Filozofska istraživanja, Vol. 33 No. 1, 2013.
Original scientific paper
Kant’s Concept of Genius and the Meaning of Art
Vedran Rutnik
; Osijek, Croatia
Abstract
Being the birthplace of artistic beauty, genius is found by Kant in a free play of understanding and imagination. Two species of beauty are identified: the natural and the artistic. Beauty is not seen as a quality of an object in observation, but as a peculiar act within the subject. Determinant principle of aesthetic evaluation is found in reflective judgment whereas its concept of formal purposiveness of nature becomes a mediator between the fields of human nature and human freedom. The autonomy of the aesthetic judgment is provided by means of avoiding both the legislation of understanding and the legislation of reason. By this way it can be shown that art is an end in itself. Taking into consideration that Kant’s conception of the origin and the essence of art is grounded in his philosophical system as a whole, the paper examines the conditions under which the philosophy of art is possible. Guided by Kant’s definition of the sense of freedom in its prior-to-art viewpoint, the paper analyzes the possibility of understanding beauty outside of art. What is hereby questioned is the meaning of art in general and the purpose of its being theoretically discussed in particular.
Keywords
Immanuel Kant; genius; reflective judgment; formal purposiveness of nature; natural beauty; artistic beauty
Hrčak ID:
101686
URI
Publication date:
17.4.2013.
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