Summary: Lectures on Aesthetics (page 5)

The desiring subject is not free either, as he remains a prisoner of his own desires and does not determine himself according to the universality and rationality of his will. He remains dependent on the object of his desire.

As a result, in desire, both the freedom of the desiring subject and that of the desired object vanish.

This is not the nature of our relationship with a work of art when we contemplate it. We allow it to exist freely, as an object in itself, and we engage with it without desire ¹.

From this, we see that our relationship to the work of art transcends the realm of mere sensibility. Its purpose is to satisfy only spiritual interests and to expel all desire ².

Although a work of art appears to us through our faculty of sensation, it is ultimately addressed to our intellect. Unlike desire, which seeks to consume things in their singularity, intellect seeks to understand them in their universality, to conceive them according to their concept ³.

However, it is science that ultimately fulfils this intellectual pursuit. In science, we truly attain the universal, the law, and thought. In art, by contrast, we remain engaged with the object in its singular existence and do not transform it into universal thought and concept ⁴.

Hegel can therefore propose his own conception of the relationship between the work of art and human sensibility. In art, thought seeks neither the pure sensuousness of desire nor the pure abstraction of science. Rather, it seeks a spiritualised sensuousness:What art desires is a sensuous presence freed from the constraints of mere materiality ⁵.

As a result, art appears as a middle ground: The work of art lies between immediate sensibility and ideal thought, and the sensuous in art is elevated to mere appearance ⁶.

Smell, taste, and touch cannot provide aesthetic enjoyment, since this enjoyment cannot be purely sensuous, insofar as these senses relate solely to materiality as such ⁷.

3. Art as an end in itself

Finally, Hegel examines the third aspect of the definition, which holds that art has no purpose beyond itself. What, then, is the true purpose of the work of art?

Is it the imitation of nature, as in the traditional conception? Should a work of art strive to imitate nature as closely as possible? Hegel refers to the famous anecdote of the grapes painted by Zeuxis, so realistically rendered that doves attempted to peck at them.

However, such an endeavour is both futile and impossible. From this perspective, art will always lag behind nature: it can never rival nature, and in attempting to do so, it resembles nothing more than a worm crawling behind an elephant ⁸.

He who merely imitates nature well is not a genius, but merely clever. For Hegel, this is not a particularly estimable quality:

The abstract competition of imitation must be placed on the same level as the skill of the man who had learned to throw lentils through a small opening without fail. He presented himself to Alexander with this prowess, and Alexander, in recognition of this art devoid of utility and substance, rewarded him with a bushel of lentils ⁹.

Imitation can produce works of skill, but not true works of art.

Moreover, some forms of art, such as architecture and poetry, are not confined to mere imitation.

Hegel examines other possible purposes of art.

Could it be the awakening of all our emotions? If so, art should embody Terence’s well-known dictum: Nothing human is foreign to me, ¹⁰ presenting us with the full range of emotions and representations that reside within the human mind.

However, if this were the case, art would be reduced to an empty form, open to all possible types of content and subject matter ¹¹.

¹ p.92
² ibid.
³ ibid.
⁴ p.93
⁵ ibid.
⁶ p.94
⁷ ibid.
⁸ p.99
⁹ p.100
¹⁰ Heauton Timorumenos, I, i, 25
¹¹ p.104