1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:02,419 Welcome back to the Deep Dive. Today, we are 2 00:00:02,419 --> 00:00:04,639 taking a really big dive into the philosophical 3 00:00:04,639 --> 00:00:07,679 architecture of art, all driven by a promise 4 00:00:07,679 --> 00:00:10,240 that was made way back in 1942. We're looking 5 00:00:10,240 --> 00:00:13,619 at Suzanne K. Langer's huge work, Feeling and 6 00:00:13,619 --> 00:00:16,519 Form, which came out in 1953. Right. And for 7 00:00:16,519 --> 00:00:18,539 decades before this, aesthetics felt kind of 8 00:00:18,539 --> 00:00:20,339 trapped, didn't it? It was all these endless 9 00:00:20,339 --> 00:00:23,000 debates about subjective taste and, you know, 10 00:00:23,059 --> 00:00:25,859 fleeting emotions. It really was. And Langer 11 00:00:25,859 --> 00:00:28,519 just steps in with this. This really radical 12 00:00:28,519 --> 00:00:30,859 proposal. She says, let's treat art with the 13 00:00:30,859 --> 00:00:33,079 same intellectual rigor we apply to science. 14 00:00:33,320 --> 00:00:36,280 How does she even propose to do that? By analyzing 15 00:00:36,280 --> 00:00:39,140 its structure as a non -discursive symbolic system. 16 00:00:39,560 --> 00:00:41,759 That's the core of her genius. So this builds 17 00:00:41,759 --> 00:00:43,899 on her earlier work, Philosophy in a New Key. 18 00:00:44,100 --> 00:00:46,039 Exactly. In that book, she laid out the whole 19 00:00:46,039 --> 00:00:48,640 framework for understanding how language and 20 00:00:48,640 --> 00:00:50,939 logic, what she called discursive symbolism, 21 00:00:51,299 --> 00:00:53,500 how that structures our scientific and everyday 22 00:00:53,500 --> 00:00:56,119 thought. And feeling and form is the follow -up. 23 00:00:56,399 --> 00:00:59,299 The fulfillment of the promise. It is. It's her 24 00:00:59,299 --> 00:01:02,359 attempt to find the equivalent framework for 25 00:01:02,359 --> 00:01:06,040 art. She argues that art isn't just about decoration 26 00:01:06,040 --> 00:01:09,359 or entertainment. It's a form of knowledge. It's 27 00:01:09,359 --> 00:01:11,780 a system for articulating what language can't. 28 00:01:11,840 --> 00:01:14,599 And what is that exactly? The subjective reality 29 00:01:14,599 --> 00:01:17,060 of human feeling. The whole goal is to build 30 00:01:17,060 --> 00:01:20,319 a complete, systematic critique of art that reveals 31 00:01:20,319 --> 00:01:24,379 its own unique logic. And that logic is... For 32 00:01:24,379 --> 00:01:27,079 her, the logic of sentience itself. Okay, but 33 00:01:27,079 --> 00:01:29,099 before she can even begin to lay that foundation, 34 00:01:29,439 --> 00:01:31,780 she has to do some serious cleanup work first. 35 00:01:32,079 --> 00:01:34,540 Oh, absolutely. She talks about how professional 36 00:01:34,540 --> 00:01:37,060 philosophy had turned the key terms of aesthetics 37 00:01:37,060 --> 00:01:40,079 into what she calls a semantic battlefield. A 38 00:01:40,079 --> 00:01:42,459 semantic battlefield. I like that. So if she's 39 00:01:42,459 --> 00:01:44,439 going to build this massive theory on the idea 40 00:01:44,439 --> 00:01:46,859 of a symbol, she first needs to define it. and 41 00:01:46,859 --> 00:01:48,599 define it rigidly. Because everyone else was 42 00:01:48,599 --> 00:01:50,439 using the term to mean just about anything and 43 00:01:50,439 --> 00:01:52,859 everything. The difficulty comes from that sheer 44 00:01:52,859 --> 00:01:55,879 range of usage. I mean, she points out the chaos 45 00:01:55,879 --> 00:01:58,680 surrounding just that one word, symbol. She gives 46 00:01:58,680 --> 00:02:01,140 examples, right? She does. You have someone like 47 00:02:01,140 --> 00:02:03,180 Cecil Day -Lewis in his work on the poetic image 48 00:02:03,180 --> 00:02:06,319 who defines a symbol very narrowly. For him, 49 00:02:06,319 --> 00:02:08,500 it's an assigned symbol, basically a sign with 50 00:02:08,500 --> 00:02:11,300 a fixed conventional meaning, one to one. Like 51 00:02:11,300 --> 00:02:14,310 a stop sign. Exactly. But then you have philosophers 52 00:02:14,310 --> 00:02:16,569 like R .G. Collingwood, who goes to the complete 53 00:02:16,569 --> 00:02:19,629 opposite extreme. He stretches the term language 54 00:02:19,629 --> 00:02:23,129 to cover pretty much every expressive form, religious 55 00:02:23,129 --> 00:02:27,110 icons, rituals, art. So he makes language really 56 00:02:27,110 --> 00:02:30,849 broad. Incredibly broad. Yeah. But then, funnily 57 00:02:30,849 --> 00:02:33,389 enough, he limits the word symbol to just those 58 00:02:33,389 --> 00:02:36,379 deliberately chosen fixed signs. Like in symbolic 59 00:02:36,379 --> 00:02:39,120 logic. So on one side, symbol is way too narrow. 60 00:02:39,180 --> 00:02:41,159 It's just a fixed sign. And on the other, the 61 00:02:41,159 --> 00:02:43,360 whole idea of language is so broad it becomes, 62 00:02:43,419 --> 00:02:45,580 well, almost meaningless. Right. It covers everything 63 00:02:45,580 --> 00:02:48,340 from tying your shoe to writing a symphony. And 64 00:02:48,340 --> 00:02:50,759 if the term can mean everything from a simple 65 00:02:50,759 --> 00:02:54,060 traffic sign to some, you know, vague, honorific 66 00:02:54,060 --> 00:02:57,199 concept of infinite suggestiveness, as some critics 67 00:02:57,199 --> 00:02:59,620 were implying. Then Langer's entire project is 68 00:02:59,620 --> 00:03:02,300 dead in the water before it even starts. Precisely. 69 00:03:02,699 --> 00:03:05,599 To build a workable theory. She needs a concept 70 00:03:05,599 --> 00:03:09,439 that is both abstract enough and applicable across 71 00:03:09,439 --> 00:03:11,379 all these different mediums. And this leads to 72 00:03:11,379 --> 00:03:13,960 the definition that becomes the absolute bedrock 73 00:03:13,960 --> 00:03:16,800 for feeling and form. And it is so profound in 74 00:03:16,800 --> 00:03:20,280 its simplicity, she says. A symbol is any device 75 00:03:20,280 --> 00:03:22,840 whereby we are enabled to make an abstraction. 76 00:03:23,370 --> 00:03:25,110 Okay, let's just sit with that for a second because 77 00:03:25,110 --> 00:03:27,590 that feels really important. A device whereby 78 00:03:27,590 --> 00:03:30,789 we're enabled to make an abstraction. So a symbol 79 00:03:30,789 --> 00:03:33,909 is fundamentally a cognitive tool. It's not just 80 00:03:33,909 --> 00:03:36,849 expressing an emotion or some fixed card. It's 81 00:03:36,849 --> 00:03:40,490 a mechanism for separating a concept, an abstraction, 82 00:03:40,669 --> 00:03:42,789 from its physical reality. Which then allows 83 00:03:42,789 --> 00:03:44,710 us to manipulate and understand that concept 84 00:03:44,710 --> 00:03:46,789 intellectually. And that's what lets her treat 85 00:03:46,789 --> 00:03:49,330 art as a genuine carrier of meaning, but a meaning 86 00:03:49,330 --> 00:03:52,409 that's distinct from language. Yes. That abstraction 87 00:03:52,409 --> 00:03:54,580 is... the whole key. Because if art is a device 88 00:03:54,580 --> 00:03:56,879 for abstraction, it means the art object itself, 89 00:03:57,020 --> 00:03:59,500 a painting, a poem, whatever it is, is fundamentally 90 00:03:59,500 --> 00:04:01,900 performing an intellectual function. It's giving 91 00:04:01,900 --> 00:04:04,659 us a concept of feeling that we can contemplate 92 00:04:04,659 --> 00:04:07,580 outside of the immediate urgency of our own personal 93 00:04:07,580 --> 00:04:10,120 emotional turmoil. Exactly. You get to look at 94 00:04:10,120 --> 00:04:13,039 the form of the feeling, not just be swamped 95 00:04:13,039 --> 00:04:16,360 by it. So our mission for this deep dive is to 96 00:04:16,360 --> 00:04:19,199 follow that very rigorous path. We're going to 97 00:04:19,199 --> 00:04:21,399 trace her argument chapter by chapter, looking 98 00:04:21,399 --> 00:04:23,920 at how she systematically develops this idea 99 00:04:23,920 --> 00:04:26,540 of the art symbol. And we'll try to connect these 100 00:04:26,540 --> 00:04:29,699 insights across philosophy, psychology, and the 101 00:04:29,699 --> 00:04:32,540 history of the specific arts to see how she really 102 00:04:32,540 --> 00:04:35,139 does build a complete unified theory of what 103 00:04:35,139 --> 00:04:37,860 art means. Okay, let's begin with that philosophical 104 00:04:37,860 --> 00:04:40,420 setup in chapter one. She titles it The Measure 105 00:04:40,420 --> 00:04:42,779 of Ideas, and she kicks it off with an attack 106 00:04:42,779 --> 00:04:45,259 on what she calls the fallacy of obvious abstraction. 107 00:04:46,180 --> 00:04:48,970 What is that trap she's identifying? The trap 108 00:04:48,970 --> 00:04:51,009 is that philosophers, when they look at art, 109 00:04:51,129 --> 00:04:53,930 they tend to start with the easiest, most generalized 110 00:04:53,930 --> 00:04:56,970 concepts that common language gives us. Beauty, 111 00:04:57,189 --> 00:05:00,990 value, culture, pleasure. Things everyone agrees 112 00:05:00,990 --> 00:05:03,569 are involved in art. Involved, yeah. But they're 113 00:05:03,569 --> 00:05:05,449 way too general to serve as systematic descriptive 114 00:05:05,449 --> 00:05:08,149 terms. You can't build a science on them. And 115 00:05:08,149 --> 00:05:11,050 she has this great analogy from ancient philosophy 116 00:05:11,050 --> 00:05:13,569 to really drive this point home. It's a wonderful 117 00:05:13,569 --> 00:05:16,050 one. She says starting with generalities like 118 00:05:16,050 --> 00:05:19,790 beauty or value is just like how the early Greek 119 00:05:19,790 --> 00:05:22,089 nature philosophers started their physics with 120 00:05:22,089 --> 00:05:24,829 elementary qualities like wetness or dryness. 121 00:05:24,889 --> 00:05:27,470 You can classify things that way, sure. The sea 122 00:05:27,470 --> 00:05:29,959 is wet, the desert is dry. But those general 123 00:05:29,959 --> 00:05:32,379 qualities in and of themselves, they give you 124 00:05:32,379 --> 00:05:35,199 absolutely no mechanism for building a rigorous 125 00:05:35,199 --> 00:05:37,800 science. They don't explain anything. So general 126 00:05:37,800 --> 00:05:40,519 qualities yield no physics. And Langer's point 127 00:05:40,519 --> 00:05:42,699 is that abstract qualities like beauty yield 128 00:05:42,699 --> 00:05:45,519 no serious art theory. Precisely. She contrasts 129 00:05:45,519 --> 00:05:49,399 these amorphous terms with concepts that actually 130 00:05:49,399 --> 00:05:52,399 work in science like mass or time or location. 131 00:05:52,720 --> 00:05:54,920 And why do they work? Because they have a measurable 132 00:05:54,920 --> 00:05:58,620 unit. And they can be combined in definite proportionate 133 00:05:58,620 --> 00:06:02,040 ways. We can't define a unit of beauty or combine 134 00:06:02,040 --> 00:06:04,459 it scientifically with a unit of value. So if 135 00:06:04,459 --> 00:06:06,920 philosophical progress doesn't happen by wrestling 136 00:06:06,920 --> 00:06:09,319 with these big, obvious generalities, how does 137 00:06:09,319 --> 00:06:12,139 she say it actually happens? By addressing highly 138 00:06:12,139 --> 00:06:15,540 specific but profoundly structural questions 139 00:06:15,540 --> 00:06:18,180 of meaning. She makes us look at the history 140 00:06:18,180 --> 00:06:20,379 of how we've actually made intellectual progress. 141 00:06:20,740 --> 00:06:24,009 Right, like in mathematics. Think about it. Nobody 142 00:06:24,009 --> 00:06:27,379 solved all of math at once. Progress came from 143 00:06:27,379 --> 00:06:29,600 asking these really specific questions like, 144 00:06:29,680 --> 00:06:32,420 what is the meaning of the square root of minus 145 00:06:32,420 --> 00:06:35,319 two in our number system? Or in physics, what's 146 00:06:35,319 --> 00:06:38,279 the meaning of cosmic simultaneity? And these 147 00:06:38,279 --> 00:06:40,699 are not general questions about the nature of 148 00:06:40,699 --> 00:06:42,980 the universe. They're very specialized, almost 149 00:06:42,980 --> 00:06:45,620 technical questions. But answering them forces 150 00:06:45,620 --> 00:06:48,040 a complete rethink of everything. It demands 151 00:06:48,040 --> 00:06:50,399 a complete reconstruction of your foundational 152 00:06:50,399 --> 00:06:53,740 notions. Defining the square root of minus two 153 00:06:53,740 --> 00:06:56,759 wasn't just some technical fix. It forced the 154 00:06:56,759 --> 00:06:58,339 development of a whole theory of mathematical 155 00:06:58,339 --> 00:07:01,160 series and the concept of complex numbers. And 156 00:07:01,160 --> 00:07:04,079 defining simultaneity led Einstein to completely 157 00:07:04,079 --> 00:07:06,740 reconstruct our entire understanding of space 158 00:07:06,740 --> 00:07:09,379 and time. Langer's argument is that aesthetics 159 00:07:09,379 --> 00:07:12,000 has to operate in the exact same way. So art 160 00:07:12,000 --> 00:07:14,079 theory shouldn't be chasing after some grand 161 00:07:14,079 --> 00:07:16,040 notion of the beautiful. It should be asking 162 00:07:16,040 --> 00:07:18,620 these really targeted questions. Yeah. Questions 163 00:07:18,620 --> 00:07:21,290 like... What exactly is expressed in architectural 164 00:07:21,290 --> 00:07:25,129 space? Or is a musical performance a creative 165 00:07:25,129 --> 00:07:27,930 generative act? Questions that are specific enough 166 00:07:27,930 --> 00:07:31,029 to force you to give complex, rigorous, and systematic 167 00:07:31,029 --> 00:07:34,189 answers. And that shifts the whole focus. It 168 00:07:34,189 --> 00:07:36,649 moves it away from subjective reaction, I like 169 00:07:36,649 --> 00:07:39,230 this painting, to the objective structure of 170 00:07:39,230 --> 00:07:41,870 the artistic work itself. It moves aesthetics 171 00:07:41,870 --> 00:07:44,370 away from being just a classification of pleasant 172 00:07:44,370 --> 00:07:46,810 feelings and puts it right into epistemology. 173 00:07:47,029 --> 00:07:49,589 The analysis of how meaning -specific structural 174 00:07:49,589 --> 00:07:52,470 meaning is inherent in the forms that we create. 175 00:07:52,670 --> 00:07:54,750 That's the foundation for her whole system. And 176 00:07:54,750 --> 00:07:57,069 this rigor. is what allows her then, in Chapter 177 00:07:57,069 --> 00:08:00,410 2, Paradoxes, to really dissect the history of 178 00:08:00,410 --> 00:08:03,810 aesthetic failures. She identifies six dominant 179 00:08:03,810 --> 00:08:06,089 ideas that have just been circling the drain 180 00:08:06,089 --> 00:08:09,350 for two centuries. Yes. These six ideas are the 181 00:08:09,350 --> 00:08:11,589 core concepts critics just keep coming back to. 182 00:08:11,769 --> 00:08:14,829 Taste, emotion, form, representation, immediacy, 183 00:08:14,910 --> 00:08:17,189 and illusion. And Langer shows that when you 184 00:08:17,189 --> 00:08:19,350 try to develop these ideas in isolation, they 185 00:08:19,350 --> 00:08:21,889 just inevitably clash or defeat themselves. For 186 00:08:21,889 --> 00:08:24,649 instance, you take the concept of immediacy. 187 00:08:25,550 --> 00:08:28,810 That direct, intuitive, unanalyzed feeling you 188 00:08:28,810 --> 00:08:31,250 get from a work of art. Right, that aha moment. 189 00:08:31,629 --> 00:08:33,309 That fits beautifully with theories that are 190 00:08:33,309 --> 00:08:36,470 centered on taste or emotion. But historically, 191 00:08:36,870 --> 00:08:39,529 critics found it almost impossible to reconcile 192 00:08:39,529 --> 00:08:42,250 that direct feeling with the structured rigor 193 00:08:42,250 --> 00:08:45,309 of form. They saw structure as intellectual and 194 00:08:45,309 --> 00:08:47,490 form as something that gets in the way of that 195 00:08:47,490 --> 00:08:49,409 immediate feeling. And to make it all even more 196 00:08:49,409 --> 00:08:52,149 complicated, she notes this fundamental division 197 00:08:52,149 --> 00:08:55,070 in aesthetic theory. The perspective of the author 198 00:08:55,070 --> 00:08:57,490 versus the perspective of the spectator. The 199 00:08:57,490 --> 00:09:00,090 spectator's view, art as impression, that's the 200 00:09:00,090 --> 00:09:02,309 more common one, right? It asks what the art 201 00:09:02,309 --> 00:09:04,610 means to us, the people looking at it. Yes, and 202 00:09:04,610 --> 00:09:06,990 that tends to lead to psychological studies of 203 00:09:06,990 --> 00:09:08,970 reaction. You end up just tabulating the effects 204 00:09:08,970 --> 00:09:11,509 of art on a viewer. Whereas the author's perspective, 205 00:09:11,789 --> 00:09:14,110 art as expression, is where she thinks the more 206 00:09:14,110 --> 00:09:17,029 fertile philosophical ground is. Absolutely. 207 00:09:17,490 --> 00:09:21,049 It asks what moves the artist to create the work. 208 00:09:21,409 --> 00:09:23,269 and how that act of expression is structured. 209 00:09:23,710 --> 00:09:26,110 I mean, just as the most interesting philosophy 210 00:09:26,110 --> 00:09:28,570 of science comes from the problem scientists 211 00:09:28,570 --> 00:09:31,049 actually face in the lab. The most vital issues 212 00:09:31,049 --> 00:09:32,990 in the philosophy of art come from the creative 213 00:09:32,990 --> 00:09:35,590 challenges in the studio. Exactly. And those 214 00:09:35,590 --> 00:09:38,110 six dominant ideas look completely different 215 00:09:38,110 --> 00:09:40,269 depending on which side you're on. Take emotion, 216 00:09:40,549 --> 00:09:42,909 for instance. From the author's side, it's the 217 00:09:42,909 --> 00:09:45,029 source of the work. But from the spectator's 218 00:09:45,029 --> 00:09:47,690 side, it's the effect the work has on you. And 219 00:09:47,690 --> 00:09:50,210 if you only take that impressionist view, you 220 00:09:50,210 --> 00:09:53,269 risk reducing art analysis to just laboratory 221 00:09:53,269 --> 00:09:55,450 psychology, you know, measuring heart rates and 222 00:09:55,450 --> 00:09:58,009 galvanic skin response rather than looking at 223 00:09:58,009 --> 00:10:00,169 the art object itself. This all leads to the 224 00:10:00,169 --> 00:10:03,029 key paradox she wants to solve, the tendency 225 00:10:03,029 --> 00:10:05,470 of these leading ideas to just defeat themselves. 226 00:10:05,889 --> 00:10:09,250 Right. A critic develops one idea, say the idea 227 00:10:09,250 --> 00:10:11,789 of form, and then it seems to totally contradict 228 00:10:11,789 --> 00:10:14,379 another essential element like emotion. And so 229 00:10:14,379 --> 00:10:16,539 they just give up. They accept the clash as some 230 00:10:16,539 --> 00:10:19,519 kind of ultimate paradox. When for Langer, that 231 00:10:19,519 --> 00:10:22,019 is exactly where the real philosophical inquiry 232 00:10:22,019 --> 00:10:25,159 should begin. Her whole goal is to resolve these 233 00:10:25,159 --> 00:10:27,860 clashes by giving us a unified theory that explains 234 00:10:27,860 --> 00:10:30,639 why form and illusion or emotion and structure 235 00:10:30,639 --> 00:10:33,799 absolutely have to coexist. Which brings us to 236 00:10:33,799 --> 00:10:36,840 chapter three, the symbol of feeling. This is 237 00:10:36,840 --> 00:10:39,519 where she lays out that unified theory, the core 238 00:10:39,519 --> 00:10:42,259 hypothesis. And the hypothesis is so simple, 239 00:10:42,279 --> 00:10:45,909 but so powerful. Significant form, which really 240 00:10:45,909 --> 00:10:48,529 has significance, is the essence of every art. 241 00:10:48,929 --> 00:10:51,629 The unity of the arts isn't in their materials 242 00:10:51,629 --> 00:10:53,909 or their techniques. I mean, paint and sound 243 00:10:53,909 --> 00:10:55,950 waves are completely different things. The unity 244 00:10:55,950 --> 00:10:57,769 is in the singularity of their characteristic 245 00:10:57,769 --> 00:11:00,490 import. Art carries meaning, and that meaning 246 00:11:00,490 --> 00:11:02,610 is structural. And to get that, you have to remember 247 00:11:02,610 --> 00:11:05,490 the distinction she made earlier. Discursive 248 00:11:05,490 --> 00:11:07,690 versus non -discursive forms. We use discursive 249 00:11:07,690 --> 00:11:10,129 forms like language every single day. Right. 250 00:11:10,559 --> 00:11:12,460 Discursive symbols are the ones that rely on 251 00:11:12,460 --> 00:11:15,039 a one -to -one correlation between parts. Words 252 00:11:15,039 --> 00:11:17,539 and concepts correspond directly. They have fixed, 253 00:11:17,620 --> 00:11:20,220 conventional meanings. And you can combine them 254 00:11:20,220 --> 00:11:22,500 according to grammar and logic to make complex 255 00:11:22,500 --> 00:11:26,059 propositions. The cat is on the mat. The meaning 256 00:11:26,059 --> 00:11:29,720 is clear and built from the parts. Exactly. A 257 00:11:29,720 --> 00:11:31,899 sentence articulates a proposition automatically 258 00:11:31,899 --> 00:11:35,509 based on those fixed rules. But the art symbol 259 00:11:35,509 --> 00:11:38,830 is different. It's articulated. It has structure 260 00:11:38,830 --> 00:11:42,139 and parts. But it's profoundly non -discursive. 261 00:11:42,200 --> 00:11:45,360 It possesses import. It's meaningful. But it 262 00:11:45,360 --> 00:11:47,620 doesn't have a conventional reference or fixed 263 00:11:47,620 --> 00:11:50,360 meanings for its components. The significance 264 00:11:50,360 --> 00:11:53,039 isn't logically discriminated. It's felt as a 265 00:11:53,039 --> 00:11:55,820 quality that belongs to the form itself. So a 266 00:11:55,820 --> 00:11:58,120 musical passage doesn't translate into a fixed 267 00:11:58,120 --> 00:12:01,350 sentence. No. It embodies a structure of feeling 268 00:12:01,350 --> 00:12:03,570 that you perceive directly. I think that's the 269 00:12:03,570 --> 00:12:06,350 point we really need to get across. A non -discursive 270 00:12:06,350 --> 00:12:08,549 symbol doesn't tell you about a feeling. It gives 271 00:12:08,549 --> 00:12:11,450 you the form of the feeling. Yes. It models the 272 00:12:11,450 --> 00:12:14,129 dynamic patterns of human sentience. The tension, 273 00:12:14,269 --> 00:12:16,049 the release, the buildup, and the resolution. 274 00:12:16,289 --> 00:12:18,490 It shows you what feeling feels like. And this 275 00:12:18,490 --> 00:12:20,809 clarity is what lets her then critique what she 276 00:12:20,809 --> 00:12:23,450 calls the aesthetic experience cult that was 277 00:12:23,450 --> 00:12:26,370 popular in the early 20th century. The one championed 278 00:12:26,370 --> 00:12:29,110 by thinkers like H .S. Langefeld and David Prahl. 279 00:12:29,450 --> 00:12:31,730 Their whole idea was that to truly appreciate 280 00:12:31,730 --> 00:12:34,429 art, you had to achieve this sort of high -minded, 281 00:12:34,529 --> 00:12:38,149 rare, almost artificial state of being, the aesthetic 282 00:12:38,149 --> 00:12:40,690 attitude. You had to be totally absorbed in the 283 00:12:40,690 --> 00:12:43,549 art and consciously reject all of your real -world 284 00:12:43,549 --> 00:12:45,860 interests and concerns. So you couldn't be thinking 285 00:12:45,860 --> 00:12:47,960 about your grocery list or whether your chair 286 00:12:47,960 --> 00:12:50,600 was comfortable? No. They argued that because 287 00:12:50,600 --> 00:12:53,360 art appreciation was so sophisticated and so 288 00:12:53,360 --> 00:12:56,679 easily polluted by practical concerns, real art 289 00:12:56,679 --> 00:12:59,120 was reserved only for this highly cultured elite 290 00:12:59,120 --> 00:13:02,590 who could get into that pure state of mind. Prowl 291 00:13:02,590 --> 00:13:05,110 even admits that total aesthetic absorption is 292 00:13:05,110 --> 00:13:07,970 rare. So on this point, Lehner actually agrees 293 00:13:07,970 --> 00:13:10,590 more with the pragmatists like John Dewey. She 294 00:13:10,590 --> 00:13:14,350 does. Dewey saw art as natural, robust, fundamental 295 00:13:14,350 --> 00:13:17,049 to human experience, not some fragile little 296 00:13:17,049 --> 00:13:19,070 flower for the elite. But she doesn't go all 297 00:13:19,070 --> 00:13:21,789 the way with them. No. She argues that the pragmatists 298 00:13:21,789 --> 00:13:23,809 are a bit blinded by their biological premises. 299 00:13:24,149 --> 00:13:26,669 They often see art only in relation to behavior 300 00:13:26,669 --> 00:13:29,289 or pleasure or social function. But for her, 301 00:13:29,389 --> 00:13:32,490 art is robust for a different reason. its robustness 302 00:13:32,490 --> 00:13:35,409 comes not from biology but from its uniquely 303 00:13:35,409 --> 00:13:38,870 human symbolic function art is fundamental to 304 00:13:38,870 --> 00:13:41,389 human cognition because it's how we formulate 305 00:13:41,389 --> 00:13:44,370 feeling which is essential to consciousness itself 306 00:13:44,370 --> 00:13:47,389 and this distinction between just arranging things 307 00:13:47,389 --> 00:13:50,529 and actually creating something leads her to 308 00:13:50,529 --> 00:13:53,049 justify using one of the biggest words in art 309 00:13:53,049 --> 00:13:57,049 creation yes when an artist is working they're 310 00:13:57,049 --> 00:13:58,929 not just arranging materials that are already 311 00:13:58,929 --> 00:14:01,309 there They apply technique to create expressive 312 00:14:01,309 --> 00:14:04,450 form, the symbol of sentience. A simple artifact 313 00:14:04,450 --> 00:14:07,110 is just an arrangement of factors. But in a work 314 00:14:07,110 --> 00:14:10,169 of art, something entirely new emerges from that 315 00:14:10,169 --> 00:14:12,710 arrangement of materials. The tones, the colors, 316 00:14:12,850 --> 00:14:15,029 the words, something that was not there before. 317 00:14:15,389 --> 00:14:18,129 And that new entity is the symbol of sentience. 318 00:14:18,330 --> 00:14:20,190 So it's not just a reflection of how the artist 319 00:14:20,190 --> 00:14:22,549 was feeling that day. It's the conceptual birth 320 00:14:22,549 --> 00:14:25,049 of a dynamic form that holds abstract emotional 321 00:14:25,049 --> 00:14:27,389 meaning. And that's why creation is the right 322 00:14:27,389 --> 00:14:29,470 word. It elevates the act of making art from 323 00:14:29,470 --> 00:14:32,549 just being a craft to being a truly generative, 324 00:14:32,549 --> 00:14:35,470 intellectual, and philosophical act. The artist 325 00:14:35,470 --> 00:14:38,350 doesn't copy reality. The artist formulates it. 326 00:14:38,509 --> 00:14:40,549 Okay, so she's established the philosophical 327 00:14:40,549 --> 00:14:44,110 foundation. Art is a non -discursive symbol that 328 00:14:44,110 --> 00:14:47,429 gives form to human feeling. Now we get to part 329 00:14:47,429 --> 00:14:50,090 two, where she applies this idea to each of the 330 00:14:50,090 --> 00:14:52,710 individual arts, detailing the unique dimension 331 00:14:52,710 --> 00:14:55,169 that each art form creates. And this starts in 332 00:14:55,169 --> 00:14:56,850 chapter four, where she defines the fundamental 333 00:14:56,850 --> 00:14:59,529 thing that is created in every art, the image 334 00:14:59,529 --> 00:15:02,429 or semblance. The image, in her sense, is the 335 00:15:02,429 --> 00:15:05,190 ultimate artistic creation. Right. It's something 336 00:15:05,190 --> 00:15:08,049 new, made for the first time out of things that 337 00:15:08,049 --> 00:15:12,230 are not images, paint, stone, sound waves. And 338 00:15:12,230 --> 00:15:15,389 crucially, this semblance exists only for perception. 339 00:15:15,769 --> 00:15:18,549 It's abstracted entirely from the physical causal 340 00:15:18,549 --> 00:15:20,870 order of the world. It's not a new thing in the 341 00:15:20,870 --> 00:15:23,090 room. It's a creation that just pops into existence 342 00:15:23,090 --> 00:15:25,350 from the way the pigments or tones are arranged. 343 00:15:25,690 --> 00:15:28,210 We even see this in nature. She uses the analogy 344 00:15:28,210 --> 00:15:30,789 of optical illusions like rainbows or mirages. 345 00:15:31,169 --> 00:15:33,909 They're perfectly definite visible objects, but 346 00:15:33,909 --> 00:15:35,929 they're intangible. They're abstracted from physical 347 00:15:35,929 --> 00:15:38,570 cause and effect. She uses the German term shine 348 00:15:38,570 --> 00:15:41,570 to explain this. Which means mere semblance. 349 00:15:42,230 --> 00:15:44,870 Shine is the mechanism that estranges the artistic 350 00:15:44,870 --> 00:15:48,450 form from actuality, from the physical world. 351 00:15:48,850 --> 00:15:52,190 It gives the art object its otherness, and that's 352 00:15:52,190 --> 00:15:54,850 what frees it up to express human feeling. The 353 00:15:54,850 --> 00:15:57,110 form has to be clearly separated from its raw 354 00:15:57,110 --> 00:15:59,330 materials and its literal functions before it 355 00:15:59,330 --> 00:16:01,289 can carry that expressive import. If you're just 356 00:16:01,289 --> 00:16:03,330 looking at the paint on the canvas, you aren't 357 00:16:03,330 --> 00:16:05,210 seeing the painting. And this abstraction is 358 00:16:05,210 --> 00:16:08,190 there even in the simplest, most universal decorative 359 00:16:08,190 --> 00:16:10,990 forms. Absolutely. The universal patterns we 360 00:16:10,990 --> 00:16:13,629 see across cultures, zigzags, scrolls, circles, 361 00:16:13,889 --> 00:16:16,570 she suggests they aren't just random design choices. 362 00:16:16,789 --> 00:16:19,690 They're direct projections of vital feeling into 363 00:16:19,690 --> 00:16:22,610 a visible shape. They offer a kind of logic of 364 00:16:22,610 --> 00:16:25,090 vision. A logic that conforms to the biological 365 00:16:25,090 --> 00:16:28,970 rhythms of life motion, rest, rhythmic unity, 366 00:16:29,210 --> 00:16:32,750 tension, not the abstract conceptual logic of 367 00:16:32,750 --> 00:16:35,470 geometry. So a simple, well -made design isn't 368 00:16:35,470 --> 00:16:37,629 just pleasing to the eye, it's actually expressive. 369 00:16:37,809 --> 00:16:40,230 It's teaching our plastic imagination the logic 370 00:16:40,230 --> 00:16:42,509 of how human vitality translates into visual 371 00:16:42,509 --> 00:16:45,889 form. It's an elementary symbol. It carves visual 372 00:16:45,889 --> 00:16:49,110 elements out of chaos that line up with our biological 373 00:16:49,110 --> 00:16:51,629 feeling and our emotional life, our sentience. 374 00:16:52,009 --> 00:16:55,490 That's why a simple, successful design has what 375 00:16:55,490 --> 00:16:58,070 she calls living form, while a purely geometrical 376 00:16:58,070 --> 00:17:01,190 drawing is just inert. Okay, that brings us to 377 00:17:01,190 --> 00:17:04,289 the core of part two, the primary illusions specific 378 00:17:04,289 --> 00:17:07,309 to the great art forms. She starts with the plastic 379 00:17:07,309 --> 00:17:09,849 arts in chapters five and six, painting, sculpture, 380 00:17:09,990 --> 00:17:12,690 and architecture, and their shared primary dimension 381 00:17:12,690 --> 00:17:15,529 is virtual space. Virtual space. It's the primary 382 00:17:15,529 --> 00:17:17,930 illusion of all plastic art. It's an intangible 383 00:17:17,930 --> 00:17:19,910 image, totally self -contained, independent, 384 00:17:20,269 --> 00:17:23,250 and it has absolutely no continuity with the 385 00:17:23,250 --> 00:17:26,480 literal physical space that we live in. The space 386 00:17:26,480 --> 00:17:28,680 inside the painting does not leak out into the 387 00:17:28,680 --> 00:17:30,579 room. It does not. So let's break this down. 388 00:17:30,799 --> 00:17:33,519 How is it achieved in painting first, where the 389 00:17:33,519 --> 00:17:36,339 virtual space is an illusory scene? In painting, 390 00:17:36,460 --> 00:17:38,819 the space is entirely visual. It's created by 391 00:17:38,819 --> 00:17:41,039 the use of color and shape. And Langer really 392 00:17:41,039 --> 00:17:43,099 emphasizes that if you take away the colors and 393 00:17:43,099 --> 00:17:45,519 the shapes, the space just vanishes. So it's 394 00:17:45,519 --> 00:17:47,599 not a pre -existing box that the artist fills 395 00:17:47,599 --> 00:17:50,519 up? Not at all. The way the visual elements are 396 00:17:50,519 --> 00:17:52,720 arranged is what brings the space into being. 397 00:17:53,099 --> 00:17:55,599 This is why you hear artists talk about the animation 398 00:17:55,599 --> 00:17:58,099 of the canvas surface. Like Edward Wadsworth 399 00:17:58,099 --> 00:18:00,380 saying, a picture is the animation of an inert 400 00:18:00,380 --> 00:18:03,319 plane surface. Or Alfred Sisley talking about 401 00:18:03,319 --> 00:18:06,119 the need to give life to the work. They're transforming 402 00:18:06,119 --> 00:18:09,220 a flat, two -dimensional surface into an active, 403 00:18:09,339 --> 00:18:12,460 three -dimensional virtual space. They're distributing 404 00:18:12,460 --> 00:18:15,660 weights and creating tensions that are only perceptible 405 00:18:15,660 --> 00:18:18,319 visually and psychologically, not physically. 406 00:18:18,579 --> 00:18:20,579 And the shapes create this independent visual 407 00:18:20,579 --> 00:18:23,140 field that's complete and self -contained where 408 00:18:23,140 --> 00:18:25,980 the dynamics of form can express feeling. Exactly. 409 00:18:26,079 --> 00:18:29,160 Now in sculpture, the illusion shifts a little 410 00:18:29,160 --> 00:18:32,039 bit. It's the semblance of organism and it creates 411 00:18:32,039 --> 00:18:35,160 what she calls virtual kinetic volume. So the 412 00:18:35,160 --> 00:18:37,460 space is organized by the presence of a living 413 00:18:37,460 --> 00:18:39,579 form. Right. And you see this in the language 414 00:18:39,579 --> 00:18:41,900 sculptors use. They talk about inevitable form 415 00:18:41,900 --> 00:18:45,240 or necessary form. Langer argues these terms 416 00:18:45,240 --> 00:18:47,400 come directly from the feeling of vital function, 417 00:18:47,519 --> 00:18:50,640 that sense that an organism's structure is intrinsically 418 00:18:50,640 --> 00:18:53,420 tied to its purpose and its life processes. So 419 00:18:53,420 --> 00:18:55,240 even if you're working with dead material like 420 00:18:55,240 --> 00:18:58,339 wood or cold metal, the artist gives it the form 421 00:18:58,339 --> 00:19:01,339 of life. And that form organizes the space around 422 00:19:01,339 --> 00:19:05,380 it with a vitalized kinetic volume. The viewer 423 00:19:05,380 --> 00:19:08,420 perceives this potential for movement, this internal 424 00:19:08,420 --> 00:19:11,880 necessity in the object, even if it's purely 425 00:19:11,880 --> 00:19:13,920 abstract and doesn't represent a person at all. 426 00:19:14,079 --> 00:19:16,599 Then we get to architecture, and its primary 427 00:19:16,599 --> 00:19:18,960 illusion seems like the hardest one to grasp 428 00:19:18,960 --> 00:19:21,900 because its utility, its function as a shelter, 429 00:19:21,980 --> 00:19:24,160 is always getting in the way of its aesthetic 430 00:19:24,160 --> 00:19:27,259 purpose. It is. The illusion architecture creates 431 00:19:27,259 --> 00:19:31,299 is the virtual place or an ethnic domain. It's 432 00:19:31,299 --> 00:19:33,480 a space that's articulated by the imprint of 433 00:19:33,480 --> 00:19:36,619 human life. feeling, and history. And it has 434 00:19:36,619 --> 00:19:39,259 to feel fundamentally organic. This is what architects 435 00:19:39,259 --> 00:19:41,319 like Louis Sullivan or Frank Lloyd Wright were 436 00:19:41,319 --> 00:19:43,359 getting at with their ideas of organic growth. 437 00:19:43,579 --> 00:19:46,140 Right. The architectural place is an illusion, 438 00:19:46,380 --> 00:19:48,880 an atmosphere that completely disappears if you 439 00:19:48,880 --> 00:19:51,380 radically alter or destroy the house, even if 440 00:19:51,380 --> 00:19:53,599 the geographical spot is still there. It's the 441 00:19:53,599 --> 00:19:55,940 human articulation of the space that creates 442 00:19:55,940 --> 00:19:57,900 the illusion. And there's a key principle here 443 00:19:57,900 --> 00:20:00,759 from the Bauhaus movement. Yes. The idea that 444 00:20:00,759 --> 00:20:02,920 architecture proceeds from the inside to the 445 00:20:02,920 --> 00:20:07,240 outside. The facade, the outer wall, is just 446 00:20:07,240 --> 00:20:09,980 the outer limit of a vital living system inside. 447 00:20:10,460 --> 00:20:13,180 The building defines a contained ethnic domain, 448 00:20:13,400 --> 00:20:16,779 articulating a whole psychological and social 449 00:20:16,779 --> 00:20:19,640 atmosphere. So painting creates a visual scene, 450 00:20:19,859 --> 00:20:22,940 sculpture creates an active living form, and 451 00:20:22,940 --> 00:20:25,720 architecture creates a humanized world, a place 452 00:20:25,720 --> 00:20:28,460 for a community to feel and act. That's the feeling 453 00:20:28,460 --> 00:20:30,859 structure at Abstracts, and that also explains 454 00:20:30,859 --> 00:20:32,740 the relationship between architecture and sculpture. 455 00:20:33,230 --> 00:20:35,609 they merge so well because the kinetic living 456 00:20:35,609 --> 00:20:38,930 form of sculpture naturally supports that deeper 457 00:20:38,930 --> 00:20:41,730 humanizing illusion of the architectural ethnic 458 00:20:41,730 --> 00:20:44,190 domain okay so we've covered space now we move 459 00:20:44,190 --> 00:20:45,950 to the dimension of time which is the domain 460 00:20:45,950 --> 00:20:48,430 of music that's chapter seven and eight Langer 461 00:20:48,430 --> 00:20:50,710 starts by rejecting systems that try to reduce 462 00:20:50,710 --> 00:20:53,109 music just to its physical materials. Right, 463 00:20:53,190 --> 00:20:55,289 all those systems based on mathematical ratios 464 00:20:55,289 --> 00:20:57,829 or things like the Schillinger system or Burkhoff's 465 00:20:57,829 --> 00:20:59,789 aesthetic measure. They try to treat music as 466 00:20:59,789 --> 00:21:02,450 an exact quantifiable science based on the physics 467 00:21:02,450 --> 00:21:05,089 of tones. But Langer insists that while those 468 00:21:05,089 --> 00:21:07,789 systems are analyzing the ingredients, they're 469 00:21:07,789 --> 00:21:09,750 completely missing the philosophical question, 470 00:21:09,970 --> 00:21:13,049 which is, what is the essence of music as an 471 00:21:13,049 --> 00:21:16,630 art form? And for her, its essence is its primary 472 00:21:16,630 --> 00:21:20,230 illusion. Virtual time. The image of subjective 473 00:21:20,230 --> 00:21:22,869 time or what philosophers sometimes call lived 474 00:21:22,869 --> 00:21:25,029 time. Exactly. And just like pictorial space 475 00:21:25,029 --> 00:21:28,589 is purely a visual thing, musical motion, which 476 00:21:28,589 --> 00:21:31,650 seems so real to us, is purely semblance. It's 477 00:21:31,650 --> 00:21:33,950 a non -physical dynamic. Nothing is physically 478 00:21:33,950 --> 00:21:36,289 moving across the stage when we hear a melody 479 00:21:36,289 --> 00:21:39,089 rise or chords get closer together. The notes 480 00:21:39,089 --> 00:21:41,130 themselves are just vibrations in the air. In 481 00:21:41,130 --> 00:21:43,710 fact, a sustained loud note is often vibrating 482 00:21:43,710 --> 00:21:45,849 faster at its point of rest, like a held C note. 483 00:21:46,259 --> 00:21:47,920 Musical motion is something completely different 484 00:21:47,920 --> 00:21:50,180 from physical displacement. It's a semblance 485 00:21:50,180 --> 00:21:52,599 of dynamic change that exists only in our perception. 486 00:21:52,920 --> 00:21:55,339 And that subjective quality is what separates 487 00:21:55,339 --> 00:21:57,599 musical duration from clock time. Clock time 488 00:21:57,599 --> 00:21:59,940 is measurable, constant. Musical time is fluid, 489 00:22:00,059 --> 00:22:02,059 it speeds up, it slows down, all based on its 490 00:22:02,059 --> 00:22:03,980 internal structure. And this brings us right 491 00:22:03,980 --> 00:22:07,420 to rhythm in Chapter 8. Langer's definition of 492 00:22:07,420 --> 00:22:09,460 rhythm is so much more than just equal divisions 493 00:22:09,460 --> 00:22:13,160 of time, or meter. For her, rhythm is the dynamic 494 00:22:13,160 --> 00:22:16,140 relation between tensions and resolutions. It's 495 00:22:16,140 --> 00:22:18,440 rooted in the organic rhythm of life itself. 496 00:22:18,759 --> 00:22:21,400 The systolic and diastolic actions of the heart, 497 00:22:21,559 --> 00:22:24,380 the intake and release of breath, the rise and 498 00:22:24,380 --> 00:22:27,319 fall of passions. The exhaustion of one process 499 00:22:27,319 --> 00:22:29,700 automatically kicks off a corrective action, 500 00:22:29,839 --> 00:22:32,339 which then sets up new tensions by resolving 501 00:22:32,339 --> 00:22:35,240 the old ones. And that dynamic pattern of subjective 502 00:22:35,240 --> 00:22:38,200 time, that feeling of urgency, expectation, and 503 00:22:38,200 --> 00:22:40,900 then fulfillment, that is the commanding form 504 00:22:40,900 --> 00:22:43,730 of music. anything that prepares a future a regular 505 00:22:43,730 --> 00:22:46,369 beat a harmonic progression that leads away from 506 00:22:46,369 --> 00:22:48,630 the home chord a tendency tone that just has 507 00:22:48,630 --> 00:22:51,410 to resolve all of that creates rhythm and in 508 00:22:51,410 --> 00:22:53,789 doing so it's articulating the symbol of feeling 509 00:22:53,789 --> 00:22:56,509 directly now chapter 10 the principle of assimilation 510 00:22:56,509 --> 00:22:59,650 deals with hybrid forms specifically music with 511 00:22:59,650 --> 00:23:01,750 words and this is where she makes that famously 512 00:23:01,750 --> 00:23:04,089 provocative claim when a composer puts a poem 513 00:23:04,089 --> 00:23:06,630 to music he annihilates the poem and makes a 514 00:23:06,630 --> 00:23:09,279 song Which is a direct consequence of her principle 515 00:23:09,279 --> 00:23:12,380 that the dominant art form in a hybrid work just 516 00:23:12,380 --> 00:23:14,900 assimilates the material from the other. The 517 00:23:14,900 --> 00:23:17,299 words themselves, no matter how good they are 518 00:23:17,299 --> 00:23:19,539 as literature, just become a composable idea 519 00:23:19,539 --> 00:23:22,200 or a text. They're the initial spark for the 520 00:23:22,200 --> 00:23:24,660 musician's imagination. But then the music takes 521 00:23:24,660 --> 00:23:27,420 over and completely transforms the verbal meaning. 522 00:23:27,599 --> 00:23:29,579 And she has great examples for this, like Franz 523 00:23:29,579 --> 00:23:32,400 Schubert using these, frankly, second -rate poems 524 00:23:32,400 --> 00:23:35,160 by Wilhelm Müller. The literary quality of the 525 00:23:35,160 --> 00:23:38,359 poem. just disappears, or it's completely redeemed 526 00:23:38,359 --> 00:23:40,740 by the music. It's the musical form that's in 527 00:23:40,740 --> 00:23:43,319 command of the work, not the words. The composers 528 00:23:43,319 --> 00:23:45,440 themselves seem to understand this. Oh, absolutely. 529 00:23:45,839 --> 00:23:47,960 Robert Schumann had that wonderful line about 530 00:23:47,960 --> 00:23:50,740 how the poem should lie like a bride in the minstrel's 531 00:23:50,740 --> 00:23:54,079 arm, free, happy, and entire. The poem has to 532 00:23:54,079 --> 00:23:56,700 be willing to be subsumed by the musical idea. 533 00:23:57,019 --> 00:23:58,980 And there's that incredible anecdote from Mozart 534 00:23:58,980 --> 00:24:01,480 about his opera, The Abduction from the Surreal. 535 00:24:01,660 --> 00:24:04,279 He wrote to his father about the libretto. And 536 00:24:04,279 --> 00:24:07,170 he admits the poetry wasn't great. But he loved 537 00:24:07,170 --> 00:24:10,650 it. And he loved it precisely because it fits 538 00:24:10,650 --> 00:24:13,009 so well with the musical ideas that were already 539 00:24:13,009 --> 00:24:16,089 buzzing around in his head. For a composer, a 540 00:24:16,089 --> 00:24:18,269 good text is simply one that can be transformed 541 00:24:18,269 --> 00:24:21,369 into music. And Mozart also insisted that the 542 00:24:21,369 --> 00:24:24,049 music has to maintain its own artistic integrity, 543 00:24:24,369 --> 00:24:28,109 even in moments of intense emotion. He said passions, 544 00:24:28,269 --> 00:24:31,069 whether they're violent or not, must never be 545 00:24:31,069 --> 00:24:33,359 expressed to the point of disgust. The music, 546 00:24:33,460 --> 00:24:36,059 even in the most terrifying situation, must always 547 00:24:36,059 --> 00:24:39,240 remain music. So the use of, say, rapid violins 548 00:24:39,240 --> 00:24:42,539 to suggest rage or a heart beating has to be 549 00:24:42,539 --> 00:24:44,619 assimilated into the musical structure. It can't 550 00:24:44,619 --> 00:24:46,700 just be an imitation of noise. It can't be an 551 00:24:46,700 --> 00:24:49,259 undramatized expression of self. It has to serve 552 00:24:49,259 --> 00:24:51,779 the art. OK, let's shift gears now to chapters 553 00:24:51,779 --> 00:24:54,960 11 and 12, which focus on dance. This is an art 554 00:24:54,960 --> 00:24:56,779 form that's often misunderstood, right? People 555 00:24:56,779 --> 00:24:58,880 call it music made visible or just an art of 556 00:24:58,880 --> 00:25:01,039 space. And Langer says that's completely wrong. 557 00:25:01,339 --> 00:25:04,660 She defined its primary illusion as virtual powers, 558 00:25:04,880 --> 00:25:07,920 the semblance of concentrated living force. And 559 00:25:07,920 --> 00:25:10,500 its basic abstraction is virtual gesture. Right. 560 00:25:10,579 --> 00:25:13,140 In our real lives, a gesture is symptomatic. 561 00:25:13,160 --> 00:25:15,980 It reveals our momentary desires or what we intend 562 00:25:15,980 --> 00:25:19,569 to do. But in dance. gesture becomes symbolic. 563 00:25:19,769 --> 00:25:23,009 It emanates from a created personality or a psychical 564 00:25:23,009 --> 00:25:26,130 being, a character or force that the dancer embodies. 565 00:25:26,210 --> 00:25:28,230 So whether the dancer is trying to portray a 566 00:25:28,230 --> 00:25:30,490 character or is performing a totally abstract 567 00:25:30,490 --> 00:25:33,490 sequence, the source of the movement is always 568 00:25:33,490 --> 00:25:35,529 perceived as coming from this internal center 569 00:25:35,529 --> 00:25:38,509 of created life. A power source that fuels the 570 00:25:38,509 --> 00:25:41,369 movement. That is the virtual power. And this 571 00:25:41,369 --> 00:25:44,029 illusion of powers connects dance really deeply 572 00:25:44,029 --> 00:25:46,470 to our human experience of force and effort. 573 00:25:46,690 --> 00:25:49,650 And even to mythic imagination. Our first understanding 574 00:25:49,650 --> 00:25:51,789 of dynamic relations comes from our own experience 575 00:25:51,789 --> 00:25:55,029 of effort, conflict, strength. The pre -scientific 576 00:25:55,029 --> 00:25:57,470 mythic view of the world is often a realm of 577 00:25:57,470 --> 00:26:00,309 individual living forces, what we might call 578 00:26:00,309 --> 00:26:02,509 the spirit world. Dance taps right into that 579 00:26:02,509 --> 00:26:05,130 fundamental way of thinking. It does. And this 580 00:26:05,130 --> 00:26:07,309 explains why the primary illusion of dance is 581 00:26:07,309 --> 00:26:09,490 so dominant that it can successfully assimilate 582 00:26:09,490 --> 00:26:11,809 all these other artistic devices. Because its 583 00:26:11,809 --> 00:26:14,970 basic illusion is virtual power, it can use music, 584 00:26:14,970 --> 00:26:17,490 space, and time for its own purposes without 585 00:26:17,490 --> 00:26:20,630 being derived from them. Exactly. Langer notes 586 00:26:20,630 --> 00:26:23,269 that a lot of very talented dancers, like Isadora 587 00:26:23,269 --> 00:26:26,069 Duncan, were reportedly not great judges of musical 588 00:26:26,069 --> 00:26:28,349 quality. but they had a perfect understanding 589 00:26:28,349 --> 00:26:30,609 of the rhythmic movements needed for their dance. 590 00:26:30,950 --> 00:26:33,910 The music was just a tool to articulate the dynamics 591 00:26:33,910 --> 00:26:36,650 of the virtual power. Okay, let's move on to 592 00:26:36,650 --> 00:26:39,289 the final set of dimensions, chapters 13 to 16, 593 00:26:39,490 --> 00:26:42,750 which cover poesis or literature. Here, the poet 594 00:26:42,750 --> 00:26:45,289 uses discursive language, but they use it to 595 00:26:45,289 --> 00:26:48,349 create a non -discursive symbolic form. And that 596 00:26:48,349 --> 00:26:50,910 form is virtual events. The illusion literature 597 00:26:50,910 --> 00:26:53,990 creates is a piece of virtual history, a chain 598 00:26:53,990 --> 00:26:56,230 of imaginative action and feeling where those 599 00:26:56,230 --> 00:26:58,869 two things are still completely undivorced. This 600 00:26:58,869 --> 00:27:01,650 history has to feel experiential, limited only 601 00:27:01,650 --> 00:27:04,390 to what a human subject perceives, not objective 602 00:27:04,390 --> 00:27:06,789 reality. She has a really powerful example for 603 00:27:06,789 --> 00:27:09,190 this, a Chinese poem called A Farewell in the 604 00:27:09,190 --> 00:27:11,990 Evening Rain. It's a great one. The poet uses 605 00:27:11,990 --> 00:27:14,009 these simple common sense statements. There's 606 00:27:14,009 --> 00:27:17,349 rain, a bell, some sails. But everything of common 607 00:27:17,349 --> 00:27:19,470 sense importance is just radically left out. 608 00:27:19,690 --> 00:27:22,569 The focus is entirely on this highly selective 609 00:27:22,569 --> 00:27:26,009 presentation of images. And that selection is 610 00:27:26,009 --> 00:27:29,170 the art. The physical facts just disappear. And 611 00:27:29,170 --> 00:27:32,029 this profound psychological event, the complex 612 00:27:32,029 --> 00:27:34,750 feeling of parting, is created by that artistic 613 00:27:34,750 --> 00:27:37,980 selection. The final line. where the rain on 614 00:27:37,980 --> 00:27:40,220 the river and the sails eventually merges into 615 00:27:40,220 --> 00:27:43,160 there are threads of water on our faces. It shows 616 00:27:43,160 --> 00:27:45,480 how the external atmosphere and the internal 617 00:27:45,480 --> 00:27:48,500 emotion have just fused. The events are crafted 618 00:27:48,500 --> 00:27:51,180 in a psychological mode to intensify feeling 619 00:27:51,180 --> 00:27:53,960 and make them more significant than actual history. 620 00:27:54,220 --> 00:27:56,299 And then in chapter 15, we get the unique dimension 621 00:27:56,299 --> 00:27:58,759 of verbal art, the way it structures our perception 622 00:27:58,759 --> 00:28:01,759 as a reader. She calls it virtual memory. Literature. 623 00:28:02,170 --> 00:28:04,250 when we hear it or read it, creates the illusion 624 00:28:04,250 --> 00:28:06,970 of life in the mode as a virtual past. Actual 625 00:28:06,970 --> 00:28:09,029 personal history is a mess. It's fragmented. 626 00:28:09,049 --> 00:28:12,630 It's full of gaps. It lacks continuity. But the 627 00:28:12,630 --> 00:28:15,730 past, created by literature, has a unity that 628 00:28:15,730 --> 00:28:18,970 our actual history lacks. It's experiential and 629 00:28:18,970 --> 00:28:22,309 it's progressive. It feels like a single unfolding 630 00:28:22,309 --> 00:28:25,950 action that's complete in itself. She even analyzes 631 00:28:25,950 --> 00:28:28,029 how this is achieved through the artistic use 632 00:28:28,029 --> 00:28:30,450 of tense. There's the timeless present of science 633 00:28:30,450 --> 00:28:33,230 or logic, and then there's the historical present 634 00:28:33,230 --> 00:28:35,589 that's used in narrative to heighten the vividness. 635 00:28:35,750 --> 00:28:37,890 Like in the rhyme of the ancient mariner, to 636 00:28:37,890 --> 00:28:40,930 make past actions feel immediate. But the most 637 00:28:40,930 --> 00:28:43,250 curious use is that grammatically inconsistent 638 00:28:43,250 --> 00:28:46,029 mixing of past and present that you see in traditional 639 00:28:46,029 --> 00:28:48,769 ballads. Langer argues this isn't a mistake. 640 00:28:48,950 --> 00:28:51,650 It's serving a crucial artistic purpose. It creates 641 00:28:51,650 --> 00:28:53,650 the effect of something that is both fixed in 642 00:28:53,650 --> 00:28:55,650 the past and immediately perceived, like it's 643 00:28:55,650 --> 00:28:58,170 timeless. A story that is both historical and 644 00:28:58,170 --> 00:29:00,250 eternally relevant. This also explains why when 645 00:29:00,250 --> 00:29:01,930 we're just outlining the plot of a story for 646 00:29:01,930 --> 00:29:04,390 someone, the non -artistic synopsis, we automatically 647 00:29:04,390 --> 00:29:07,430 swish to the present tense. Because in that synopsis, 648 00:29:07,430 --> 00:29:09,250 we're just showing the raw material, the pure 649 00:29:09,250 --> 00:29:12,829 plot, which she argues is essentially timeless. 650 00:29:13,450 --> 00:29:15,569 We use the present tense to avoid pretending 651 00:29:15,569 --> 00:29:18,150 that our little summary has the same literary 652 00:29:18,150 --> 00:29:21,369 status as the full work of virtual memory. In 653 00:29:21,369 --> 00:29:23,930 Chapter 16, The Great Literary Forms, she looks 654 00:29:23,930 --> 00:29:26,710 at how these specialized devices then shape entire 655 00:29:26,710 --> 00:29:30,150 literary works. She notes how earlier forms, 656 00:29:30,329 --> 00:29:32,970 like the romance, introduced explicit social 657 00:29:32,970 --> 00:29:34,950 settings and constant character relationships, 658 00:29:35,349 --> 00:29:38,190 which slowed down the rapid action of the ballad 659 00:29:38,190 --> 00:29:40,769 and allowed for these complex intertwined plots. 660 00:29:41,279 --> 00:29:43,240 And that leads naturally to the modern novel. 661 00:29:43,400 --> 00:29:45,440 Which is the form that is uniquely suited to 662 00:29:45,440 --> 00:29:48,259 articulating modern life by focusing on the hazards 663 00:29:48,259 --> 00:29:50,759 of personality. Henry James called the novelist's 664 00:29:50,759 --> 00:29:53,539 job creating the illusion of felt life. And Langer 665 00:29:53,539 --> 00:29:56,240 warns that novels are often misjudged. People 666 00:29:56,240 --> 00:29:58,880 treat them as sociological or psychological commentary. 667 00:29:59,319 --> 00:30:02,819 When their aim, like all art, is poetic. To formulate 668 00:30:02,819 --> 00:30:05,079 feeling and to make the complexities of modern 669 00:30:05,079 --> 00:30:07,630 subjective life intelligible. And before we leave 670 00:30:07,630 --> 00:30:09,950 literature, she has this surprising classification 671 00:30:09,950 --> 00:30:12,390 for discursive writing. Nonfiction as applied 672 00:30:12,390 --> 00:30:15,789 art. Right. Discursive writing essays, history, 673 00:30:15,930 --> 00:30:18,490 philosophy. She sees it as a really important 674 00:30:18,490 --> 00:30:21,410 form of applied art. Like a scientific drawing, 675 00:30:21,670 --> 00:30:24,650 it serves actuality. Its purpose is to communicate 676 00:30:24,650 --> 00:30:27,150 facts or arguments. But when it's done with mastery, 677 00:30:27,329 --> 00:30:29,490 it meets an artistic standard. By exploiting 678 00:30:29,490 --> 00:30:32,589 discursive form itself as a motif, it achieves 679 00:30:32,589 --> 00:30:35,069 clarity and elegance through its structure and 680 00:30:35,069 --> 00:30:37,940 composition. The author isn't creating events, 681 00:30:38,319 --> 00:30:40,960 but they're organizing items drawn from life 682 00:30:40,960 --> 00:30:44,619 with a real artistic formal rigor. Okay, let's 683 00:30:44,619 --> 00:30:46,640 move to the final art form she covers in this 684 00:30:46,640 --> 00:30:49,500 section, chapters 17 through 19, which is the 685 00:30:49,500 --> 00:30:53,220 dramatic illusion, drama. The literary mode is 686 00:30:53,220 --> 00:30:56,039 virtual memory. The dramatic mode is destiny. 687 00:30:56,319 --> 00:30:58,859 Drama moves not toward the present, like narrative 688 00:30:58,859 --> 00:31:01,480 does, but toward something beyond. It deals with 689 00:31:01,480 --> 00:31:04,539 consequences and final commitments. Drama creates 690 00:31:04,539 --> 00:31:07,430 a virtual future. The action is constructed so 691 00:31:07,430 --> 00:31:10,009 that a whole indivisible piece of virtual history 692 00:31:10,009 --> 00:31:12,809 is implicit right from the start. Which generates 693 00:31:12,809 --> 00:31:14,890 this constant illusion of an imminent future. 694 00:31:14,950 --> 00:31:17,289 It's a feeling she calls form and suspense, and 695 00:31:17,289 --> 00:31:18,950 you feel it from the moment the curtain rises. 696 00:31:19,309 --> 00:31:21,789 And she identifies the two great rhythms that 697 00:31:21,789 --> 00:31:24,710 govern this dramatic form, the comic and the 698 00:31:24,710 --> 00:31:27,750 tragic. Let's start with the comic rhythm. The 699 00:31:27,750 --> 00:31:30,210 comic rhythm reflects the fundamental life feeling 700 00:31:30,210 --> 00:31:34,750 of survival. Here, destiny is presented as fortune. 701 00:31:35,279 --> 00:31:38,119 A chaotic mix of random events, opportunities, 702 00:31:38,279 --> 00:31:41,619 and dangers. The rhythm is one of upset and recovery. 703 00:31:42,140 --> 00:31:44,359 The protagonist copes with the world through 704 00:31:44,359 --> 00:31:47,339 wit or resilience or just sheer luck. And the 705 00:31:47,339 --> 00:31:49,839 defining comic figure is the buffoon punch, the 706 00:31:49,839 --> 00:31:52,700 clown. He's the personified Elan Veedle, the 707 00:31:52,700 --> 00:31:54,700 indomitable living creature fending for itself. 708 00:31:55,289 --> 00:31:57,930 The buffoon is close to the animal world, all 709 00:31:57,930 --> 00:32:00,769 motion and whim and impulse. And he's essential 710 00:32:00,769 --> 00:32:02,490 because he builds up that comic rhythm, that 711 00:32:02,490 --> 00:32:04,450 essential lilt and balance and persistence of 712 00:32:04,450 --> 00:32:06,390 life, no matter what setbacks happen. And the 713 00:32:06,390 --> 00:32:08,549 form of comedy is inherently open -ended. It 714 00:32:08,549 --> 00:32:11,410 suggests life just goes on. Right, but the tragic 715 00:32:11,410 --> 00:32:13,450 rhythm reflects that darker consciousness of 716 00:32:13,450 --> 00:32:16,049 mortality. In tragedy, destiny is presented as 717 00:32:16,049 --> 00:32:18,609 fate. It's the inevitable conclusion determined 718 00:32:18,609 --> 00:32:21,799 by inherent human nature. Because we are aware 719 00:32:21,799 --> 00:32:23,859 of our individual history as a passage from birth 720 00:32:23,859 --> 00:32:27,240 to death, the hero's life becomes a career, the 721 00:32:27,240 --> 00:32:29,819 realization and complete exhaustion of all his 722 00:32:29,819 --> 00:32:32,720 possibilities. And the action is closed, final, 723 00:32:32,900 --> 00:32:35,980 and passional, culminating inevitably in defeat 724 00:32:35,980 --> 00:32:39,119 and death. And tragedy uses dramatic exaggeration 725 00:32:39,119 --> 00:32:43,000 to intensify this virtual life. This is key to 726 00:32:43,000 --> 00:32:45,319 its social function. What function is that? The 727 00:32:45,319 --> 00:32:47,319 exaggeration in the action, the setting, the 728 00:32:47,319 --> 00:32:49,619 spectacle, lighting, music, costumes. It all 729 00:32:49,619 --> 00:32:51,920 serves a profound purpose. Yeah. It heightens 730 00:32:51,920 --> 00:32:54,319 the lure of the world. It makes the hero's life 731 00:32:54,319 --> 00:32:57,440 seem extraordinarily worthwhile, rich, and beautiful. 732 00:32:57,660 --> 00:32:59,859 So by doing that, it makes the final defeat and 733 00:32:59,859 --> 00:33:02,640 death. truly awesome. It elevates mortality from 734 00:33:02,640 --> 00:33:05,119 just being a simple biological event to a profound 735 00:33:05,119 --> 00:33:08,160 shared human experience. And Langer notes that 736 00:33:08,160 --> 00:33:10,480 the hero's famous tragic flaw is really an artistic 737 00:33:10,480 --> 00:33:13,039 element. It marks the limit of his power and 738 00:33:13,039 --> 00:33:15,019 ensures that the action is finite and complete. 739 00:33:15,259 --> 00:33:17,839 So we've moved through the creation of the symbol 740 00:33:17,839 --> 00:33:21,019 across all the arts. In chapter 20, Langer comes 741 00:33:21,019 --> 00:33:22,980 back to that central philosophical question. 742 00:33:23,619 --> 00:33:26,319 How is the art symbol's import actually known? 743 00:33:26,890 --> 00:33:29,730 If it's not discursive, How does meaning get 744 00:33:29,730 --> 00:33:33,170 transferred without language? Her answer is through 745 00:33:33,170 --> 00:33:36,809 intellectual intuition. And this isn't some mystical 746 00:33:36,809 --> 00:33:40,410 instantaneous vision. She defines it as the most 747 00:33:40,410 --> 00:33:44,309 elementary cognitive process, a direct, immediate 748 00:33:44,309 --> 00:33:49,019 insight into relatedness. congruence, and formal 749 00:33:49,019 --> 00:33:51,519 significance. So all cognition of form, whether 750 00:33:51,519 --> 00:33:53,799 it's recognizing a square or perceiving the rhythm 751 00:33:53,799 --> 00:33:56,240 of a fugue, is fundamentally intuitive. It's 752 00:33:56,240 --> 00:33:58,539 the basic symbolic value through which we apprehend 753 00:33:58,539 --> 00:34:01,079 art. And she uses this idea to address a big 754 00:34:01,079 --> 00:34:02,980 criticism in aesthetics, what we could call the 755 00:34:02,980 --> 00:34:05,319 Collingwood problem. Right. R .G. Collingwood 756 00:34:05,319 --> 00:34:07,660 claimed that an artist can't possibly know what 757 00:34:07,660 --> 00:34:09,840 kind of work they're creating, a tragedy versus 758 00:34:09,840 --> 00:34:12,320 a comedy, before they express it. Because that 759 00:34:12,320 --> 00:34:14,139 would imply they knew the emotion before they 760 00:34:14,139 --> 00:34:16,820 formulated it in the artistic medium. But Langer 761 00:34:16,820 --> 00:34:19,199 refutes this. By distinguishing between the intellectual 762 00:34:19,199 --> 00:34:21,980 concept and the artistic envisagement, the artist 763 00:34:21,980 --> 00:34:24,219 doesn't start with a fully worked out academic 764 00:34:24,219 --> 00:34:27,539 definition of tragedy. No. Rather, the act of 765 00:34:27,539 --> 00:34:30,659 conception is the direct envisagement of the 766 00:34:30,659 --> 00:34:33,639 commanding form. And that immediately determines 767 00:34:33,639 --> 00:34:36,039 the general structure and the rhythmic necessity 768 00:34:36,039 --> 00:34:39,820 of the work. A true artist recognizes, I have 769 00:34:39,820 --> 00:34:42,699 an idea for a tragedy, because that foundational, 770 00:34:42,900 --> 00:34:46,559 closed, faded structure is already present in 771 00:34:46,559 --> 00:34:48,780 the intuitive conception. And this leads to a 772 00:34:48,780 --> 00:34:51,460 really beautiful insight about the artist's own 773 00:34:51,460 --> 00:34:54,000 learning process. The artist is the first recipient. 774 00:34:54,840 --> 00:34:57,880 By handling their own creation, the emotive symbol, 775 00:34:58,059 --> 00:35:00,599 they learn the emotive possibilities of the form 776 00:35:00,599 --> 00:35:02,940 itself. They aren't just regurgitating their 777 00:35:02,940 --> 00:35:05,639 own current moods. No, they're discovering new 778 00:35:05,639 --> 00:35:08,619 ways of feeling through the medium. They're experiencing 779 00:35:08,619 --> 00:35:10,519 subjective realities they might not have even 780 00:35:10,519 --> 00:35:12,900 known in their personal life. As one artist told 781 00:35:12,900 --> 00:35:15,400 her, his personality changed under the influence 782 00:35:15,400 --> 00:35:17,500 of the piece he was writing, allowing him to 783 00:35:17,500 --> 00:35:20,690 grasp the musical idea and feel a new way. So 784 00:35:20,690 --> 00:35:23,210 art teaches the artist just as much as it teaches 785 00:35:23,210 --> 00:35:25,650 the audience. Then in chapter 21, the work in 786 00:35:25,650 --> 00:35:28,130 its public, she discusses the essential social 787 00:35:28,130 --> 00:35:31,050 role of art. And she's very clear that art's 788 00:35:31,050 --> 00:35:34,329 import is not commentary. Right. The artist isn't 789 00:35:34,329 --> 00:35:36,590 commenting on public objects or generally known 790 00:35:36,590 --> 00:35:38,909 types of feeling. He's showing the appearance 791 00:35:38,909 --> 00:35:41,829 of feeling. And this import is always held in 792 00:35:41,829 --> 00:35:44,059 the symbol. It's inseparable from the form. The 793 00:35:44,059 --> 00:35:46,579 work has to be contemplated as objective. Which 794 00:35:46,579 --> 00:35:48,800 is what allows the feeling it exhibits to become 795 00:35:48,800 --> 00:35:51,739 public and shared and to actually mold our collective 796 00:35:51,739 --> 00:35:54,360 sensibility. So what is that creative influence 797 00:35:54,360 --> 00:35:57,579 of art on our sensibility? It molds our actual 798 00:35:57,579 --> 00:36:00,380 life of feeling. She cites the poet Guillaume 799 00:36:00,380 --> 00:36:02,820 Apollinaire, who said that the order which we 800 00:36:02,820 --> 00:36:06,699 find in nature is only an effect of art. Art's 801 00:36:06,699 --> 00:36:08,980 penetration is deep because it shapes how we 802 00:36:08,980 --> 00:36:11,289 perceive the world. For example, the Impressionists, 803 00:36:11,369 --> 00:36:13,409 like Renoir, they didn't just paint what they 804 00:36:13,409 --> 00:36:16,389 saw. They changed how people after them visualized 805 00:36:16,389 --> 00:36:19,210 color and light. Art articulates human nature, 806 00:36:19,329 --> 00:36:22,190 our sensibility, our energy, our passions, and 807 00:36:22,190 --> 00:36:24,510 in doing so, it determines the very shape of 808 00:36:24,510 --> 00:36:26,829 our felt life. In this chapter, she also makes 809 00:36:26,829 --> 00:36:28,829 some really necessary distinctions that often 810 00:36:28,829 --> 00:36:31,429 get confused in cultural critique. The difference 811 00:36:31,429 --> 00:36:33,849 between entertainment and amusement, and between 812 00:36:33,849 --> 00:36:37,179 genius and talent. Right. Amusement is the temporary 813 00:36:37,179 --> 00:36:39,840 stimulus, that momentary lift of vital feeling, 814 00:36:40,000 --> 00:36:42,420 often what leads to laughter. And entertainment 815 00:36:42,420 --> 00:36:45,420 is broader. It's any activity without a direct 816 00:36:45,420 --> 00:36:47,860 practical aim, basically what people do with 817 00:36:47,860 --> 00:36:50,760 their freedom. And entertainment can be trivial, 818 00:36:50,900 --> 00:36:53,679 like a pastime. Or it can be really serious, 819 00:36:53,679 --> 00:36:57,280 satisfying, fundamental mental needs, like following 820 00:36:57,280 --> 00:37:00,389 a complex story or philosophizing. Art falls 821 00:37:00,389 --> 00:37:03,170 into that category of serious, essential entertainment. 822 00:37:03,510 --> 00:37:05,190 And the distinction between the capabilities 823 00:37:05,190 --> 00:37:08,050 of the maker. Talent is the ability to handle 824 00:37:08,050 --> 00:37:10,690 ideas and achieve desired effects. It's closely 825 00:37:10,690 --> 00:37:13,579 linked to technique. training, muscular control, 826 00:37:13,739 --> 00:37:15,880 and aesthetic responsiveness. It's trainable 827 00:37:15,880 --> 00:37:18,500 and it's highly specialized. But genius is the 828 00:37:18,500 --> 00:37:20,780 power of conception. It is not just a higher 829 00:37:20,780 --> 00:37:23,219 degree of talent. Genius drives the engine. Exactly. 830 00:37:23,619 --> 00:37:26,340 Genius often compels a talented person to develop 831 00:37:26,340 --> 00:37:28,780 every last bit of their talent just to meet the 832 00:37:28,780 --> 00:37:31,840 urgency of a new idea. She gives Mussorgsky as 833 00:37:31,840 --> 00:37:34,360 a great example. He was technically pretty crude 834 00:37:34,360 --> 00:37:37,300 early in his career. He created laboriously, 835 00:37:37,460 --> 00:37:41,099 clumsily, imperfectly. But the sheer power of 836 00:37:41,099 --> 00:37:44,480 his conception, his genius, forced him to develop 837 00:37:44,480 --> 00:37:47,650 his talent fully. Genius provides the compelling 838 00:37:47,650 --> 00:37:50,949 form. Talent provides the means to execute it. 839 00:37:51,090 --> 00:37:53,449 Finally, we get to the appendix, a note on the 840 00:37:53,449 --> 00:37:55,960 film. This was still a relatively young art form 841 00:37:55,960 --> 00:37:57,960 when Langer was writing, so she had to place 842 00:37:57,960 --> 00:38:00,559 it within her systematic framework. And she concludes 843 00:38:00,559 --> 00:38:02,340 that the motion picture is a separate poetic 844 00:38:02,340 --> 00:38:04,900 mode, totally distinct from plastic art or drama. 845 00:38:05,059 --> 00:38:07,650 Which is a remarkable piece of analysis. She 846 00:38:07,650 --> 00:38:10,349 recognized that while film uses elements of painting 847 00:38:10,349 --> 00:38:13,309 and theater and music, it just swallows them 848 00:38:13,309 --> 00:38:15,809 to serve its own primary illusion. And what is 849 00:38:15,809 --> 00:38:18,010 that unique illusion? Its illusion is the virtual 850 00:38:18,010 --> 00:38:20,989 present, which she calls the dream mode. Its 851 00:38:20,989 --> 00:38:24,190 basic abstraction is givenness or authenticity, 852 00:38:24,469 --> 00:38:27,530 that overwhelming immediacy of experience. Which 853 00:38:27,530 --> 00:38:29,630 relates directly to how we actually dream, where 854 00:38:29,630 --> 00:38:31,570 images and actions and events just are. They 855 00:38:31,570 --> 00:38:33,909 don't require any logical or sequential justification. 856 00:38:34,730 --> 00:38:37,530 And she pincoins the exact technical device that 857 00:38:37,530 --> 00:38:40,250 allowed film to achieve this symbolic form. It 858 00:38:40,250 --> 00:38:42,369 was the moving camera. Before the moving camera, 859 00:38:42,530 --> 00:38:45,250 film was just photograph theater. It was restricted 860 00:38:45,250 --> 00:38:48,130 by the proscenium arch. But the camera's ability 861 00:38:48,130 --> 00:38:51,489 to shift perspective, to zoom, to cut, that divorced 862 00:38:51,489 --> 00:38:53,769 the screen from the stage. And by adopting the 863 00:38:53,769 --> 00:38:56,210 camera's perspective, the spectator is placed 864 00:38:56,210 --> 00:38:58,389 in the role of the dreamer you're seeing with 865 00:38:58,389 --> 00:39:01,449 the mind's eye. Which creates a unified, continuously 866 00:39:01,449 --> 00:39:05,059 passing, significant apparition. that is felt 867 00:39:05,059 --> 00:39:08,300 as immediate, authentic experience. The physical 868 00:39:08,300 --> 00:39:11,679 space of the film, unlike in plastic art, is 869 00:39:11,679 --> 00:39:14,440 always secondary and malleable. It comes and 870 00:39:14,440 --> 00:39:17,639 goes. It expands and contracts, just like space 871 00:39:17,639 --> 00:39:19,679 does in a dream. So the fundamental nature of 872 00:39:19,679 --> 00:39:22,239 film is that continuous transformation and immediacy 873 00:39:22,239 --> 00:39:25,199 of appearance. It presents the present as a flow 874 00:39:25,199 --> 00:39:27,380 of experience. Which is why it became such a 875 00:39:27,380 --> 00:39:30,349 powerful, pervasive art form. and one that really 876 00:39:30,349 --> 00:39:32,429 shaped the consciousness of the mid -20th century. 877 00:39:32,630 --> 00:39:34,570 So this whole deep dive into feeling and form 878 00:39:34,570 --> 00:39:37,289 really reveals the true scope of Langer's achievement. 879 00:39:37,710 --> 00:39:40,530 She built this unified, systematic critique of 880 00:39:40,530 --> 00:39:42,570 all the major art forms by identifying their 881 00:39:42,570 --> 00:39:45,190 underlying non -discursive symbol, the expressive 882 00:39:45,190 --> 00:39:47,710 form. And the primary virtual dimensions they 883 00:39:47,710 --> 00:39:51,389 create. Virtual space, virtual time, virtual 884 00:39:51,389 --> 00:39:54,670 powers, and virtual history, or the virtual present. 885 00:39:54,969 --> 00:39:57,269 Her work successfully integrated all these elements 886 00:39:57,269 --> 00:39:58,610 that were often thought to be contradictory. 887 00:39:59,210 --> 00:40:01,969 the importance of strict form, the role of human 888 00:40:01,969 --> 00:40:04,449 feeling, and the necessary function of illusion. 889 00:40:04,829 --> 00:40:07,590 And by showing that they are all necessary components 890 00:40:07,590 --> 00:40:10,030 in creating the felt life of the art symbol, 891 00:40:10,289 --> 00:40:13,610 she moved aesthetics out of those tired old debates 892 00:40:13,610 --> 00:40:16,489 about subjective taste and put it firmly into 893 00:40:16,489 --> 00:40:18,550 the realm of rigorous philosophical inquiry. 894 00:40:18,849 --> 00:40:21,409 Asserting that art is a genuine structural form 895 00:40:21,409 --> 00:40:24,010 of human cognition. And it's important to remember, 896 00:40:24,230 --> 00:40:27,369 Langer saw her work as part of a much larger 897 00:40:27,369 --> 00:40:30,449 ongoing intellectual project on expressive form. 898 00:40:30,809 --> 00:40:33,190 She was building on seminal thinkers like Ernst 899 00:40:33,190 --> 00:40:35,960 Casuer, who the book is dedicated to. She saw 900 00:40:35,960 --> 00:40:37,920 herself as completing this necessary task of 901 00:40:37,920 --> 00:40:39,900 unifying all these disparate aesthetic insights 902 00:40:39,900 --> 00:40:42,679 into one coherent, commanding philosophical system. 903 00:40:42,840 --> 00:40:45,119 Which, of course, raises a really important question 904 00:40:45,119 --> 00:40:47,619 for us today. Langer was analyzing art forms, 905 00:40:47,739 --> 00:40:50,559 the novel, the tragedy, the film, that defined 906 00:40:50,559 --> 00:40:53,059 and molded the consciousness of previous generations. 907 00:40:53,579 --> 00:40:55,920 Right. The film created that sense of virtual 908 00:40:55,920 --> 00:40:58,480 immediacy, the virtual present. We now live in 909 00:40:58,480 --> 00:41:02,079 a world that is saturated with new digital media, 910 00:41:02,199 --> 00:41:04,650 virtual reality. Immersive gaming, personalized 911 00:41:04,650 --> 00:41:07,210 social feeds, which also create these incredibly 912 00:41:07,210 --> 00:41:10,429 powerful senses of givenness and virtual immediacy. 913 00:41:10,590 --> 00:41:12,929 So if the great arts fundamentally shape our 914 00:41:12,929 --> 00:41:15,730 capacity for feeling and for abstraction, then 915 00:41:15,730 --> 00:41:18,530 these new digital realms must be shaping our 916 00:41:18,530 --> 00:41:20,489 contemporary consciousness in ways we're only 917 00:41:20,489 --> 00:41:24,190 just beginning to get a handle on. So our final 918 00:41:24,190 --> 00:41:26,329 provocative thought for you to consider is this. 919 00:41:26,650 --> 00:41:29,289 If Suzanne Langer were writing Feeling Informed 920 00:41:29,289 --> 00:41:32,820 today and she was moving beyond film, What primary 921 00:41:32,820 --> 00:41:35,400 illusion would she say is dominant in the newest, 922 00:41:35,500 --> 00:41:38,440 most pervasive digital art forms? Is it still 923 00:41:38,440 --> 00:41:41,000 the virtual present? Or has the digital world 924 00:41:41,000 --> 00:41:43,360 abstracted something else entirely from actuality, 925 00:41:43,380 --> 00:41:46,539 maybe virtual identity? Or the constant fragmented 926 00:41:46,539 --> 00:41:49,280 pressure of virtual connectivity to express a 927 00:41:49,280 --> 00:41:52,059 new definitive pattern of human sentience? Something 928 00:41:52,059 --> 00:41:54,440 to ponder as you navigate your own virtual worlds. 929 00:41:54,679 --> 00:41:57,119 Thank you for joining us for this deep dive into 930 00:41:57,119 --> 00:41:58,780 Suzanne Liner's feeling and form.