1st Edition

The Concept of the Animal and Modern Theories of Art

By Roni Grén Copyright 2017
    176 Pages 30 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    176 Pages 30 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    This book examines the importance of the animal in modern art theory, using classic texts of modern aesthetics and texts written by modern artists to explore the influence of the human-animal relationship on nineteenth and twentieth century artists and art theorists. The book is unique due to its focus on the concept of the animal, rather than on images of animals, and it aims towards a theoretical account of the connections between the notions of art and animality in the modern age. Roni Grén’s book spans various disciplines, such as art theory, art history, animal studies, modernism, postmodernism, posthumanism, philosophy, and aesthetics.

    Table of Contents

    List of Figures

    Acknowledgments

    Introduction

    Part 1 The Exceptionality of the Human Spirit

    The Human Exception

    Natural Aesthetics

    Origin and Language

    Nature Created in Man’s Image

    To Have and Have Not

    Part 2 The Animal and the Image

    Introduction: Discourse and Imagicity

    Condillac and Animal Imagination

    Rousseau and the Noble Visual

    Diderot’s Suspicion

    A Concluding Note

    Part 3 Art and Evolution

    Introduction: Darwin’s Century

    The Subjective and the Objective

    The Crisis of Symbolism and the Violent Other

    Evolution of the Species and the Creative Sentiment

    Nietzsche

    Part 4 The Poetic Lie

    The Primitive Origin of Art

    Gaze and the Invisible

    The World of Abstraction and the Revolution of the Beasts

    Dream, Debauchery, Myth

    Part 5 Conclusion: The Modern Other

    Animalization of Art

    The Formalist World of Creation

    The Surrealist Solutions

    The Animal Itself

    Afterword

    Bibliography

    Index

    Table of Contents

    List of Figures

    Acknowledgments

    Introduction

    Part 1 The Exceptionality of the Human Spirit

    The Human Exception

    Natural Aesthetics

    Origin and Language

    Nature Created in Man’s Image

    To Have and Have Not

    Part 2 The Animal and the Image

    Introduction: Discourse and Imagicity

    Condillac and Animal Imagination

    Rousseau and the Noble Visual

    Diderot’s Suspicion

    A Concluding Note

    Part 3 Art and Evolution

    Introduction: Darwin’s Century

    The Subjective and the Objective

    The Crisis of Symbolism and the Violent Other

    Evolution of the Species and the Creative Sentiment

    Nietzsche

    Part 4 The Poetic Lie

    The Primitive Origin of Art

    Gaze and the Invisible

    The World of Abstraction and the Revolution of the Beasts

    Dream, Debauchery, Myth

    Part 5 Conclusion: The Modern Other

    Animalization of Art

    The Formalist World of Creation

    The Surrealist Solutions

    The Animal Itself

    Afterword

    Bibliography

    Index

    Biography

    Ph.D. Roni Grén is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Turku, Finland. His topics of research have been centered on modern art theory and French culture. Formerly, he has written a book on Georges Bataille’s writings on art, and is currently working on research entitled "Prehistory and Modernism."