ABSTRACT
Viktor Shklovsky considered estrangement, or “ostranennie,” to be the basic function of art. He was right, but for the wrong reasons. In his work on the subject, he mingled three theoretical perspectives: a theory of perception, a theory of semiosis, and a theory of abstraction. On the basis of an analysis of his discourse, I will argue that the concept of estrangement can and should be reassessed in contemporary art theory; that is to say, in the context of a theory of art as a specific instance of human semiotic cognition, realized in a variety of media, and focused on imaginative self-consciousness.
