau, Melville, Wittgenstein, as well as Benjamin, as well as the graphic works of Holbein, Durer, Mondrian, and Rothko.As a work of critical theory, "The Aesthetic Contract" posits an alternative model to Kant's "original genius." The author explores an understanding of art powered by the notion of the aesthetic contract, in which artists and intellectuals choose to operate within the parameters of certain explicit experiments until the contractual clauses that delimit these endeavors lose their currency or validity. As an intellectual analog to Rousseau's social contract, the aesthetic contract has allowed the modern artist to address issues of knowledge, authority, and experience once thought to fall within the domain of arbitrary, remote, and inaccessible agencies. Back Cover "An extremely important work of criticism and historical synthesis. [Sussmans] deepest motivation is not just to get the story straight about Western culture since the sixteenth century, but to explain to himself and to his readers how we got to be the way we are today."-J. Hillis Miller,University of California, Irvine "A rare achievement in an age when critical endeavor is still being consumed by theoretically and historically driven polemics. . . . Sussmans The Aesthetic Contract does us a great service by demonstrating the significant level to which critical understanding can rise when it does not reliquish historical specificity in the name of textal astuteness but, through this conbination, seeks to uncover what our more limited modernities have refused to think. In this respect, [the book] makes an extremely strong and convincing argument for the pervasive operation of the aesthetic as both an historically and theoretically significant category. Flap Ambitious in scope and innovative in concept, this book offers an overview and critique of the conventions surrounding artistic creativity and intellectual endeavor since the outset of "the broader modernity", which the author sees as beginning with the decline of feudalism and the Church. As a work of intellectual history, it suggests that art and the conventions associated with the artistic constitute a secular institution that has supplanted pre-Reformation theology. From the perspective of the "subject," modernity has entailed a heightened sense of individuation, moral conflict, and pervasive loss and disaster. Yet the pitfalls that have earmarked personal experience have taken on positive value in an artistic enterprise that aspires to be a salutary replacement for externally imposed theological dogmas. Beginning with Luther, Calvin, and Shakespeare and culminating with the Kantian notion of the artist as an "original genius," the author reconstructs the steps by which art and creative activity were installed as the redemptive values of a modernity in which human beings were forced to define knowledge and establish authority according to their own devices. In the process, the author reads passages from Plato, Proust, Donne, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, Kleist, Rousseau, Melville, Wittgenstein, as well as Benjamin, as well as the graphic works of Holbein, Drer, Mondrian, and Rothko. As a work of critical theory, The Aesthetic Contract posits an alternative model to Kants "original genius." The author explores an understanding of art powered by the notion of the aesthetic contract, in which artists and intellectuals choose to operate within the parameters of certain explicit experiments until the contractual clauses that delimit these endeavors lose their currency or validity. As an intellectual analog to Rousseaus social contract, the aesthetic contract has allowed the modern artist to address issues of knowledge, authority, and experience once thought to fall within the domain of arbitrary, remote, and inaccessible agencies. Author Biography HENRY SUSSMAN is the Julian Park Professor in the Department of Comparative Literature at University of Buffalo of the State University of New York and ongoing Visiting Professor in the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures at Yale University. He has most recently published "The Task of the Critic" (Fordham). His other books include "The Aesthetic Contract: Statutes of Art and Intellectual Work in Modernity and The Hegelian Aftermath". Table of Contents Introduction: criticism and cartography; Part I. The Emergence of the Artist as Priest in a Secular Art Religion: 1. Portraits of modernity; 2. Framing modernity: Protestant and critical reformations; 3. The knowledge of modernity: tragedy and empiricism; 4. Melancholic borders: from Trauerspiel to Michael Kohlhaas; 5. Kant and the anointment of the modern artist; Part II. Untimely Propositions on the Contracting of Art in Modernity: 6. Corollaries to the aesthetic contract; 7. Maxima moralia: millennial fragments on the public and private dimensions of language; Part III. The World at Large: Systematic Expansionism on the Threshold of Modernitys Realization: 8. From social to aesthetic contract; 9. Between sublimities: Melville, Whaling, and the melodrama of incest; Conclusion: parting shots: final portraits; Notes; Index. Review "An extremely important work of criticism and historical synthesis. [Sussmans] deepest motivation is not just to get the story straight about Western culture since the sixteenth century, but to explain to himself and to his readers how we got to be the way we are today." - J. Hillis Miller,University of California, Irvine "A rare achievement in an age when critical endeavor is still being consumed by theoretically and historically driven polemics... Sussmans The Aesthetic Contract does us a great service by demonstrating the significant level to which critical understanding can rise when it does not reliquish historical specificity in the name of textal astuteness but, through this conbination, seeks to uncover what our more limited modernities have refused to think. In this respect, [the book] makes an extremely strong and convincing argument for the pervasive operation of the aesthetic as both an historically and theoretically significant category. Long Description Ambitious in scope and innovative in concept, this book offers an overview and critique of the conventions surrounding artistic creativity and intellectual endeavor since the outset of "the broader modernity", which the author sees as beginning with the decline of feudalism and the Church.As a work of intellectual history, it suggests that art and the conventions associated with the artistic constitute a secular institution that has supplanted pre-Reformation theology. From the perspective of the "subject," modernity has entailed a heightened sense of individuation, moral conflict, and pervasive loss and disaster. Yet the pitfalls that have earmarked personal experience have taken on positive value in an artistic enterprise that aspires to be a salutary replacement for externally imposed theological dogmas.Beginning with Luther, Calvin, and Shakespeare and culminating with the Kantian notion of the artist as an "original genius," the author reconstructs the steps by which art and creative activity were installed as the redemptive values of a modernity in which human beings were forced to define knowledge and establish authority according to their own devices. In the process, the author reads passages from Plato, Proust, Donne, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, Kleist, Rousseau, Melville, Wittgenstein, as well as Benjamin, as well as the graphic works of Holbein, Drer, Mondrian, and Rothko.As a work of critical theory, The Aesthetic Contract posits an alternative model to Kants "original genius." The author explores an understanding of art powered by the notion of the aesthetic contract, in which artists and intellectuals choose to operate within the parameters of certain explicit experiments until the contractual clauses that delimit these endeavors lose their currency or validity. As an intellectual analog to Rousseaus social contract, the aesthetic contract has allowed the modern artist to address issues of knowledge, authority, and experience once thought to fall within the domain of arbitrary, remote, and inaccessible agencies. Review Quote A rare achievement in an age when critical endeavor is still being consumed by theoretically and historically driven polemics. . . . Sussmans The Aesthetic Contract does us a great service by demonstrating the significant level to which critical understanding can rise when it does not reliquish historical specificity in the name of textal astuteness but, through this conbination, seeks to uncover what our more limited modernities have refused to think. In this respect, [the book] makes an extremely strong and convincing argument for the pervasive operation of the aesthetic as both an historically and theoretically significant category. Details ISBN0804728437 Author Henry Sussman Short Title AESTHETIC CONTRACT Pages 336 Publisher Stanford University Press Language English ISBN-10 0804728437 ISBN-13 9780804728430 Media Book Format Paperback DEWEY 111.85 Year 1997 Publication Date 1997-11-30 Imprint Stanford University Press Subtitle Statutes of Art and Intellectual Work in Modernity Place of Publication Palo Alto Country of Publication United States Illustrations 7 half-tones Birth 1946 Edition 1st Affiliation Professor of Germanic Languages and Literatures, Yale University DOI 10.1604/9780804728430 Audience Professional and Scholarly UK Release Date 1997-12-01 AU Release Date 1997-12-01 NZ Release Date 1997-12-01 US Release Date 1997-12-01 We've got this At The Nile, if you're looking for it, we've got it. With fast shipping, low prices, friendly service and well over a million items - you're bound to find what you want, at a price you'll love! TheNile_Item_ID:159728843;

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