Overview

Whether it was the demands of life, leisure, or a combination of both that forced our hands, we have developed a myriad of artefacts---maps, notes, descriptions, diagrams, flow-charts, photographs, paintings, and prints---that stand for other things. Most agree that images and their close relatives are special because, in some sense, they look like what they are about. This simple claim is the starting point for most philosophical investigations into the nature of depiction. On Images, by contrast, argues that what it is to be a picture does not fundamentally concern how such representations can be perceived. What matters is not how we perceive representations but how they relate to one another. This kind of approach, first championed by Nelson Goodman in his Languages of Art, has not found many supporters, in part because of weaknesses with Goodman's account. On Images shows that a properly crafted structural account of pictures has many advantages over the perceptual accounts that dominate the literature on this topic. In particular, it explains the close relationship between pictures, diagrams, graphs and other kinds of non-linguistic representation. Kulvicki undermines the claim that pictures are essentially visual by showing how many kinds of non-visual representations, including audio recordings and tactile line drawings, are genuinely pictorial. Part Two shows that the structural account of depiction can help to explain why pictures seem so perceptually special, rather than taking that fact for granted. Based on these results, Part Three provides a new account of pictorial realism.

Full Product Details

Author:   John V. Kulvicki (Dartmouth College, New Hampshire)
Publisher:   Oxford University Press
Imprint:   Oxford University Press
Dimensions:   Width: 13.80cm , Height: 1.60cm , Length: 21.50cm
Weight:   0.344kg
ISBN:  

9780199561674

ISBN 10:   0199561672
Pages:   274
Publication Date:   08 January 2009
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  Tertiary & Higher Education ,  Undergraduate
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   To order  
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Table of Contents

Introduction: Alberti's Window, Leonardo's Mirror, and van Gogh's Room Part One: Image Structure 1: Goodman's Progress 2: Repleteness, Sensitivity, and Richness 3: Transparency 4: Mimesis 5: Other Visibilia and Other Media Part Two: Image Content 6: Bare Bones Content 7: Understanding Commitments 8: Sense Data and Bare Bones Content 9: Fleshing-out and Seeing-in 10: Perceiving Pictures Part Three: Realism and Variety 11: Verity 12: Information, Imitation, and Inculcation

Reviews

<br> On Images is an important book on the topic of pictorial representation that will, no doubt, contribute significantly to our understanding of many aspects of this phenomenon, even some of the most perplexing ones...one of the most valuable and important contributions to the topic. --Mind<br> Innovative and well-written. A great contribution to one of the most popular topics in aesthetics. I strongly recommend this book . One of the best on the topic. --British Journal of Aesthetics<br> From start to finish, it is original, beautifully argued, and just brimming with useful ideas. It is written in clear, crisp prose and unfolds in a logical manner. I learned something from almost every sentence in this book. I predict that it will enter the ranks of the classics in the philosophy of pictures. --Dominic McIver Lopes, University of British Columbia<br> [A] provocative book...more than amply illustrates his capacity for genuinely original philosophical thought.... In the breadth and de

On Images is an important book on the topic of pictorial representation that will, no doubt, contribute significantly to our understanding of many aspects of this phenomenon, even some of the most perplexing ones...one of the most valuable and important contributions to the topic. --Mind<br> Innovative and well-written. A great contribution to one of the most popular topics in aesthetics. I strongly recommend this book . One of the best on the topic. --British Journal of Aesthetics<br> From start to finish, it is original, beautifully argued, and just brimming with useful ideas. It is written in clear, crisp prose and unfolds in a logical manner. I learned something from almost every sentence in this book. I predict that it will enter the ranks of the classics in the philosophy of pictures. --Dominic McIver Lopes, University of British Columbia<br>

From start to finish, it is original, beautifully argued, and just brimming with useful ideas. It is written in clear, crisp prose and unfolds in a logical manner. I learned something from almost every sentence in this book. I predict that it will enter the ranks of the classics in the philosophy of pictures. * Dominic McIver Lopes, University of British Columbia * Innovative and well-written . . . a great contribution to one of the most popular topics in aesthetics . .. I strongly recommend this book . . . one of the best on the topic. * British Journal of Aesthetics * Review from previous edition On Images is an important book on the topic of pictorial representation that will, no doubt, contribute significantly to our understanding of many aspects of this phenomenon, even some of the most perplexing ones...one of the most valuable and important contributions to the topic. * Mind *

Author Information

John V. Kulvicki is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire

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