The difference between photography and representation is brought by zooming in on another peculiarity of the vistas through windows and in mirrors. Photos, mirrors, and windows all prove that what is seen in or through them is real, really existant. And they prove this either by the polymodality of their perception (mirrors and windows), or…

Jawel hoor, je kon er op wachten. Von Hagens heeft een setje lijken geleverd voor op de set van de nieuwe James Bond film, Casino Royale. Ik heb dat uit de VPRO-gids van de komende week (nr. 48), waar ze het verder ook over “ethisch gequatsch” hebben en dat de mensen in Guben, Oost-Duitsland, het…

Schilderijen als La Condition Humaine van René Magritte maken de representationele houding ervaarbaar: het verschil tussen wat we ervaren als we naar het doek kijken (“Het afgebeelde canvas beeldt af wat het verbergt “) en wat we zouden ervaren als we in de afgebeelde kamer konden rondlopen. Hetzelfde gebeurt bij de man met de appel…

1. While listening to John Coltrane, this thought came up:jazz musicians play on a favourite instrument. And, sometimes, the instrument they pick does not really connect with them. [Multi-instumentalist Anthony Braxton seems best when playing on a soprano; Coltrane on a tenor sax, etc.]. This is not merely due to an accidental preference on behalf…

Performers of classical music seem better off than pop or jazz musicians, in that in classical music the relevance of the score for the performance is uncontested. You don’t (always) have to invent your means to bring a score to life; in large measure, you must make sure to perform it correctly. Maybe, however, this…

The model for thinking about the creation of art that we shall be talking about in the next weeks, is this: the artist sees himself or herself confronted with ‘inert’ material, i.e. material that ‘merely exists’ and does not carry any artistic meaning yet. An artist confronts the challenge of making something artistically meaningful with…

We are so much Hegelians with regard to art. I can bring this out by arguing that our interest in art is little more than a category mistake. Sure, people sometimes make interesting, or beautiful pictures. So what? Why put them in a museum? We could rightly ask this rhetorical question with regard to old…

Three conceptions of culture Culture can be conceived of as1. a set of products (works of art, our cultural heritage)2. a set of processes (sports, art policy), or, lastly, 3. as an activity. The sequence of these three conceptions is conform our common sense views. In reality the activity founds the processes, and these produce…

Architectuur doet zichzelf tekort als ze kunst wil zijn, en, trouwens, kunst die zich als architectuur wil gedragen ook. In onze pogingen om design en architectuur als kunstvormen te beschouwen zijn er slechts verliezers. Architectuur als de laagste der kunstvormen beschouwen omdat het zich met steen, de meest inerte, minst door interne beweging bestierde elementen…

One of the moral values of art appreciation (according to Eaton) is that it teaches us about narrative coherence, but: Is a human life coherent? When would one say of a human life that it is incoherent? In short: how exactly is artistic (narrative) coherence going to teach us a lesson about our lives? In…