Overview

What is art? What counts as an aesthetic experience? Does art have to beautiful? Can one reasonably dispute about taste? What is the relation between aesthetic and moral evaluations? How to interpret a work of art? Can we learn anything from literature, film or opera? What is sentimentality? What is irony? How to think philosophically about architecture, dance, or sculpture? What makes something a great portrait? Is music representational or abstract? Why do we feel terrified when we watch a horror movie even though we know it to be fictional? In Conversations on Art and Aesthetics, Hans Maes discusses these and other key questions in aesthetics with ten world-leading philosophers of art: Noël Carroll, Gregory Currie, Arthur Danto, Cynthia Freeland, Paul Guyer, Carolyn Korsmeyer, Jerrold Levinson, Jenefer Robinson, Roger Scruton, and Kendall Walton.The exchanges are direct, open, and sharp, and give a clear account of these thinkers' core ideas and intellectual development. They also offer new insights into, and a deeper understanding of, contemporary issues in the philosophy of art.

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9780199686100

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Reviews

Maes's questions and comments are exceptionally well-informed, and he draws on a rich stock of artistic examples, whether to illustrate his points or to provide a challenging case to think about. ... While a few of the discussions were via email, most, Maes notes in his introduction, were conducted in person and taped. Maes has transcribed these recordings and edited them considerably so that they read with concision and focus. But he has nonetheless kept a bit of the fluidity of informal speech. The conversations are divided into useful sub-sections, and good guidance is given as to relevant further reading at the end of each discussion. ... Maes showed strong philosophical judgment throughout, but managed to temper this well with an admirable objectivity and open-mindedness ... this is a fine book, and a worthwhile genre for publishers to explore further. * Andrew Huddleston, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews * I enjoyed reading Hans Mae's Conversations on Art and Aesthetics. In part, this was because I know most of the conversationalists - some of them well, some of them not so well - and this is closer to time in their company than reading their published work. As they are relatively unguarded, one can pick up on points of agreement and points of disagreement across the chapters. * Derek Matravers, Open University, Aesthetics for Birds * This excellent book isn't made up of a series of simple interviews, either in the goal-directed sense of the term, nor in the format. Instead, it consists of what one might call 'curated conversations' between a series of philosophers and a distinctive mind eager to tease out and explore both points of contact and contradiction in the work of his interlocutors. I highly recommend reading it. Engaging with the arguments and discussions offered will be rewarding to anyone with an interest not only in art but philosophy in general. * Elisabeth Schellekens, University of Durham, Aesthetics for Birds * The book glides across analytic aesthetics, taking in large swathes of its terrain at altitude and dropping down often to scrutinize its many landmarks. Maes is its affable and erudite pilot, expertly accelerating and slowing as the topography demands, adjusting elevation where the air gets too rarefied, and radioing back to the control tower ... okay, metaphors have to end somewhere, but you get the idea. * Nils-Hennes Stear, British Journal of Aesthetics *

The book glides across analytic aesthetics, taking in large swathes of its terrain at altitude and dropping down often to scrutinize its many landmarks. Maes is its affable and erudite pilot, expertly accelerating and slowing as the topography demands, adjusting elevation where the air gets too rarefied, and radioing back to the control tower ... okay, metaphors have to end somewhere, but you get the idea. * Nils-Hennes Stear, British Journal of Aesthetics * This excellent book isn't made up of a series of simple interviews, either in the goal-directed sense of the term, nor in the format. Instead, it consists of what one might call 'curated conversations' between a series of philosophers and a distinctive mind eager to tease out and explore both points of contact and contradiction in the work of his interlocutors. I highly recommend reading it. Engaging with the arguments and discussions offered will be rewarding to anyone with an interest not only in art but philosophy in general. * Elisabeth Schellekens, University of Durham, Aesthetics for Birds * I enjoyed reading Hans Mae's Conversations on Art and Aesthetics. In part, this was because I know most of the conversationalists - some of them well, some of them not so well - and this is closer to time in their company than reading their published work. As they are relatively unguarded, one can pick up on points of agreement and points of disagreement across the chapters. * Derek Matravers, Open University, Aesthetics for Birds * Maes's questions and comments are exceptionally well-informed, and he draws on a rich stock of artistic examples, whether to illustrate his points or to provide a challenging case to think about. ... While a few of the discussions were via email, most, Maes notes in his introduction, were conducted in person and taped. Maes has transcribed these recordings and edited them considerably so that they read with concision and focus. But he has nonetheless kept a bit of the fluidity of informal speech. The conversations are divided into useful sub-sections, and good guidance is given as to relevant further reading at the end of each discussion. ... Maes showed strong philosophical judgment throughout, but managed to temper this well with an admirable objectivity and open-mindedness ... this is a fine book, and a worthwhile genre for publishers to explore further. * Andrew Huddleston, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *

Maes's questions and comments are exceptionally well-informed, and he draws on a rich stock of artistic examples, whether to illustrate his points or to provide a challenging case to think about. ... While a few of the discussions were via email, most, Maes notes in his introduction, were conducted in person and taped. Maes has transcribed these recordings and edited them considerably so that they read with concision and focus. But he has nonetheless kept a bit of the fluidity of informal speech. The conversations are divided into useful sub-sections, and good guidance is given as to relevant further reading at the end of each discussion. ... Maes showed strong philosophical judgment throughout, but managed to temper this well with an admirable objectivity and open-mindedness ... this is a fine book, and a worthwhile genre for publishers to explore further. * Andrew Huddleston, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *

Author Information

Hans Maes is Senior Lecturer in History and Philosophy of Art and Director of the Aesthetics Research Centre at the University of Kent at Canterbury. He has authored papers on a variety of subjects in aesthetics, including the role of intention in the interpretation of art, the notion of free beauty, and the relation between art and pornography. In 2010 he was elected President of the Dutch Society for Aesthetics. He is the editor of Art and Pornography: Philosophical Essays with Jerrold Levinson (OUP, 2012)

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