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Here are some discussion questions about Berleant's thoughts on evironmental a ideas on envrionemental sensibility.

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Please post a response to one of the questions on the wall. Response should be pithy (500 words). These questions are like essay or discssion prompts.  They can be like this, in a text, or in an attachment, like this. One post per person on each Padlet page.

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Do you prefer the 'older' theory of aesthetics which focuses more on the art as an object, natural beauty etc. or the one that requires a multi-sensory perceptual engagement and expands to other dimensions and values such as the environment, everyday experiences etc. Why the one over the other?

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Do you prefer the 'older' theory of aesthetics which focuses more on the art as an object, natural beauty etc. or the one that requires a multi-sensory perceptual engagement and expands to other dimensions and values such as the environment, everyday experiences etc. Why the one over the other?

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Stefan-Octavian Eremia
I much prefer the “new aesthetics” approach because it seems to be a more holistic one since it doesn’t arbitrarily limit the discourse to only a few perspectives. We’ve learned quite a bit about art during these three years and one of the overarching points has been related to how perception about what art is and what art can be and do changes constantly. The more our knowledge and awareness of the natural and human world around us increases, the more vast, varied and diverse what is considered art has become. Limiting the scope of an endeavor can prove fruitful when one is interested in achieving a very clear and set technical goal however, when that goal is artistic expression, one cannot limit one’s considerations to only some segments of it, because one is part of an entire art world and they can be indirectly and subconsciously influenced by things that they - the artist - will not be aware of. I think at least a part of society has become more aware of our embodied, physical, sensorial existence paradoxically, thanks to our increased use of digital media. Even though we consider virtual products and objects to be as “real” as something is in the physical world - and some of us “live” most of our lives online - this has the effect of accentuating the importance and “other realness” of the actual IRL space. Obviously this isn’t something generally applicable nor am I saying that one approach is superior to the other, I’m just saying that this newer aesthetic seems to take more factors into consideration when analyzing things and that’s rarely a bad thing.

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Q: What is the difference between philosophy and theory?
How can philosophy be used in report writing for
example?

A: Philosophy is an ideology, a belief created through experience or researched on a specific topic and the researcher gets his own philosophy of the subject. It is the study of fundamental knowledge, reality, existence or it is a theory or attitude that acts as a principle for behavior in a guiding fashion.

Theory is a set of principles on which a practice or project is based upon, or an idea to account for a situation or used to justify a course of action

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Berleant mentions:"perceptual experience having positive and negative values" - what are these values and how and why are they positive and negative?

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Berleant mentions:"perceptual experience having positive and negative values" - what are these values and how and why are they positive and negative?

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As far as I understand it, traditional aesthetics focuses on things that are beautiful such as art and nature and the 'positive' aspects that they present.  However, as the 'range' of aesthetics grows to include a much wider palette (including environmental aesthetics for instance), we must also look at aesthetics that are 'negative' or can be seen as negative for some people.  As an example, I think of a horror movie that contains aesthetics of fear, violence, decay etc.  Here we can say that a horror movie has aesthetics specific to that genre that are often 'negative' or may produce negative feelings or experience in the viewer.

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If a certain environmental aesthetic, such as an 'ugly' concrete building, provides a 'negative' perception, does the aesthetic change when the beauty of concrete is realized?      

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If a certain environmental aesthetic, such as an 'ugly' concrete building, provides a 'negative' perception, does the aesthetic change when the beauty of concrete is realized?      

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Katja: I find two aspects to consider; Aalborg has a lot of concrete involved in their newer buildings and e.g., the harbor area in Aalborg has this urban environment which is unifying the aesthetics of nature and complimenting the (currently) urban environment with concrete buildings. This area seems popular as people enjoy spending time in these areas. However, that might not be the case for every person. The aesthetics must function as of being useful while it needs to be somewhat symbolic for the people involved, e.g., a modern society, a society which keeps improving and maintain a certain aesthetic and represents its citizens. Perhaps, time and culture mixed also influence what people will perceive as aesthetic of concrete buildings. Another aspect, the older and perhaps abandoned concrete buildings can seem to be a symbol of neglect and can be a “sore eye” for the urban environment. But it can also be a symbol of a rich history of a city.

I think that already there is some who will find concrete buildings beautiful while others might find them as otherwise – depending on the context. From my example of Aalborg harbor, it seems these concrete buildings already has been realized as beautiful – it has been designed and planned to fit with the rest of the environment. Meanwhile, there might be concrete buildings in other places which have been deemed as unfitting and must be changed – or the negative aesthetics is actually positive aesthetics. It depends on who is perceiving the concrete building and how they are perceiving it in the context. But otherwise yes; I would think that the aesthetics change when the beauty of concrete is realized.

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What happens with the environment when a work of art doesn’t exist in the physical world?

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What happens with the environment when a work of art doesn’t exist in the physical world?

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Brigita - What happens with the environment when a work of art doesn’t exist in the physical world per se - and doesn’t need to exist in a physical sense, that being at least part of the point behind it - say in the case of a fully digital work (VR, AR, video game)? I suppose you just need to analyze the artwork a bit differently if it is a fully digital work. But the way I understand it nothing happens to the environment. Berleant writes that “Perception of the built environment is through multi-sensory engagement. Such aesthetic engagement transforms our environmental perception of space, mass, density, force, and directionality” (pp.55) so that means that the environment can be built which is what happens most of the time using VR for example. And also, the same quote states that you need multi-sensory engagement which is provided in VR and also in other digital works. In my opinion the environment just gets altered a bit but in no way, it disappears or gets broken in any way. Berleant also, writes that environment involves a whole-body experience which in my understanding still can be found in digital works. For example, in VR you will have a whole-body experience because you will probably be able to move (if not with your body than with the control remotes or your eyes) and if your are a healthy person participating in VR experience after a while you might start feeling how difficult it is to stand or how heavy the goggles are, or you might be getting dizzy. You still be smelling things which might happened to be a scent of alcohol because the headset was cleaned before you put it on. This kind of questions reminds me of that big debate wheatear digital art can be art, and people just keep on finding reasons to make digital art creators feel small. In my opinion no mater the form everything can be art and, in this case, have an environment, just because it’s digital it does not mean that it is something lesser than physical work. Like Maurice Merleau-Ponty in Phenomenology of Perception wrote “the world is what we perceive.” (pp.73) and if we have a chance to experience digital work then we are capable to identify the environment of the work.

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Do you see any overlap between Böhme’s concept of atmosphere and Berleant’s discussion of environment?

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Do you see any overlap between Böhme’s concept of atmosphere and Berleant’s discussion of environment?

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Maria G-J:
In some ways yes and in others no. In my understanding, Böhme’s concept explains atmosphere as a feeling or a mood you can achieve where ever, when ever and it can consists of many things. Whereas Berleant discusses the concept of an environment, which is mostly seen as an area of some sort, that gives of some form of mood or feeling.  So both of them discusses the idea of where to gain this feeling, but in different aspects. Berleant focuses on place and space more than object and body. This is of course also something that can rather be discussed in a longer discussion, whether or not Berleant is not only given a simple example of Böhme´s concept, as Böhme in some ways are also including the atmosphere of an environment. “On entering a room con feel atmosphere”

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Berleant mentions: "perceptual experience having positive and negative values" - what are these values and how and why are they positive and negative?

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Berleant mentions: "perceptual experience having positive and negative values" - what are these values and how and why are they positive and negative?

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Vanda
I consider positive values to be something pleasing that you find about the experience as such. It is part of the aesthetics as a celebratory study of sensible experience, that type of aesthetics which we have known for our entire life, when you see aesthetics as something nice, beautiful, having these “positive values”. But this “new aesthetics” brings to the forefront negative values, too. It expanded to the full range of appreciative experience and became a descriptive study of sensible experience. So, these “negative values” give us more elements to discuss when considering the aesthetics of an experience.

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How can artists make use atmosphere according to Berleant?