The Paradoxes of Art
A Phenomenological Investigation

In this study, Alan Paskow situates the phenomenological approach to the experience of painting.

Alan Paskow (Author)

9780521828338, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 15 January 2004

272 pages, 8 colour illus.
23.6 x 16.2 x 2.4 cm, 0.583 kg

"This, I believe, is a significant contribution, not just to the debate about why art matters to us but also to the wider question of how we consciously inhabit the world...[The Paradoxes of Art] is of particular relevance given that the discourses of art, philosophy, and consciousness are rapidly converging..."
Robert Pepperell, Leonardo On-line

In this study, Alan Paskow first asks why fictional characters, such as Hamlet and Anna Karenina, matter to us and how they emotionally affect us. He then applies these questions to painting, demonstrating that certain paintings beckon us to view their contents as real. As emblematic of the fundamental concerns of our lives, paintings, he argues, are not simply in our heads but in our world. Paskow also situates the phenomenological approach to the experience of painting in relation to contemporary schools of thought, particularly Marxist, feminist, and deconstructionist.

Introduction
1. The reality of fictional beings
2. Things in our world
3. Why and how others matter
4. Why and how a painting matters
5. For and against interpretation.

Subject Areas: Philosophy [HP], Literature & literary studies [D], History of art / art & design styles [AC], Theory of art [ABA], The arts: general issues [AB]