Alex Deaconu

Subjective Universality of Aesthetic Presentations

PG Student: Alex Deaconu

Module Code: PY950-7-SP

Words: 3987

19.04.2015

Alex Deaconu

Kant’s main purpose in Analytic of Beauty is to disclose the conditions that

make judgments of taste possible. Pure aesthetic judgments, argues Kant, are not

cognitive judgments, thus they do not determine what is grasped as object of

experience. On the contrary the basis of judgments of taste is represented by the way

in which the subject responds to the presentation referred by the judgment. The

aesthetic response consists in a disinterested feeling of pleasure expressing the free

play of cognitive faculties: imagination and understanding. Since, following Kant’s

theory of knowledge, free play of imagination and understanding is a necessary

condition for cognition in general, then the aesthetic response is universal

communicable.

By claiming that an object X is beautiful the aesthetic judger requires that

everyone, having the same presentation, to have the same aesthetic response. In

consequence, it must be the case that everyone can present the object in the same way

as the one that makes the claim does. Since the aesthetic presentation of an object is

not determined by any concept, then no concept of beauty can determine the kind of

presentation that can occasion an aesthetic response. This means that there can be no

rule for how an aesthetic presentation ought to be. On the other hand it must be the

case that a presentation appearing beautiful to a judger, must be beautiful to any

judger, if aesthetic judgments are to be universally valid. If this is the case, are there

any definable conditions that a presentation of an object has to fulfil in order to be

worthy of aesthetic appreciation? Kant claims that only the form of objects is

universal communicable, thus if aesthetic presentation is to be universal accessible

then the aesthetic response must be occasioned only by the form of objects. This is the

main thesis of Kant’s formalism.

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I argue that if we accept Kant’s analysis of aesthetic response then we have to

accept that the free play of cognitive faculties is a response to the form of the object

and that the form is universally accessible. First I discuss the thesis of aesthetic

response is occasioned by the “form of purposiveness” exhibited by an object. Second

I analyse Kant’s claim that the aesthetic response can be occasioned only by the form

of objects. This thesis requires a separate discussion because, as I will show, the form

of purposiveness cannot impose any restriction on what determinations of a

presentation are aesthetically relevant. Third I discuss Guyer’s objection that the

universal communicability of aesthetic presentation cannot be granted on the basis of

universal communicability of the aesthetic response.

I

The relation of aesthetic presentations with judgments of taste is the theme of

the Third Moment of Analytic of Beauty. The first task Kant needs to fulfil is to show

how it is possible that a judgement can determine an existing individual. For example

in saying “this is an X”, what it means that X (for example a concept) determines that

which is present? In other words, how can be secured the relation between the

individual and the concept?

Although Kant does not address the problem precisely in these terms, he does

discuss, in section 10, the relation by which a concept determines an individual. He

calls this kind of relation purposiveness. The exemplary case in which we are

justified to determine an individual by a concept (make a judgment about their

relation) is when we know that the concept is the cause of the individual. In such a

case the individual fulfils a purpose the latter being defined by the considered

concept. Kant definition of purpose as “an object of a concept in so far as we regard

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this concept as the object’s cause (the real basis of its possibility)” and their relation

as “the causality that a concept has with regard to its object” (that is purposiveness)

suggests that he takes as exemplary, cases in which the existence of the individual is

informed by a concept; this is the case for example with every object produced by

humans1. The power of a concept to determine the existence of an object as purposive

resides in the faculty of will. Will then, “the power of desire, insofar as it can be

determined to act only by concepts”, can in-form the existence of an object in a

purposive way.2

However there are cases in which the existence of some objects “does not

necessarily presuppose the presentation of a purpose.”3 Even in this cases, claims

Kant, we call such objects purposive, because “we can explain and grasp them only if

we assume that they are based on a causality [that operates] according to purposes,

i.e., on a will that would have so arranged them in accordance with the presentation of

a certain rule.”4 Kant does not explain us why shall we call such objects purposive

instead of claiming that they lack any purpose but, what he seems to imply is that in

order to grasp something as meaningful we have to discover a certain regularity,

which the object exhibits; even if we are unable to bring its regularity (the form)

under a concept. Since we discover in such objects regularity rather than mere

“buzzing sensations” we grasp them as if they fulfil a purpose.

The previous quote makes clear why for Kant it is important to define the

relation of purposiveness as causality a concept has in regard to an object. He is not

interest to isolate a class of objects, say the ones produced by humans, he is rather

interested to highlight that we, as judging subjects, can make sense of something we

1 Something is a chair because is made to fulfil a certain purpose.2 Kant, I., “Critique of Judgment”, Trans. Pluhar, W. S., (Hackett: 1987), p.142 [220]3 Idem4 Idem

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grasp only if we can discover some regularity exhibited by the individual we

encounter. Because of this we can explain something we grasp “only if we assume

they are based on a causality [that operates] according to purposes.” Such objects

exhibit purposiveness without purpose.

Once the relation between an individual and the concept determining it has been

established as relation of purposiveness, Kant moves on to determine the kind of

purpose that grounds judgments of taste.

There are two kinds of purposes, claims Kant, subjective and objective. In the first

case, to regard something as purposive is to regard it as an object of interest. Since

judgments of taste cannot be “mingled” with any interest (a point Kant makes in the

First Moment but also in section 13) then the kind of purpose determining judgments

of taste cannot be subjective. But neither can it be an “objective purpose”, the kind

that determines moral judgments, because such a purpose is determined by a concept

(concept of good) while aesthetic judgments are not determined by any concept. By

elimination it follows that the only kind of purposiveness an aesthetic object can

exhibit is “the mere form of purposivness.”

Nevertheless the idea that judgments of taste are based on the form of purposiveness

needs further clarifications because in the first two Moments of the Analytic Kant has

argued that what determine judgments of taste is solely the disinterested feeling of

pleasure we are conscious of when our cognitive faculties are in free play. Now it

seems that judgments of taste are determined by two different conditions. On the one

hand, being aesthetic judgments, they are determined by the free play of cognitive

faculties, on the other hand as judgments about individuals they are based on the form

of purposiveness. In what way and why should the form of purposiveness and the

aesthetic pleasure be related?

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One way to answer is to argue that the object, in virtue of its form, cause the

aesthetic pleasure, another way to answer is to argue that the presentation is nothing

else but the creation of our own mind, which finds pleasure in fantasizing.

In the first case the object would cause the aesthetic pleasure. The main

problem with this answer is that reduces aesthetic pleasure to “mere agreeableness”,

the latter being defined as the pleasure that depends “directly on the presentation by

which an object is given”, while aesthetic pleasure has its basis on the free play of

faculties.5 The second answer is problematic because reduces aesthetic presentations

to mere private mental content and makes impossible the inter-subjective

confirmation.

Kant addresses this problem in section 11 where he reiterates the claim that

“the liking we judge to be universally communicable” is that which determines a

judgment of taste. In addition the aesthetic response is not “occasioned” by any

presentation, but only by those presentations which exhibit a “form of purposiveness”

(in contrast to determinate purposes).6 This does not mean that the object causes the

aesthetic response but rather the inherent purposive nature of our cognitive faculties

can come to light any time a presentation looks as if it is purposive. That our faculty

of judgment has a purposive nature was already one of the implications of the thesis

that judgments about particulars rests on the relation of purposiveness. Following

Allison’s interpretation, we can argue that since the relation of purposivness is the

ground for making a judgment about an individual, and since in making such a

judgment two faculties need to collaborate with one another: imagination and

understanding7; then it is reasonable to assume, in the case of judgments of taste, “that

5 Ibidem., p.139 [217]6 Ibidem., p.143 [221]7 I return to this aspect in the next section.

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the mental state of free harmony is itself <<subjectively purposive>>.”8 Subjective

purposiveness means nothing else but that the purpose is not caused by a concept

rather purposiveness is the way in which our faculties make sense of what is

presented.

Thus the aesthetic presentation does not cause an affective reaction in the

subject but the subject does not create the form ex nihilo either (in the latter case we

would speak about fantasy), rather “the relation between subject and object is

reciprocal in the aesthetic case.”9 In other words judgments of taste are determined by

what can be called a “dual harmony”10, on the one hand is the harmonious free play of

cognitive faculties that lies as a possibility to be actualized in judging, on the other

hand the harmony to be discovered in the presentation of the object, the form of

purposiveness.

This explanation links together two essential conditions that make possible

judgments of taste, the form of purposiveness of presentations and the aesthetic

response.

However, because form of purposiveness cannot be determined objectively

then it cannot be derived any general condition that has to be fulfilled by a

presentation in order to be aesthetically relevant. Beauty cannot be determined in

regard to classes of objects. This means that one cannot judge beforehand if a kind of

presentation exhibits form as to purposiveness (which is a condition for calling an

object beautiful). The point is that although only those presentations that exhibit a

form of purposiveness are aesthetically relevant the form of purposiveness cannot be

defined as a certain configuration exhibited by beautiful presentations.

8 Allison, H., “Kant’s Theory of Taste”, (Cambridge: 2001), p.1279 Hughes, F., “Kant’s Aesthetic Epistemology”, (Edinburgh: 2007), p.28310 Hughes, F., “Kant’s Critique of Aesthetic Judgement”, (Continuum: 2010), p.21

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The question then remains: why shall we assume that every subject can grasp

the form of purposiveness exhibited by a presentation the same way does the one who

makes the aesthetic claim?

II

Kant deals with this problem in sections 13 and 14. Here he makes two

important claims about aesthetic presentations. First claim is that only the form of a

presentation is universally communicable (form “is moreover all that can be

universally communicated with certainty about these presentations [referring to

colours]”11. Second he claims that only the form of a presentation occasions an

aesthetic response, but not the matter, “beauty should actually concern only form”12.

However, Kant does not offer us any explicit arguments for neither of these claims.

Since the form of purposiveness is nothing more than that in a presentation which

occasions the free play of faculties, it does not follow straight from this claim that

only the form, but not the matter, are determining for calling an object purposive as to

form.

Although Kant does not define the concepts of “form” and “matter” he does

offer us two important clues. He claims that the matter of presentations consists

“solely on sensation”.13 In the next passage he speaks about “the form in the

connection of different presentations” and about the “formal determination of the

manifold”14. It seems that Kant links matter with mere sensations and form to what

connects different presentations together, presumably, what unites them. In this sense

we can speak about the matter as “bulk” of sensations, and form as what connects the

sensations (manifold) in a united presentation.

11 Kant, “Critique of Judgment”, p. 146 [224]12 Ibidem., p.145 [223]13 Ibidem., p.145 [223]14 Ibidem., p.146

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Based on this distinction and on Kant’s claims in section 9 we can construct an

argument to justify the two mentioned claims. In section 9, Kant argues that the

mental state of the free play of cognitive faculties is “universal communicable” to any

judging subject. The collaboration of imagination and understanding is the subjective

condition for cognition, since, by definition, a judging subject is a subject capable of

cognition as a result of the collaboration of both imagination and understanding. Then

Kant is justified to claim that the mental state in which imagination and understanding

are in collaboration (free play in the case of aesthetic contemplation) is universally

communicable.

The role of imagination in cognition is to combine “the manifold in intuition”

while understanding provides “the unity of the concept uniting the [component]

presentations.”15 Considering that in the aesthetic collaboration of imagination and

understanding, the latter does not provide a concept that gives the rule for uniting the

presentations then in aesthetic contemplation imagination and understanding are “in

free play”.

We cannot give here a detailed account of Kant’s theory of perception but it is

necessary to clarify a few points about the relation between the faculties of cognition

and form of presentations. In the previous quote Kant says that cognition is possible

when the manifold in intuition is combined by imagination under a concept which

provides the rule for uniting presentations. There are two different components

involved in cognition, the manifold given in intuition (as a result of being affected by

objects) and the work of combining and uniting. The form of an object is nothing

more but the way in which the manifold is combined, is what makes an object

recognizable as a unity of elements. Since the combination is the result of

collaboration between imagination and understanding, and because the capacity to

15 Ibidem., p.140 [217]

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combine a manifold in intuition, and to uniting under a concept, is what it takes to be

a judging subject, then we can infer that the form of a presentation is universally

communicable to any judging subject.16

Even if in judging aesthetically imagination and understanding collaborate

freely, we have seen that there is a form which presentations qualified as aesthetic

must exhibit (as condition of possibility for aesthetic judgments), this is the

indefinable form of purposiveness. Thus, since the free play of faculties is universally

communicable then the form of purposiveness exhibited by an aesthetic presentation

is also universally accessible to any judging subject.

But why could not be possible that even the matter (sensations as colours or

tones) of presentations determine an aesthetic response? The aesthetic pleasure occurs

when imagination and understanding collaborate to each other in free play, but since

their collaboration aims at the form of the presentation and not at its matter, then

matter is not aesthetically relevant. It does not follow that the form and the matter do

not influence each other, as we will see when I discuss Guyer’s objections to Kant’s

formalism colours can play in certain cases a determinant role in aesthetic evaluation.

III

Some commentators argued that Kant makes an illegitimate move from the

conditions of aesthetic response, form of purposiveness, to claims about presentations,

purposiveness as to form. I tried to show in the first two sections why Kant is justified

to make this move. Others, like Guyer, had argued that Kant is not justified to reclaim

universal communicability for aesthetic presentations. The focus of Guyer’s

objections is Kant’s thesis that only the form of objects is aesthetically relevant, while

the matter can be associated only with mere agreeableness.

16 Ibidem., p.140 [217]

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He’s first objection is that de facto “certain colours and tones, while nothing

by sensations themselves, might be felt to belong together in such a way as to satisfy

the understanding’s requirement of unity in the manifolds imagination presents to

it.”17 He gives the example of Josef Albers’ paintings “Homage to the square”. These

paintings are representative because they “conform fully with the Kantian constrains

on aesthetic response, but do so because their colour rather than their form produce

harmony between imagination and understanding.”18 If this is the case then Kant is

not justified to say that only the form of objects is aesthetically relevant.

In addition Guyer19 argues that Kant is not justified to presuppose that the

matter of a presentation is not universally communicable because varies from subject

to subject. Considering that colours and tones represent in Kant’s view the matter of a

presentation and since colours and tones can actually determine the beauty of a

presentation then either Kant is wrong in assuming that the matter of sensations varies

from subject to subject, either the matter of presentations really vary from one subject

to another and it is possible that an object occasions an aesthetic response to one

subject but not to another. Thus the object is really beautiful for one person but is not

for the other. In response to this I notice that Kant claims only that “we cannot assume

that in all subjects the sensations themselves agree in quality”20 because we cannot

connect the quality of sensations with the cognitive conditions as we do with form.

Guyer’s objections are reducible to the claim that colours and tones are de

facto aesthetically relevant because there are presentations that are only play of colour

(and tones) but which occasion aesthetic response. From this follows that the free play

of faculties actually can be entertained by the matter of presentations, and the matter

17 Guyer, P., “Kant and The Claims of Taste”, (Cambridge: 2007), p.20418 Ibidem., p.20519 Ibidem., p.20920 Kant, “Critique”, p.146 [224]

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of presentations either makes possible the universal communicability of the

presentation (in which case Kant is unjustified to claim that only the form has such a

property), either does not make possible the universal communicability of

presentations; in which case aesthetic presentations “do not necessarily imply the

possibility of “intersubjective agreement”21

Further on I show why these objections are not fatal to Kant’s formalism. First

Kant does not consider colours and tones a priori irrelevant for aesthetics. In the

passage of section 14 where he discusses Euler’s theory of colour Kant considers the

possibility that colours and tones might not be simple sensations, but “vibrations of

aether”, in which case the mind could perceive by reflection “the regular play of the

impressions (and hence the form in the connection of different presentations)” and so

“colour and tone would […] be the formal determination of the manifold in these

[impressions].”22 I do not claim that Kant was committed to this theory but I only

want to remark that for Kant colours could be determinant for aesthetic response if

they were to influence the form of presentations.

My intention is to show that even if we accept colours as aesthetically relevant

for determining the beauty of an object this does not prove that Kant’s formalism is

faulty. I consider that Kant’s formalism can accommodated the thesis that colours and

tones do contribute to aesthetic responses. My argument is that colours (presumably

tones) can be grasped in two ways, aesthetically and non-aesthetically/mere

sensations. In the second case we consider the way in which colours affect our senses

while in the first case it is essential the role colours play in suggesting form and

shape.

21 Guyer, “Kant and The Claims…”, p.21022 Kant, Critique, p.146 [224]

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That colours can influence our moods is a fact we can all observe. Colours can

have an immediate effect on our disposition. Some psychologists even speak about a

psychology of colour which treats questions as: what colour can be associated with

what mood?23

However there is also an aesthetic way of appreciating colours. When we make an

aesthetic evaluation about a painting we are not interested in the way in which the

colour influences our mood. Let’s consider an abstract painting, as Albers’ paintings

are. I will refer to Liza Lou painting Carbon Gunmetal/Divide which is part of hers

exposition Solid/Divide24. The painting consists of only two colours that delineate

each other; but if we keep contemplating the painting we observe that what presents at

first as a dull image of two colours, starts to reveal more and more details. For

example, at a certain moment we might start seeing that the painting actually

illustrates a calm see and the line that separates the colours is actually the horizon that

separates the sea from the sky. The way in which the colour is disposed in the inferior

part of the painting, I am referring to different shades of black, blue-grey, suggests

small waves; the way in which the grey-blue of the sky is illuminated from the line of

the horizon and fades away in the upper part of the painting suggests distance.

I do not say we have to fantasy about the presentation it is the presentation

which allows us to grasp it in this way. For example, the whole aesthetic effect

depends on the precise colours and the relation in which the colours stand to each

other.

But the effect that colours contribute to is the design (form and depth) which

we discover gradually and which monopolize our attention as soon as we start

23 Elliot, 2007) (Color and Psychological Functioning, Andrew J. Elliot, Markus A. Maier).24 Pictures of Lou’s paintings can be found here: http://whitecube.com/exhibitions/liza_lou_bermondsey_2014/ Unfortunately the pictures cannot reproduce the level of detail of her works.

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discovering the complexity of the painting. It cannot be the case that we enjoy the

mere colours, because we can easily see that if the colours were misplaced or if the

wrong colours were used the whole effect would be ruined. Even if I like the green

colour I can easily imagine that if instead of the blue-grey of the sky was bright green,

then the aesthetic effect would have been destroyed.

The same kind of effect we can observe when we contemplate Albers’

paintings, thus I think that Guyer is right to say that this kind of works of art do

occasion aesthetic response. But I consider that Guyer misinterprets the aesthetic

experience when he says that what we enjoy in such cases are the mere colours. It is

clear that when we interact with aesthetic presentations which are coloured we do not

have the same attitude we have when we interact in a non-aesthetic way with colours.

For example it is said that the purple colour is intellectually stimulating and so it is

preferable to study in rooms where are purple walls. But who would argue that this

kind of effect colours have on us is aesthetically relevant?

On the contrary, in aesthetical context the role of colour is to create space,

form, depth, distance or proximity. Once we discover that the mentioned painting

reveals depth and the space is split between the plan of sea and that of sky, we

understand it and it is really difficult to try then to see it in a different way. Once we

start to see the space created by the play of colours our mind “forces” us to follow that

direction.

Finally, if I am right and we can distinguish between an aesthetic and an un-

aesthetic way of relating to colours and if the aesthetic way of relating to colours is to

grasp the form and the space which colours create then Kant is right to claim that

colours are not aesthetically relevant (when grasped un-aesthetically) and that only

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the form of the presentation counts aesthetically (if we consider that colours can shape

the space and make form visible).

In conclusion I consider that if Kant is right in interpreting the aesthetic

pleasure as expression of the free play of our faculties then he is also justified to claim

the universal communicability of presentations that occasion aesthetic response, since

the cognitive faculties in their free play aim at the form of presentations.

Words: 3998

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Bibliography:

Allison, H., Kant’s Theory of Taste, Cambridge: University Press, 2001.

Elliot, A.J. and Maier, M.A., Color and Psychological Functioning, in Current

Directions in Psychological Science, Oct. 1, 2007, Vol. 16, No. 5

Guyer, P., Kant and the Claims of Taste, Harvard: University Press, 1979.

Hughes, F., (2007), Kant’s Aesthetic Epistemology, Edinburgh: University

Press, 2007.

Hughes, F., (2010), Kant’s Critique of Aesthetic Judgment, London:

Continuum International Publishing Group, 2010.

Kant, I., Critique of Judgment, Trans. Pluhar Werner S., Indianapolis, Hackett

Publishing Company, 1997, Kindle edition.

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