"The universality of art and artistic behaviors, their spontaneous appearance everywhere across the globe and through recorded human history, and the fact that in most cases they can be recognized as artistic across cultures suggest that they derive from a natural, innate source, a universal human psychology"
Which was first discussed, of course, by Aristotle in the "Poetics" and the natural inclination to enjoy mimesis. Dutton also points out that Aristotle had traveled through the eastern Mediterranean and Asia Minor, and he discussed various societies in "Politics": "Practically everything has been discovered on many occasions - or rather an infinity of occasions - in the course of the ages; for necessity may be supposed to have taught men the inventions which were absolutely required and when these were provided, it was natural that other things which would adorn and enrich life would grow up by degrees." Dutton then adds that "A standard Objection to any mimetic theory of art insists that it is not the representations per se that are valued by human beings but rather the things represented - the content of the representation" And Dutton notes that Aristotle pointed out that people enjoy seeing the representation of things, like snakes and spiders, that would repel them in real life, although, he neglects to mention that Aristotle also requires that good drama represent people of good character, a quality which may not be quite so cross cultural. "Aristotle's Poetics takes as unproblematic that human beings have a stable intellectual, imaginative, and emotional nature that is universal across cultures" But don't people in every culture believe that they exemplify what it is to be human ? ( so their word for human is commonly the same word that outsiders would use to identify them.) Skipping ahead a thousand years, Dutton then finds the same assumption in Hume and Kant. "The general principles of taste are uniform in human nature" ---- (David Hume, 1757, "Of the Standard of Taste") So if Mando fails to recognize the "powerful artistic synthesis" in "The Bar at the Folies Bergere", it's because human nature is also prone to systematic mistakes and types of corruption -- including: a lack of delicacy, insufficient experience, or a prejudice against an artist or cultural background. As well as "the different humours of particular men" and the "particular manners and opinions of our age and country" --- two fudge factors that might undermine his claim if Hume were not so determined to stick with it. Kant then handles this problem by "proposing that judgments about beauty are logically separate from mere personal, idiosyncratic preferences since they are founded in the *disinterested contemplation* of works of art" Bringing us into the 20th Century, Dutton lists three more recent philosophers who share this assumption: Frank Sibley, Monroe Beardsley, and Francis Sparshott (whose "The future of aesthetics" may be worth reading in the future) And he notes that George Dickie, with his ever popular "Institutional Theory of Art" takes the opposite stance. (well expressed yesterday by Saul's assertion that "context determines hierarchy") But the problem with that stance is consistancy, because it's difficult to avoid establishing a hierarchy of contexts. Even Dickie, in his discussion of the history of theater, wrote that "That tradition has run very thin a times, and perhaps even ceased to exist altogether during some periods, only to be reborn out of its memory and the need for art" "The need for art?" -- yes, that's exactly the assertion that Dutton has been making as he claims that there is "some kind of psychological impulse, psychic requirement, or instinct" that exists independently of any institutions that might be established to satisfy it. Which finally leads to Dutton's compilation of the "innate, universal features and capabilities of the human mind" (page 43) It's too long for me to list here -- but it's mostly sourced from a list compiled by the anthropologist, Donald E. Brown that can be found here: http://condor.depaul.edu/~mfiddler/hyphen/humunivers.htm .. with additions from Tooby,Cosmides, Steven Pinker, and Joseph Carroll. It's a fine list -- but I'm not sure how it can be applied to this discussion of art -- since so many of those universal features are social. So just as there might be an innate disposition to like a blue landscape -- there might also be an innate desire to like whatever you are supposed to - even an all-black painting or a Campbell's soup can. And it's been my observation that the desire for social status usually trumps all the others. ____________________________________________________________ Weight Loss Program Best Weight Loss Program - Click Here! http://thirdpartyoffers.netzero.net/TGL2231/c?cp=7scjyElanTeoTysF-ugf8gAAJz6c l_zTaptgNR5c8Mer1v9kAAYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADNAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAEUgAAAAA=
