ABSTRACT
Years ago, Jerome Stolnitz provided an interesting analysis of art criticism in a text entitled Aesthetics and Philosophy of Art Criticism: An Introduction. Stolnitz claimed that criticism-the talk about art-can have different, often interrelated functions; sometimes criticism is used to ascertain reasons for supporting value-judgments and sometimes it is used simply to describe, explain, or clarify a work of art. Stolnitz would hardly have approved of contemporary critics' emphasis on theory. He believed that one perceived a work aesthetically while maintaining an aesthetic attitude. Stolnitz insists on two requirements for criticism, namely, that it illuminate understanding of the work of art and that it provide workable criteria of evaluation. Contextual criticism also fails to provide workable criteria of evaluation. Stolnitz takes issue with contextualist critics for failing to stop at the appropriate boundary and for presuming to be qualified to move from the activity of interpreting to the activity of evaluating.
