From Allen Carlson to Richard Long : The Art-Based Appreciation of Nature
Tafalla, Marta (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona)

Imprint:	The European Society for Aesthetics, 2010
Abstract:	The question I ask in this paper is whether some works of art could teach us to aesthetically appreciate nature. The first part of the text presents the current debate in analytical aesthetics on appreciation of nature, and examines Allen Carlson thesis that only natural sciences, and not art, teach us to appreciate natural beauty. Carlson argues that natural sciences as biology or ecology show us nature as it is, making possible an objective aesthetics of nature, while art only projects subjective ideas on it. The text examines the arguments raised against this thesis by different authors, some of them defending a cognitivist position and some a non-cognitivist one. The second part analyzes Carlson's rejection of art, and focuses on his reasons for rejecting landscape painting. Carlson argues that landscape painting distorts the true character of natural environments because it frames and flattens environments into scenery. He claims that aesthetic appreciation of nature is not a matter of looking at views from a distance, as we contemplate pictures in a gallery, but it is being involved in the environment, moving through it, and not only looking, but hearing, touching, smelling. The third part proposes the work of Richard Long as an art that cannot be rejected by Carlson arguments. Land art was born at the same time as philosophical aesthetics of nature was renewed by Ronald Hepburn after a long time of oblivion, and we can find some affinitiesbetween Carlson's critiques to landscape painting and some landart works, like the art of Rich ard Long. Long explores natural environments in a new way, and it is argued that his art can teach us to aesthetically appreciate nature.
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Language:	Anglès
Document:	Comunicació de congrés ; recerca ; Versió publicada
Published in:	Proceedings of the European Society for Aesthetics, Vol. 2 (2010) , p. 491-515, ISSN 1664-5278

Adreça original: https://proceedings.eurosa.org/2/tafalla2010.pdf

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