In this article, I argue that one has yet to acknowledge the extent to which the notion of the aesthetic and its content is institutionally negotiated. A central question that we ought to bear in mind is: does the organization of “aesthetic knowledge” that the traditional disciplines facilitate promote or prevent insight into meta-aesthetic and transaesthetic concerns?

Aesthetization, or aestheticization, has recently become a new key word in scholarly debates about culture and society, roughly concerned with the kind of phenomenon that pictorial turn describes. It is not that `aesthetization', in its literal sense, is making the unaesthetic aesthetic, nor does it point to the sort of topics typical of an aestheticized human life as favored by some traditional Chinese intellectuals; rather it is about a transaesthetization. This process differs not just in the range and extent of (...) aesthetization, but in its essence and nature: reality will no longer exist when it is transaesthetized and what is left is an aesthetic realm only; in other words, there will be no reality, but purely the `hyperreal'. Accordingly, transaesthetization can then often be associated with the concept of simulacrum, or the proliferation of images; it would thus result from the expansion of simulacra. However, there arises the problem that simulacrum is not identical with image. Assuming that the beauty of image consists in its rich connotations and its presentation at the level of form, it is doubtful that transaesthetization is configured merely by the simulacral. Why, and how could it be so? (shrink)

This text contemplates Western culture "after the orgy" - the revolutions of the 1960s. The author argues that the sexual revolution has led not to sexual liberation but to a reign of transvestism, to a confusion of the categories of man and woman, and a "transaesthetic realm of indifference".

This paper analyses the cluster of aesthetic features involved in the common experience of the weather. Perceptual features (framelessness, chromatics, texture, synaesthesia, ephemerality, proteism) are accompanied by ‘atmospheric’ moods that are irreducible to physiological well-being. Representation and imagination reach their limits due to the more-than-human spatiotemporal scale of the atmosphere. Finally, some ‘transaesthetic’ aspects include the agency of an active matter and the longing for an elemental alterity. The aesthetics of the weather has to account for the interdependence between aesthetic (...) and ethical values, between bodily engagement and appropriate knowledge, individual contemplation and social commitment, in order to develop ecological responsibility. (shrink)

The paper gives insight into the revaluation of popular Gothic aesthetics in Jim Jarmusch’s 2014 production Only Lovers Left Alive. Drawing on critical theory and the postmodern theoretical framework, the article suggests that the film transgresses contemporary culture immersed in a “culture of death” that has produced a vast amount of cultural texts under the rubric of “Gothicism.” By considering Jean Baudrillard’s concept of transaesthetics and Judith Halberstam’s writings on contemporary monstrosity, the paper shows that a commodified Gothic mode (...) has lost its older deconstructive functions that operated on the margins of the mainstream. Now entirely focused on the duplication of the same aesthetic codes and signs, Gothic productions conform to the rules of postindustrial culture, enriching entertainment imagery with the neutralized concept of “otherness.” Hence, the article engages primarily with Jarmusch’s indie aesthetics that goes beyond easily recognizable patterns and generic conventions and allows the director to emphasize that the arts are rejuvenating forces, the antidote to a commoditized environment. Then, the focus is on the construction of main characters—Adam and Eve, ageless vampires and spouses—who thanks to nostalgic theatricality and performance reconfigure the mainstream monstrosity. Ultimately, the article emphasizes that Jarmusch’s film, to a large extent, becomes a warning against the inevitable results of advanced capitalism practiced on a global scale. (shrink)

El presente trabajo está dedicado al concepto de simulacro de Jean Baudrillard. Al definirlo como exterminio fundamental de la ilusión, el autor proclama la desilusión total que tiende a desaparecer la realidad y destruir su representación referencial y significativa. Con la simulación total, el arte y la estética entran en su etapa transestética cuando ellos mismos pierden su propio fin y especificidad. Desde el enfoque en el aspecto estético-artístico del simulacro, se presentan varios modelos de la simulación artística y se (...) analizan las consecuencias que ellos producen en el arte, cuyo estado Baudrillard define como el complot del arte. (shrink)

이 글의 목적은 ‘예술의 사라짐’에 관한 보드리야르의 비판을 ‘기호의 역전’ 현상으로 검토함으로써, 그 과도성을 ‘탈신체화된 기호화’의 문제로 해명하는데 있다. 보드리야르는 이미지의 조작이 이루어지는 소비사회의 예술이, 미디어 기술로 인해 예술의 일상화 또는 전세계를 미학화함으로써 미적가치를 포화상태로 만들었고 분석한다. 그러한 예술의 ‘평범함’이 부정성과 창조성을 통한 비판적 거리를 상실하게 만들었고, 이제 소비사회의 예술은 ‘초과실재’의 세계만을 순환적으로 재생산함으로써 ‘예술의 공모’에 동참하고 있다는 것이다. 그 결과 현대예술은 이미지 또는 기호들의 과잉증식만을 보여 주는 초과실재의 숙명처럼, 그 스스로 무가치해지며 소멸될 수밖에 없는 ‘초미학’의 운명을 맞이한다. 그러나 필자는 (...) ‘예술의 사라짐’에 관한 보드리야르의 비관적 전망이 예술의 기호를 철저하게 물질화된 형식, 즉 탈신체화된 기호의 관점으로 규정한 결과에서 나온다고 보았고, 그 과도성을 ‘기호의 역전’ 현상으로 검토하려고 한다. 먼저 체험주의 기호이론에서 규명하는 기호의 역전은 추상적인 기호가 물리세계에서 작동하는 현상에 관한 것으로. 기호가 ‘사역자로의 인간’을 필연적으로 매개해야만 하는 물리적 개입의 과정을 의미한다. 그러나 이러한 기호의 역전 현상이 우리의 삶을 왜곡하거나 억압하는 ‘기호적 존재론’의 형태로 변질될 때, 그 사역자는 굴절된 기호체계 안에 갇힌다. 말하자면 자신이 생산한 기호로부터 ‘소외’되는 것이다. 이 문제에 체험주의 기호이론은 기호의 전도된 가치를 회복하기 위한 길이, 기호를 신체화된 경험의 관점에서 이해하는 ‘기호적 경험’의 문제로 전환할 때 비로소 가능하다고 보았다. 기호를 산출하고 사용하며 해석하는 그 모든 과정은 기호의 사역자인 인간의 활동이 매개되어 있기 때문이다. 따라서 이 글은 과도하게 추상화된 기호적 존재론을 평가할 수 있는 토대는 기호적 경험의 연속성에 대한 이해, 즉 ‘신체화된 경험의 귀환’으로부터 출발해야 한다고 제안한다. (shrink)