ART (Aesthetics Research Torino) Philosophical Seminar

in collaboration with the seminar

"Kant, oltre Kant"

Aviv Reiter
(Humboldt Universität zu Berlin)

March, 8. h 2 pm

Aula 9, Palazzo Nuovo
&
Online

https://unito.webex.com/unito/j.php?MTID=m36ad9da37aaa84a9ae039522dbc30d3a

The Question of Artistic Mannerism: Freedom and the Constraint of Rules in Vasari, Bellori and Kant

Vasari unites the arts of architecture, sculpture and painting as necessarily ‘derived from design’. Design or drawing is ‘the visible expression’ of the idea of the perfect spatial form or three-dimensional outline of natural objects. However, for Vasari, the expression of this artistic rule is not enough for attaining beauty in art. The talent for drawing the idea is the gift of genius. Divine genius lies in the ability to embody the idea – though freely through personal style or maniera, i.e., the hand. Vasari thinks of this as embodying the idea inspired with life. In the late Renaissance and increasingly in the sixteenth century, artists gave license to their individual creative freedom. This gave rise to Mannerism. Bellori vocally charges, however, that in the aspiration to innovate in their works, artists gradually altered the structure of the idea until they utterly distorted it. Indeed, Mannerism, for Bellori, is the abandonment of beauty and the devastation of art. Freedom came at the expense of the definitive task of presenting the idea. Kant’s discussion of genius aims to restore the importance of maniera, without losing sight of its inherent risks. For Kant, there are two means of artistic expression: manner and method – the latter being a determinate set of academic rules. Although method is necessary in order to bring art into being, in stating that in artistic beauty ‘only the first [manner] is valid’ (5:318) Kant sides with Vasari. Kant indeed recognizes the crucial role of artistic freedom. Paying heed to Bellori’s criticism though, he claims that ‘some deviation from the common [academic] rule is well suited’ (5:318) – as long as it serves artistic expression and is not itself the end of creation. Kant can thus be seen as striking a sweet-spot between the figures of Vasari and Bellori and between freedom and the constraint of academic rules.

Aviv Reiter is a fellow at the Department of Art and Visual History, Humboldt University of Berlin. She earned her Ph.D. in Philosophy at Tel-Aviv University (2020). Her area of specialization is aesthetics, specifically early modern theory and philosophy of art (from the Renaissance to the eighteenth century), Kantian aesthetics and Hegel’s philosophy of art. She has published papers on Kant and Hegel. In 2020 she was awarded the British Society of Aesthetics Essay Award for her paper “Kant on the Aesthetic Ideas of Beautiful Nature.”

ART (Aesthetics Research Torino) is a periodic philosophical seminar organized by the Department of Philosophy and Educational Sciences of the University of Turin and the PhD Program FINO.

Coordinators:
Prof. Alessandro Bertinetto (University of Turin).
Prof. Federico Vercellone (University of Turin).

Members:
Prof. Carlo Serra (University of Turin/University of Calabria)
Prof.ssa Serena Feloj (University of Pavia)
Dr. Alberto Martinengo (University of Turin)
Dr. Paolo Furia (University of Turin)
Dr. Lisa Giombini (University Rome 3)
Dr. Gregorio Tenti (University of Turin)
Dr. Amalia Salvestrini (Istituto italiano di Studi Filosofici, Neaples)
Dr. Francesca Monateri (Pisa, Scuola Normale)
Dr. Francesca Perotto (FINO)
Dr. Ivan Quartesan (FINO)
Dr. Sofia Boz (University of Padua)
Dr. Leonardo Pietropaolo (University of Turin)
Dr. Luisa Sampugnaro (Università of Turin)
Dr. Nicola Davide Angerame (Turin)

ART addresses different topics of the contemporary debate in Aesthetics: philosophy of beauty, philosophy of the arts, theory of sensory experience, philosophy of image and imagination, and history of aesthetics.

ART is supported by:

Centro Interuniversitario di Ricerca sulla Morfologia Francesco Moiso (CIM)
Centro Studi Arti della Modernità
Centro Studi Filosofico-religiosi "Luigi Pareyson"

ART is sponsored by:

Italian Society for Aesthetics (SIE)
European Society for Aesthetics (ESA)