ABSTRACT
What can phenomenology contribute to aesthetics? My answer to this question will be highly qualified, so I may as well start with something clear and bold: of all philosophical approaches to aesthetics, it is pheno menology that best accounts for why art matters to us. Phenomenology uncovers the “meaning” of art. Now, to some caveats. First, it is difficult to speak of “phenomenology” in the singular. Identifying commonalities among thinkers as diverse as Edmund Husserl, Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Maurice Merleau-Ponty (to name just a few) is not easy, and phenomenology’s contribution to aesthetics will perhaps be more readily apparent in what is distinctive of each author than in what they share. Second, the notion of “aesthetics” is itself complex, concerned as it traditionally has been with both beauty and art. The “and” is important, since not everything that is beautiful is art, and not all art need be beautiful. What, then, is the real topic of aesthetics? Since I will be treating it exclusively as philosophy of art, I should say a word in defense of this restriction. This will require a brief look at the history of aesthetics.
