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Philosophy Essays | Is beauty sublime or oppressive?

The aesthetic judgement we make when we label something ‘beautiful’ could easily be categorised as a declaration of personal taste. Therefore when one states ‘this Monet is beautiful’ one could be interpreted as meaning ‘I find in myself an attraction toward that Monet’. Notably under this description one is not identifying anything within the work of art itself but rather in oneself and of one’s aesthetic responses and this configuration openly allows for people’s ostensible differences in taste. However there has been a trend in western philosophy and hence in western contemporary culture to insist that there is actually something within the ‘beautiful’ object itself which makes it so and that this is therefore not simply a judgement of taste. Some have chosen to describe beauty as ‘sublime’ meaning that it is great beyond all comparison and being beyond comparison cannot be understood in terms of anything else. It can only be known in itself and external factors, such as taste have no bearing upon it.

This however gives rise to the question on who’s authority do we choose our Platonic form of what is beautiful, for as Hume points out even ‘men of the most refined knowledge are able to remark on a difference of taste in the narrow circle of there acquaintance’ [1] There is a philosophical and social concern that once a standard of beauty has been raised, that which does not comply cannot be worthy of appreciation. In fact there are those who suspect, not without reason that the ‘sublime’ is an invention of those that wish to subjugate others to there personal preferences. Among these accusers have been the Dada art movement as well as modern feminism who have deliberately attacked and rejected their societies’ ‘laws’ of beauty. If these suspicions were upheld and the concept of beauty were nothing more than the elitist sentiments of the few, imposed upon the many then beauty could indeed be better categorised as oppressive than sublime

When the eighteenth century philosopher, Immanuel Kant delineated what he meant by the ‘sublime’ he acknowledged it as being founded in pleasure and displeasure. However he was quick to distinguish it from the type of sensory gratification that we share with animals or from the rational interest we might show in perceiving something’s objective worth. He conceived the sublime instead as being the way in which something manifests itself as an ends in itself. It may be argued that Kant has needlessly mystified and complicated a simple matter of taste or accounted for his own aesthetic responses in an overly elaborate fashion.

However by metaphysically detaching beauty from taste Kant is able to claim ‘when someone calls something beautiful he judges not only for himself but for all men and . . . demands . . . agreement of them’ [2]. This is the sense in which a universal standard is being raised and one can see simply from Kant’s language how this may oppress the opinions and responses of others.He is however by no means alone in his assertions that beauty is a distinct and untouchable entity, Schopenhauer can be seen to be arguing along similar lines when he talks of original artistic knowledge as being ‘entirely separate and independent of the will’[3] and indeed an entire aesthetic tradition has succeeded to Kant’s assertions. There have however been some very valid objections.

Feminist writer Naomi Wolf certainly takes issue with these sentiments. In direct opposition to Kant she claims that it is a deliberately constructed myth that ‘the quality called “beauty” objectively and universally exists (however, she laments that) women want to embody it [4] and men to possess women who embody it’ Wolf goes on to claim that the standard image of female beauty is being used as a political tool to beat back the advances of feminism. She points to this phenomenon as the latest stage in man’s domination of woman. The feminist revolutions of the past decades, have, according to Wolf, finally dispelled the myth of woman’s domesticity only to find that ‘the beauty myth’ has risen in its place to suppress women. Says Wolf, ‘the gaunt model has supplanted the happy house-wife as the arbiter of successful womanhood’[5] placing immense pressure on women to conform. Wolf cites that a survey of American women revealed that more would wish to lose 10-15lbs than achieve any other life goal. Such is the extent to which the ‘model’ has a grip on the women’s psyche. Add to this the exponential rise in eating disorders since the feminist revolutions and Wolf’s conspiracy theory starts to gain credibility.

Leo Tolstoy may lend support to Wolf’s project in that he refutes Kant and Schopenhauer’s insistence that beauty is in isolation from all other considerations and instead points out the pain and suffering that artists endure to produce their work. As well as the differing amounts of government expenditure that is afforded to the arts. Tolstoy notes that art and beauty do have a value which contrary to Kant et al’s position can be weighed up against other considerations, suggesting that they are not sublime because they are comparable to other entities.[6]

Just as Wolf urges women of the modern era to reject the ‘laws’ of beauty that she feels have been imposed upon them, so did the artists of the dada movement try to attack what they saw as the oppression of art by the prejudices of the elite. Artists such as Francis Picabia and Jean Arp deliberately snubbed conventions of the beautiful artistic form. That their work inspired an entirely new movement in art (surrealism) and found appreciation despite supposedly breaking the laws of beauty is perhaps suggestive that beauty may not have a set of definable and universal criteria.

There is plenty of evidence to suggest that conceptions of ‘beauty’ can be oppressive. Wolf identified many and the artists of the Dada movement certainly felt they had to take a stand against it. It leaves the question open; who is the oppressor? Is it men? As Wolf claims or are institutions such as the media and the fashion industry to blame as suggested by S Bordo[7] Hume suggests that ‘few are qualified to give judgement on any work of art or establish their own sentiment as the standard of beauty’[8] however it seems as if this may be what has happened and the many are indeed being oppressed by the tastes of the few. Says Hume ‘Beauty is no quality in things themselves it exists merely in the mind which contemplates them; and each mind perceives a different beauty’. [9]

It is arguable that Kant and Schopenhauer have mystified there own subjective tastes and that therefore the concept of sublime beauty is a ‘phantom’ used to oppress those who may not wish to conform.

1. Hume D. – On the standard of taste- reproduced in Western Philosophy; an anthology, ed. Cottingham J. – Blackwell (1996) p549[Return]
2. Kant I. – Critique of judgement- reproduced in Western Philosophy; an anthology, ed. Cottingham J. – Blackwell (1996) p560[Return]
3. Schopenhauer A. - On aesthetics- reproduced in Western Philosophy; an anthology, ed. Cottingham J. – Blackwell (1996) p563[Return]
4. Wolf N.- The Beauty Myth- Vintage (1991) p12[Return]
5. ibid p10[Return]
6. Tolstoy L. – What is art?- reproduced in Western Philosophy; an anthology, ed. Cottingham J. – Blackwell (1996) p570[Return]
7. Bordo S- Unbearable Weight- University of California Press (1993)[Return]
8. Hume D. – On the standard of taste- reproduced in Western Philosophy; an anthology, ed. Cottingham J. – Blackwell (1996) p550[Return]
9. ibid[Return]

• BIBLIOGRAPHY:
  
• Lyas C. – Aesthetics-UCL press (1997)
• Hume D. – On the standard of taste- reproduced in Western Philosophy; an anthology, ed. Cottingham J. – Blackwell (1996)
• Kant I. – Critique of judgement- reproduced in Western Philosophy; an anthology, ed. Cottingham J. – Blackwell (1996)
• Schopenhauer A. - On aesthetics- reproduced in Western Philosophy; an anthology, ed. Cottingham J. – Blackwell (1996)
• Tolstoy L. – What is art? - reproduced in Western Philosophy; an anthology, ed. Cottingham J. – Blackwell (1996)
• Wolf N. - The Beauty Myth- Vintage (1991)
• Bordo S- Unbearable Weight- University of California Press (1993)