Alice Ramos - Hunger for Beauty

Alice Ramos in "Hunger for Beauty" at MercatorNet, wants to see art return to the concept of beauty, something that seems to be missing in the contemporary scene. She feels that art has lost its relationship with the "true and the good," and that it must return to those roots.

Here is one key quote with which I agree completely:

Although it is difficult to explain, there is a relationship between beauty and the mind; one of the features of the beautiful is clarity, light, or luminosity, and of course the mind seeks light, it seeks clarity, and when the mind reaches that clarity it experiences the joy of understanding. That’s why, I think, when we go to certain museums or concert halls we experience a kind of “high,” in the sense that we seem to be living at an optimal state, a state in harmony with our nature as intellectual beings. True art, the beauty it manifests, creates within us a kind of equilibrium whereby we are, so to speak, renewed. Hence, the importance of beauty and the arts for work–they energize and inspire us.

Here, then in the interview with Alice Ramos.

Hunger for beauty

Enough of 'art for art's sake'. Let's have some art for the sake of humanity, truth and goodness.

The great literary artist Dostoevsky once wrote that beauty would save the world. That may be truer than ever today, says philosophy professor Alice Ramos, because, while many people have given up on truth and goodness, they remain fascinated by beauty, even if it is only the cosmetic attractiveness of movie stars. This means, she told an audience in Rome, “that beauty may be a privileged route to both the true and the good, and thus that art could be of singular importance in helping the modern world”. In this interview with MercatorNet, Professor Ramos explains how art lost its classical relationship with the true and the good, and how important it is for artists to make those connections again.

*****

MercatorNet: You are a philosopher with a deep interest in aesthetics. Forgive me for sounding like a philistine, but aesthetics is one of those rarified fields which puts my head in a spin. What is it all about?

Alice Ramos: The word aesthetics comes from the Greek aisthesis which means sensation, perception. Aesthetics as a philosophy refers to sensible knowledge and the perception of the beautiful. It has as its object the study of beauty and especially the study of art. In classical and medieval thought aesthetics was not an independent discipline but rather formed part of metaphysics, the philosophy that deals with all of reality, with being. Philosophers were interested in beauty as an aspect or property of reality; they were also interested in art, especially the production of art. This is clear for example in Aristotle’s Poetics, which is undoubtedly the most influential work on art. Both Aristotle and Plato recognized the influence of the arts on a person’s moral character.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn thought that in our time beauty would be called to soar to the place once occupied by truth and goodness and thereby 'complete the work of all three'.

Aesthetics as an autonomous philosophical discipline is actually a product of modern thought. The German philosopher Baumgarten in his work entitled Aesthetics, which dates from 1750, is the first one to use the term aesthetics to refer to a specific body of knowledge which attempts to give an account of the perception of the beautiful. There are also other German philosophers whose influence has been remarkable in the field of aesthetics: Kant’s work on the aesthetic judgment, and Hegel’s lectures on philosophy of art. In postmodern times we have almost witnessed the demise of aesthetics, the death of art and of beauty, but at present there is a renewed interest in aesthetics. Beginning in the early 1970s the humanities in particular were being studied under the lens of deconstructionist, psychoanalytical, and political theories and were as a result being emptied of beauty.

Judging from the number of conferences and publications on beauty and aesthetics in the last ten years, I think we’re witnessing a renaissance of beauty in academic circles. Perhaps the waning interest in truth propositions and in moral rules has given rise to the hunger for beauty. Perhaps, too, through aesthetics and a reflection on the beautiful we may find a new route toward the recovery of truth and morality. Alexander Solzhenitsyn thought that in our time beauty would be called to soar to the place once occupied by truth and goodness and thereby “complete the work of all three.”

MercatorNet: I can see the need for truth and for morality. But we can live without beauty and art, can't we? Plenty of people seem happy with a diet of American Idol and reruns of The Simpsons.

Alice Ramos: I would say that we really can’t live without beauty, that just as the human person by nature desires to know, to attain truth, the human person also desires the beautiful. A perennial thinker such as Thomas Aquinas speaks of beauty as principally pertaining to the life of the mind, to understanding or contemplative activity. Just as knowing the truth brings us joy, so do we take delight in the contemplation of the beautiful. Who has not experienced more than just a sensible delight in seeing the Sistine Chapel of Michelangelo, or the magnificent sculptures of Rodin, or in hearing Andrea Bocelli sing sacred arias? True art speaks not only to the senses but also to the mind; it elevates us in such a way that we transcend corporeal existence, or that through the sensible–the exquisiteness of the colors or the sounds–an intelligible or spiritual realm is unveiled to us such that we acquire a new access to the truth of things and of our very selves.

Unfortunately, in our culture we seem to be fixated on a superficial beauty, on sensible beauty, on cosmetic beauty.

Although it is difficult to explain, there is a relationship between beauty and the mind; one of the features of the beautiful is clarity, light, or luminosity, and of course the mind seeks light, it seeks clarity, and when the mind reaches that clarity it experiences the joy of understanding. That’s why, I think, when we go to certain museums or concert halls we experience a kind of “high,” in the sense that we seem to be living at an optimal state, a state in harmony with our nature as intellectual beings. True art, the beauty it manifests, creates within us a kind of equilibrium whereby we are, so to speak, renewed. Hence, the importance of beauty and the arts for work–they energize and inspire us.

Unfortunately, in our culture we seem to be fixated on a superficial beauty, on sensible beauty, on cosmetic beauty. There is a veritable cult of beauty as evidenced by “extreme makeover” shows in the United States, by the recourse to cosmetic surgery both among the young and the not so young. And yet, as we all know, such beauty is fleeting, ephemeral; perhaps our taste for this type of beauty is an indication of the nihilistic philosophy which pervades so much of our culture. By saying this I don’t mean to suggest that sensible, external beauty is not important, that we shouldn’t care about our looks; self-image is important and we should want to present a pleasing appearance to others, but out of respect for them and not out of vanity or sheer egotism.

I think the cult of beauty that I’m speaking of encloses the person in him or herself and therefore does not allow the person to experience other dimensions of beauty such as the beauty of self-sacrifice, the intrinsic beauty of persons that radiates from their virtuous living, from their dedication to an ideal greater than themselves. Examples of such beauty abound in history, but one has only to think of the recent figures of Mother Teresa or John Paul II. Because beauty in its many forms does delight us, I think it’s important for us to examine what type of beauty we’re attracted to, what types of things delight us. Thomas Aquinas in his wisdom saw clearly that the human person cannot do without delight and that when the person is deprived of spiritual joys then carnal delight will take their place. Perhaps this is the reason for the contemporary cult of beauty that I’ve spoken of, and also the reason for much of the sadness and despair that has invaded human life. If this is so, and I do think it is, then we are in dire need of recovering the spiritual dimension of beauty.

Go read the whole interview.

Tags: Alice Ramos, Hunger for Beauty, the true, the good, Art, Philosophy, culture, Mercatornet, art for art's sake, aesthetics