And Yet: A Kantian Analysis of Aesthetic Interest
Sidney Axinn
Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. 25, No. 1. (Sep., 1964), pp. 108-116.
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AND YET: A KANTIAN ANALYSIS OF AESTHETIC INTEREST
This paper develops a speculation on the psychological nature of the
interest in a work of art.1 The position starts with Kant's analysis of
human nature, and his distinction between the objectives of individuals
and of mankind. By "Kantian" I mean that some of Kant's ideas are
taken out of context and used for my purposes. This is not a complete
exposition of Kant's own theories, but an effort to call attention to some-
thing overlooked in his position. The second object is to explain certain
common techniques for creating aesthetic interest and some properties
of the aesthetic moment.
I. A Definition of Man
Let us explore the consequences of assuming that man, considered
distributively, has contradictory intentions as his fixed nature. More
exactly, man is taken to be an individual who has some intention for
the contradictory of whatever objective he wants. (Of course, contradic-
tion is a relationship between sentences: we call objectives contradictory
if the sentences describing them are contradictory.) The Kantian pedigree
for this view of man's nature is found in various stages in Kant's work
on history,2 ethics,s and religion.4 One of the special properties of
aesthetic interest can be seen as a consequence of this definition of man.
In addition to having contradictory intentions as their essential nature,
let us assume that humans know themselves to have contradictory inten-
tions! Consider the spectacle that such individuals present to themselves.
The author would like to express his thanks to the audience and the other
speakers at the Aesthetics Section of the American Philosophical Association
meeting in December, 1961, at Atlantic City. An earlier version of this paper was
presented and benefited by the response of Dr. A. Tymieniecka, the commentator,
and others present.
In "Idea for a Universal History on a Cosmo-Political Plan," Fourth Propo-
sition. Also in the Critique of Judgment, 83.
Foundations o f the Metaphysics o f Morals.
In the first two books of Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone.
They see something that is apparently trying to move in opposite direc-
tions; and yet, this entity does seem to have coherence. It is this spectacle
that, by analogy, is projected in a successful art work: the spectacle of
a single entity that suggests an interest in contradictory directions, and
yet does not lose its impression of unity.
If we temporarily ignore the first Critique and the more familiar for-
mulation of his ethics, and instead follow the consequences of Kant's
analysis of human nature in other places, we find ourselves with a per-
fectly good explication of his concept of a "purposeless purpose." Kant
again and again uses the phrase "and yet" at critical points in his ethics
and religion (Und doch, doch zugleich, are liberally sprinkled in almost
every section). Not merely a stylistic fixity, it is Kant's position that man
has contradictory principles in him: reason and sensuousness, the cate-
gorical imperative and personal greed. I will briefly mention a few pas-
sages from his book on religion. (Page references are to Religion Within
the Limits of Reason Alone, Greene and Hudson trans., Harper, 1960.
The emphasis is mine.) Kant says that man, "despite a corrupted heart
yet possesses a good will" (p. 39). In another section, "Our reason com-
mands us potently, yet without making either promises or threats . . . ."
(p. 44). Still later, he holds that the only way that man can frame a
concept of a moral disposition is by "picturing it as encompassed by
obstacles, and yet, in the face of the fiercest onslaughts, victorious"
(p. 55), "The idea d the highest good. . . c m o t be realized by man
himself . . . yet he discovers within himself the duty to work for this end"
(p. 130). The use of "and yet" is no mere coincidence or accident of the
translations. It occurs at dozens of critical points, and it is usually
essential to the thought.
The conception of man as a creature who1 has contradictory intentions
is not Kant's private property; it can be found throughout the history of
philosophy from Plato's image of the horses in the Phaedrus to Schopen-
hauer and Freud. In Kant the idea seems to have the most general for-
mulation. Perhaps just one point of contrast with Aristo.tle should be
mentioned. Aristotle also takes individual man to have both rational and
irrational "elements" in his soul, but he takes the rational element to
be the essentially dominant part.5 In Kant's position the contradictory
tendencies are equally essential parts of the nature of the individual.
From Kant's viewpoint, individuals participate in the history of man-
kind, the pursuit of a rational universe. One is a member of mankind,
and yet he is also a particular person, a combination of humanity and
5 ". . .the irrational element is in some sense persuaded by a rational prin-
ciple. .." Nichomachean Ethics, I , 1103a.
personality. Individuals are continually torn between their personal in-
terest in pleasure and their human interest in mankind's rational progress.
Kant asserts this in many places, (e.g., Critique of Judgment, #83).
Because the individual has inconsistent dispositions, it is impossible for
him to be satisfied. To be free of conflict is to be dead. Therefore, Kant
challenged his reader to imagine a human who is happy over a con-
siderable period of time. Individuals are both social and unsocial; they
have both egoistic and moral drives; they wish to promote the advance
of morality, and yet wish to satisfy only their own sensuous inclinations.
This is the "one-many predicament" in which the individual finds him-
self.
11. Aesthetic Interest and Its Techniques
Art works. are efforts to objectify the individual's one-many predica-
ment. One may agree with Aristotle's view that art imitates nature,
providing one adds that the nature imitated is the psychological and
metaphysical nature of the individual. Following Freud, the child/parent,
child/family, and the individual/species relationships are each variations
of the human onemany predicament. Art provides a way of thinking
about such patterns without the immediacy that would cause guilt or
confusion. An individual is a partial repetition of his parents; art objects
permit one to study examples of similar repetitions impersonally. Freud
alone takes us this far, but by generalizing within Kant's framework, we
find a basis for understanding the aesthetic appeal of a wide variety of
devices. The interest in objects that are reflected in water may be
explained in terms of our interest in seeing two things that are almost
but not quite the same. The tree on the shore has some obvious priority
over the tree in the water; the image in the water is both the same and
yet clearly not the same. The same psychological factors develop the
interest in contrapposto in sculpture, in steps, in fire, smoke, in a play
within a play, in the devices of poetry such as rhyme, alliteration, equiv-
ocation, rhythm, and the refrain. A stairway consists of a series of steps
each essentially the same size, and yet each a little further along on some
scale. Smoke consists of something that is both material and yet not quite
material. The interest in fire is, among other things, the interest in some-
that is both very dramatically existing and yet continually changing (kill-
ing) itself and already nothing. Kant mentions "the changing shapes of
a fire on the hearth or of a rippling brook. . ." (Critique of Judgment,
#22, Bernard translation, Hafner, New York, 1951, p. 81). In a play,
we find ourselves watching something that is happening and yet not
really happening. In a play within a play, we add to this the chance to
watch people who are in the same position; that is, they are both aware
and yet not aware that the play before them is real. When we find two
words that rhyme, we find two things that are the same and yet clearly
not the same. In alliteration, we again find words that are in one sense
the same and yet in another sense not. To find two lines of a poem that
rhyme is to find two things that are clearly different in one way and yet
the same in another. The root of the interest in these devices is in the
notion of the contradictory nature of the individual and his interest in
objectifying (projecting) this nature in a way that preserves its dignity.
These examples are taken from the stock devices of the history of art.
I'm ignoring a host of questions about the effectiveness with which the
devices may be used and the fatigue and boredom that follows some
repetition but not others. My point is that here is a special kind of in-
terest in what I am calling the "and yet" situation. This is a situation in
which we find ourselves drawn toward a pair of somewhat different
aspects of the same entity. For example, it may add to the interest of
an object if we see it against strong back-lighting because the eye is
drawn toward both the object and the light behind it. Again, the molding
at the top of the wall gives us a chance to follow two paths, two patterns
that are alike and yet not quite. Where we would have had only one
line, formed by the wall and the ceiling, the molding gives us at least
two lines, somewhat different. The argument here is that to have aesthetic
interest something must both be and yet not be quite what it seems.
Easel painting itself is an art in which the surface is known to be two-
dimensional and yet may be employed to seem three-dimensional. We
have an example of the same kind of interest in a highly polished surface
that reflects something else; and yet we know that it's only a reflection.
The appeal of water, again, is that it is both a substance and not a solid
substance. Myths do and yet do not portray reality, and this seems to
be known to the audience if they are successful as myths. For other
examples, we might mention the Aphrodite (in the Metropolitan) that is
obviously hard stone, and yet seems to be soft flesh. Also, the architeo
turd technique of a stone column that shows "sag" and yet obviously
hasn't sagged in centuries.
Some of the special charm of poetry consists in the sheer fact of its
condensation. It may carry a large meaning in a small space. . . a pro-
jection of the hope of significance for finite man. The same kind of thing
seems to be involved in the appreciation of simplicity in other areas, for
example, in mathematical elegance. Visual arts occasionally gain special
appeal on just this score. In miniatures, an extremely small object can
express vastness. For example, Jan Van Eyck's "Saint Francis Receiving
the Stigmata," is a mere five inches in height, yet it includes in a small
part of its area a wide distant landscape. Kant explains that in the
112 PHILOSOPHY RESEARCHAND PHENOMENOLOGICAL
sublime we find "boundlessness is represented, and yet its totality is also
present to thought" (Critique of Judgment, gz2.3). Of course, the most
typical human activity, work, is quite clearly an example of conflicting
objectives. It seems to be both the bane of life and the only source of
satisfaction; theologically, both punishment by God and yet collabora-
tion with God.
To repeat, the argument is that: 1) man is an animal that pursues
conflicting objectives; 2) man is, consciously or not, aware of his contra-
dictory nature; 3) anything analogous (isomolt-phic?) to man's nature may
become a convenient and interesting projection of it; 4) aesthetic interest
is the interest humans find in examples of unified conflict, the "and yet"
situation.
Perhaps "no man can serve two mastors . . . ." Certainly one cannot
succeed in serving two masters, should they conflict. However, if the
masters are the conflicting goals of human nature, one can't be satisfied
without trying to serve two1 masters. The reward for trying is human
dignity, but not success. Morally considered, the two masters are the
individual and mankind. The poht to see for Kant is that it is necessary
to try but almost impossible for anyone to succeed in being moral. The
one-many predicament can't be solved but it can be formulated imper-
sonally in art, permitting us to study variations of part/whole relation-
ships without committing ourselves to any specific relationship to our
parents, children, or group.
111. Commercial Art?
If the previous sections are well-taken, it is impossible to have art
genuinely integrated with an advertising or propaganda objective. "Com-
mercial" refers to a well-defined objective; "Art" to an objectless
moment, a "purposeless purpose." Art, then, is an essentially hesitant
(therefore tragic) pose. It can hardly be made to express a single con-
sistent message. In a portrait even the facial features may be in conflict;
the eyes may look undecided and yet the mouth and jaw may look set.
In Holbein's "Sir Brian Tuke" (Hans Holbein the Younger, Painting 65,
National Gallery, Washington, D. C.), we have a portrait of a man with
his hands tightly clenched, holding something, and with a faraway look
on his face. His eyes are looking off into the distance, apparently only
concerned with the future, and yet his hands show us that he is also at
the same time very much concerned with the immediate moment. Are
the hands and face part of the same man? The interest in the painting
comes from the conviction that these are indeed parts of the same man,
that he is caught at a moment in which he is concerned with contra-
dictory plans.. . to ignore the present and again not to ignore the
present. Rembrandt's "A Woman Weeping" shows us someone in the
moment in which she has almost but not quite managed to stop crying.
In the sculpture of "The Prisoner" by J. Greenberg, one finds an indi-
vidual presented at just the moment in which he turns as if to try to
stand up again against the bonds that are holding him and yet at the
same time has just realized that it is useless to try again. One gets the
sense of both contradictory intentions.
If the previous examples are at all general, the techniques necessary
for the unity of propaganda must fail aesthetically. A typical advertiser
who wants to show a young lady chewing gum and looking as if chewing
gum is the one and only objective in life, ordinarily chooses a cartoon,
rather than a photograph of a young lady. No actual young lady can
look as if her only objective is chewing gum and still look human. In a
photograph or a drawing with "aesthetic interest," the y oug lady must
look as if she both wants to continue chewiug that gum and also realizes
at the same time that there are other and perhaps better things to do.
Another example is a recent drawing of a young couple leaving the
church in whish they were just married, and the slogan underneath reads,
"And they lived happily ever after with Standard Brands." Only puppets
could look as if their only objective at this point was to make sound
investments. Actual humans, or drawings with aesthetic interest, must
show some conflict over their next move. To have only one objective is
to be either a machine or a monster. The commercial artists do manage
to hold our aesthetic interest occasionally by devices such as the drawing
of a young lady in a typical soft-drink advertisement that seems to show
us an individual who would much prefer an alcoholic beverage. On the
adjacent billboard, we may see a drawing of a prim and prudent young
lady holding a glass of beer and yet looking as if she'd prefer a soft
drink.
IV. The Aesthetic Moment
The aesthetic moment or mood is assumed to be the moment in which
one both wants something to continue because it gives him pleasure; and
yet feels that it must not continue because it is irrational. Kant says that
there are situations in which ". . . the mind is not merely attracted by
the object but is ever being alternately repelled, the satisfaction in the
sublime does not so much involve a positive pleasure as admiration or
respect, which rather deserves to be called negative pleasure" (Critique
114 PHILOSOPHY RESEARCHAND PHENOMENOLOGICAL
of Judgment,#23). Of course, for many works, there may be no such
single moment. As a familiar example, consider Tennyson's poem, "The
Charge of the Light Brigade." There is a moment in which the reader
feels both the pleasure in the unquestioning obedience of soldiers and
would like absolute military obedience to continue because of the pleas-
ure in contemplating it; and yet, at the same time, feels that it is in-
human and irrational to have unquestioning obedience and that the
entire circumstance rationally must not be allowed to be repeated. The
moment at which one feels both the pleasure in the obedience and the
irrationally of the circumstance is the aesthetic moment.
Lest this sound out of place in a Kantian speculation, remember
Kant's view that "Even in the most highly civilized state this peculiar
veneration for the soldier remains . . . because . . . it is recognized that
his mind is unsubdued by danger. . . . In the comparison of a stateman
and a general, the aesthetical judgment decides for the latter. War itself,
if it is carried on with order and with a sacred respect for the rights of
citizens, has something sublime in it . . ." (Critique of Judgment,#28).
(What a recruiting sergeant Kant would make!) The pyramids in Egypt
can produce an aesthetic moment of this sort when one feels the force
of the objective of eternal life, and yet the irrationality of that goal for
man. A Greek statue of an athlete, a woman, or a god that is a perfect
example of the type can provide such a moment when one agrees that
perfection of type is the all-encompassing human objective; and yet, that
perfection of type is a trivial objective. A Roman aquaduct as a symbol
of civic virtue and a medieval cathedral as a symbol of anolther world
can each provide us with a moment in which we agree that we are faced
by an example of the proper human ideal; and yet we find ourselves
disillusioned with it.6 The Renaissance version of individualism has left
us with portrait painting that again makes us feel both the pleasure in
pursuing individuality and the futility of such pursuit. In contemporary
art, we are presented with materials that give us pleasure by themselves
alone; and yet, at the moment in which we feel that texture, color or
form
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