7. Rancier Aesthetics as Politics

8/3/2019 7. Rancier Aesthetics as Politics

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Aesthetics as Politics

The same assertion is bandied about nearly everywhere

today, namely the claim that we are over and done

with aesthetic utopia, with a certain idea of artistic radical-

ity and its capacity to perform an absolute transformation


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20Politics of Aesthetics

However, this refe b 'T he first in th renee can e in terpreted in tw o w ays,, sees in t e Sl ng I fmg of a bei u ar power 0 the work the found-

emg-m-commo" "possible forms o f ,n, anterior to the various d iffe re n r

m eaning of h'bPo lincs. Su ch, for exam ple, w as the

an ex I lliO . d i ,Thierry de 0 n organize InBrussels in 2001 bythree section ~vMeunder the tirle Voici, itself divided into

s. e VOICI V ' , , 'to this appar t ' ous uoia, Nous uotci. The key

a us w as p id db'Marier the so IJ d rovi e y a canvas by Edouard, -ca e fath f " ,

Olympia or Le D" er 0 p ic to rial 'm od erni ty : n otyouth the Ch ' eteuner sur l'herbe, b ut a w o rk f ro m his

" rtst mort b d 'Rlbalta, Thi ' ase On a work by FranCISCO

fs op en -e ye d C h '

o GO d, turns art' list, resurrected by the deathfor the comm s p ow er o f p re se nrat io n into a subsurutr

TI' unltanan p f '" '

us power of ' , ower 0 Christian lI1carnatlOll,

how: mcarnatlo ib fs OWing then' I n, ascn ed to the very act ()

II' a so proved t '

p ara e le pipe d t J ransrnitrable to a Donald Juddb ' 0 oseph B ' diu tter p ac ke ts t Phil: euys isplay of East-Germang h

' ,0 "ppe B ' ,rap s or to M I azrn s se ries o f b a b y p h oto-arce Broodth 'museum, aers documents of a fictitious

, T he ot he r w a v bsublime', cOnst;~i y ,Contrast, radicalizes rhe idea of theIdea d ng It asan i d '

han the sensibl J 'nirre ucible gap between the

t em' e. t IS In thiISS'on of m d IS w ay tha t L yo ta rd see sfact f h 0 ern art a b '

th ~ t e unpresentabl T

S

emg to bear witnessto

the

Be re o re a n eg at iv e p e . h e sIn gu la ri ty o f ap pe ar in g is

arnett N resentatlo Thnak d eWman canvas I n. e rnonochromy of ath e speech of a Paul CCleaved by a lightning flash or the

e mOdel f h e an Or a P , , 'a bs t, , 0 t ese insc!'" nm o L eV I are, for hl111,

laCt and I Iptlons C ' ,ings t 1e figurativ . ,onversely, mlxJIlg the

, not to . . e on tr .'play mentIon the h d ans-avant-gardlst Palnt-

ohjec~nort~1~ indiscernibili~y g~podge of installations that

plishment 7 ns o f c om me rc e et We en w or ks o f a rt a ndThe id 0,aesthetic Utopi ,represent the nihilist accom-

eatlatth a.The very 0 0" e se t wo V is io ns h ' 'nation of tPhPS lt lo n h e tWe en t l a ve Incommon is c lear.

e wo d 1e Chr ' ,sentatio

nbrand the J 'h lSlJan power of IJ1car-

, etwee h eWiS p h'b"n t e euch " to I I tlon o n rep re -alJstlc hOSt and the burning

Aesthetics as Politics 21

Mosaic bush, reveals a dazzling, heterogeneous singularity

of artistic form, one that commands a sense of community.

But this is a community which builds itself on the ruining

of perspectives for political emancipation to which modern

a rt w as a ble to l in k u p. I t is an e th ic al c om m un ity w hichrevokes every project of collective emancipation.

If this p osit io n h as som e fav ou r w ith p hi lo so ph ers, i t i s

q ui te a no th er o ne tha t i s ke en ly a sser te d b y ar tists a nd

p ro fes si on al s w or ki ng in a rt is tic i ns ti tu ti on s to da y -

museum directors, gallery directors, curators and critics.

Inste ad o f m a king a c on trast b etwe en a rt is tic rad ic al ity

a nd a esth et ic u to pia, this o the r p osit io n e nd ea vo ll rs to

keep the two equally at a distance. It replaces them with

the p ro clam at io n o f ar t' s n ew m od esty - i t i s m od est n ot

only as regards its capacityto

t ra nsfo rm the w o rld, b utalso as regards claims about the singularity of its objects.

T his a rt i s n ot the fou nd in g o f a c om m on w orld throu gh

the absolute singularity of form; it is a way of redisposing

the o bjec ts a nd ima ge s tha t c om prise the c om m on w orld

a s i t i s a lr ea dy g iv en , o r o f c re ati ng situations apt to

m od if y o ur g az es a nd o ur a tt it ud es w it h r es pec t t o t his

collective environment. Such micro-situations, which vary

only slightly from those of ordinary life and are presented

i n an ir on ic a nd p la yf ul v ei n r at he r t ha n a c ri ti ca l a nd

denunciatory one, a im to create or re-create bonds betweenindividuals, to give rise to new modes of confrontation and

participation. The principle of so-called relational art here

is e xe mp la ry : in c on trast to tbe rad ic al h eterog en ei ty o f

the sho ck o f the aistheton that Lyotard sees on a Barnett

N ew m an c an va s s ta nd s the p ra ct ic e o f a P ie rre H uy gh e,

who, instead of the advertisement that had been expected,

r eg is te rs o n a b ill bo ar d a n e nla rg ed p ho to gr ap h o f t he

place and its users.I d o n ot i nt en d t o d ec id e i n f av ou r o f on e o r o th er o f

these two attitudes. Instead J want to e xa mine w ha t the ytestify to and what renders them possible . They are in fact

the tw o s tr ands that em erge by un doing the alliance

b et we en a rt is tic r ad ic al it y a nd p ol iti ca l r ad ic al it y, a n


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22 Politics of Aesthetics

alliance whose pro 'of aestheri Th per name IS today's incriminated term

one of these erefore, instead of deciding in favour oflese position I 'IIlogic of th' heri S, WI attempt m reconstitute the

e aest eric' I' bfrom which h c re anon etween art and politics

t ey are d d I 'IIwhat bot! h iertvec. WI base my analysis on1 t ese osrens: bl " heri ' 'utopian' art I" y anti-aesr enc sragmgs of 'post-

c rave Incom Iutopia the I mono n contrast to the denounced, atter propos h d f '

politics that ' ,es t e mo est orrns of a rmcro

politics advoc':res~~etlmes not far from the community

contrary co t your governments, T he forme r, on the, n rasts uto - , hfrom its d ist ' pia Wit a power of art that ensues

Nance with ' 'everthe less b h ' ,respect to ordinary expenenc e,

c ' ot posinons . .'communitarla ' [uncri are o ne m reasserting art s

, an uncno h fworld space n: t at 0 constructing a specific

I ' a new f orm f di idiwor d, The a esth '0 IVI ing up the common

, encs of th blisign of an imme 'I e su ime plac es art unde r theB' moria debt dut It confers' towar s an absolute Other,

b' on It an hi tori ,su Jee r i t calls the ', ISortc mission, a ssigned to a

sensible inscript' avant-garde': to constitute a tissue off rons at an ab I dio p roducts and th ' so ure istance from the world

~esthetics rejects ar:~r clo~lmercial equivalence. Relational

Its dreams of trans] s c alms to self-sufficiency as much as

ess 'I' ormmg lif bentia Idea: that " e, ut even so it reaffi -ms an

relari art consist ",'ons to reccnfian _ s Inconstructi ng spaces and

territory of the cong re materially and symbolically themenrs f fil lmon In "t,om towards h" SI U art practices, displace-

I11stall t" t e spa" I' da IOns, conten tla Ize forms of museumand cu lpOrary fo" f "" '

h d

' Hent theatre and dims 0 spatlahzing muSiC,ea 1 1 1 tI ance p " 'th' le same direct" ractlces - all these thll1g

s

e mstrum "'on, towa"d d " ' ffel"e ents, materials drs a especlficJtlo

n0

nt arts an ap '"f art ' a convergence paratuses specific to dl .as a wa f on a s"d f bodi " Y0 OCcupying a I arne I ea and pracrice 0

es, linage p aCe wi - . I -

TI

- s, Spaces and ' lete te anons betweenIe very t,mes d"'

WI " "expression' " are re Istnbuted.

lat IS att k contelnpo ,. .meallS ac ed Or defend d rary art testifies to thIS., a Comn e und "10n tendency th' er Its name is by nO

at would serve to character

Aesthetics as Politics23

ize the various arts of today, Of all the 'Hguments put

forward with respect to it, virtually no references are made

to music, literature, cinema, dance or photography. Almost

all of them bear instead on an object definable as that

which succeeds to the place of painting, i.e. the arrange-

ments of objects, the photographs, the video apparatuses,the computers _ and sometimes even the performances -

that occupy the spaces on whose walls portraits were

previously to be seen. It would be wrong, however, to

criticize these arguments for their 'partiality', Indeed, 'art'

is nor the common concept that unifies the different arts.

1 t is the dispositif that renders them visible, And 'painting'

is not merely the name of an art. It is the name of a system

of presentation of a form of art's visibility. Properly speak-

ing, 'contemporary art' is a name for that dispositif which

has taken the same place and function.What the term 'art' designates in irs singularity is the

framing of a space of presentation by which the things of

art are identified as such" And what links the practice of

art to the question of the common is the constitution, at

once material and symbolic, of a specific space-time, of a

suspension with respect to the ordinary forms of sensory

experience. Art is not, in the first instance, political because

of the messages and sentiments it conveys concerning rhe

state of the world. Neither is it political because of the

manner in which it might chooseto

represent society'Sstructures, or social groupS, their conflicts or identities, It

is political because of the very distance it takes with respect

to these functions, because of the rype of space and time

that it institutes and the manner in which it frames this

time and peopl;s this space. Indeed, the figure I referred

to above today suggests tWO sorts of transformation of this

polirical function, In the aestheticS of the sublime, the

space-time of a passive encounter with 'tbe heterogeneous'

sers up a conflict between twO different regimes of sensibil-

ity. In 'relational' art the construction of an undecideda nd ephe mera l situ~tion enjoins a displaceme nt of


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perception a pass' f Iof act id age rom t re status of spectator to thator, an a reconfi ' f specificir f gurauon 0 places. In both cases, the

I y 0 an const t ' bri 'material a db's s In rm gm g about a reframing ofbears upo'n SYllTIolic space. And it is in this way that art

. n po ItiCS.Politics, indeed i 'power. It' h' s not the exercise of, or struggle for,

IS t e confie f Iframing of ,,,uratlon 0 a specific space, m e

posited as ca particular sphere of experience, of objects, omlnon and a ' , '

sion, of subject' ,s penallllng to a common decl-objects and s recognized as capable of designating these

puttmg fo 'dElsewhere Ih ' rwar arguments about them,, ., ave tried tc h h ' ' ' 'ISthe very co fl' )S ow t e sense In which politlcs

In ret over th 't te desi"natio f bi e existence of that space, over

f

b n 00 Jects ' , d

o subjects as havi as pertairung to the common anM

avmg th 'an, said A' 'I ,e capacity of a common speech,nsrot e IS I" Ispeech a ca ' ' po inca because he possesses

, pacrty to I h' 'common wher II pace t e J ust and the unjust 1 1 1

I ' eas a th 'P easure and I)' B e animal has is a voice to signalk Iam. ut th I Inow who po e w 10 e question then is tov ' ssesses spe I "Olce. For all ti ec 1and who merely possessesnes f irne, the refusal ido people as I " to cousi er certain catego-of f po itica] I' ha re usal to he')' I lemgs as proceeded by meansco c It te word "urse, The orhe s exmng t heir mouths as dis-

of tl " r way consisrs : ',lell material in ,SIStSI1l the Simple observatlon

politi ,I I' I capacity t . ' f,ca t lings _ P I 0 occupy the space-time 0nOthm I as ato put" '

I

g Jut their wo 'k Of It, artisans have time fort)eyha I. cO h'

Tl

' . ve no time to d' urse t I S 'nothing' which

lelt'ab' o,lstobe I ', ,sence of time' ' at t lepeople's assenlbly,

Wfltten i I ISactuall

1

> I' , nto tle very f ' ,y a naturalized prohibitiono ltlcs orms of se

t' OCCUtSwhen h nsory experience.line nece t ose wh 'hspace' dssary to frOnt u ,0 ave no' time take the

, ,In de p as \Ilhab'Speech nl0nStrate th h' ltants o f a comlll

On

which capable of makin" pat t e'r mouths really do emit

cannot b b ronOuncedistrib' e reduced t ' ments on the commonUtlon and' 0VOIces' II' ' .

apportio ' redlstributio f signa rng palll. ThiS11 1 ng and n 0 pia d ' '

the visl'bl reapponl'o ' ces an Identities, thiSe and tl' mng of le.\Ilvisibl spaces and times of

e, and of ' 'nOise a nd speech con-

Aesthetics as Politics25

stirutes what Icall the distribution of the sensible.'o

Politics

consists in reconfiguring the distributiOn of the sensible

which defines the common of a community, to introduce

into it new subjects and objects, to render visible what had

not been, and to make heard as speakers those who had

been perceived as mere noisy animals, This work involvedin creating dissensus informs an aesthetics of politics that

operates at a complete remove from the forms of staging

power and mass mobilization which Benjamin referred to

as the 'aestheticization of politics'.More precisely, then, the relationship between aesthet-

ics and politics consists in the relationship between this

aesthetics of politics and the 'politics of aesthetics' - in

other words in the way in which the practices and forms

of visibility of art themselves intervene in the distribution

of the sensible and its reconfiguration, in which they dis-

tribute spaces and times, subjects and objects, the common

and the singular. Utopia or otherwise, the task that the

philosopher attributes to the 'sublime' painting of the

abstract painter, hung in isolation on a white wall, or that

which the exhibition curator gives to the installation or

intervention of the relational artist, both register the same

logic: that of a 'politiCS' of art which consists in suspending

the normal coordinates of sensory experience. One valor-

izes the solitude of a heterogeneOUS sensible form, the

other the gesture thar draws a common space, But these

two different ways of relating tbe constitution of a ma-

terial form and tbat of a symbolic space are perhaps tWO

sttands of the same otiginary configuration, namely that

which links the specificity of art to a certain way of being

of the community.This means that art and politiCS do not constitute twO

permanent, separate realities whereby the issue is ro knowwhethet or not they ought to be set in relation, They are

roJ. Raneiere, TI " Poli tics o f Aestl,elics: DistributiOU o f the S ellSibfe,tn:llls. a nd w it h intro. by Gabriel Rockhin~ L on do n t md N e w Y or k:

Continuum, 2004 (French original, 20(0),


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26 Politics of Aesthetics Aesthetics as Politics 27

tw f f di ib 'o arms 0 istn ution of the sensible both of whichare dependent on a specific regime of identification. There

are not always Occurrences of politics, although there

always exist forms of power, Similarly, there are not

always occurrences of art, although there are always forms

of poetry, painting, sculpture, music, theatre and dance,That art a d I', n po rues are perfectly conditional in characterrs shown' in PI, t' Retrubli , f, a os epu IC, The famous excl USlOn 0poers is often interpreted as the mark of a political pro-SC"ptlon of art H

, . owever, the Platonic gesture alsoproscnbes polir 0 d ' , ,

ibl b lCS. ne an the same distribution of rhesensi e oth excl d' , ,

hh

cues art isans from t he political scenewere t ey might d hi d

Iibi 0somet mg other than their work an

pro II us poets f 0 'th ' h r m gertmg on the artisric stage where

ey ITIlg t assume h

Th d a c aracter other than their own,eatre anr assembl . I 'of th "y. these are two interdependent forms

e same dlstnhut' 'Plato w hi' ' ron, two spaces of heterogeneity that

as 0 iged to r d'to consrit h i epu late at the same time in order

.I ure IS Rbi" , ,Communit epu rc a s t he organic life of the

y,

Art a nd politic s are h b 'as forms of t ere y linke d, b eneath the mselves,

presence of si I b di ,and time ]'1 t ' I mgu ar 0 re s In a specific space

. a 0 simu ta Iand theatre so tl I neous y excludes both democracy

rat le can c . .a community without ,onstruet an ethical commuruty,

ought to occup polItICS.Today's debates about whatf y museum s h horrn of solidar't I pace per aps reveal a furt e r

, I Y letween d d IeXIstence of a sp "fi mo e rn emocracy and t le, ect C space' th' I hmg of crowds d ,at IS, no onger the gat er-

, . aroun the t '. I 'sIlent spa ce of the aIlca actIon, but i nstead the

passivity of passers~useum III which the solitude and the

of artworks. Art's SOtYenCOllnter the solitude and passivityI uatlOn tod 'I

one specific form of ay mig 1t actually constitute, a much III .

eXi sts between t he' Ole general relati onshi p t hat

d' autonomy f I

an ItS apparent co tOt le spaces reserved for arr

f

n rary' art" I

orms of common I'f ., s lllVOvement in constitutingI l e.n order to understand this' ,

the pOhtlClty of art is t ' d ,apparent paradox in whIchIe to Its '

very autonomy, it pays to

take a quick trip back in time to one of the first formula-

tions of the politics inherent to the aesthetic regime of art.

At the end of the fifteenth of his letters published as Uber

die asthetische Erziehung des Menschell in 1795, Schiller

invented an exhibition scenario which allegorizes a par-ticular status of art and its politics, I I He sets us in imagina-

tion before a Greek statue known as the Juno Ludovisi.

This statue, he says, is a ' free appearance' ; it i s self-

contained, To a modern ear this expression tends to evoke

the self-containment celebrated by Clement Greenberg,

But Schiller's 'self-containment' proves to be somewhat

more complicated than the modernist paradigm, which

seeks to emphasize the work's material autonomy. At Issue

here is not to affirm the artist's unlimited power of crea-

tion, nor to demonstrate the powers specific to a particularmedium. Or instead: the medium at issue is not the matter

on which the artist works. It is a sensible milieu, a particu-

lar sensorium, foreign to the ordinary forms of sensory

experience. But this sensorium is identical neither WIth the

eucharistic presence of the voici nor with the sublime flash

of the Other. What t he ' free appearance' of t he Greek

statue manifests is the essential characteristic of divinity,

its 'idleness' or 'indifferency'. The specific attribute of

divinity is not to want anything, to be liberated from the

concern to give oneself ends and to have to realize them.And the artistic specificity of the statue inheres III Its par-

ticipation in that 'idleness', in this absence of volItion,

Standing before rhe idle goddess, the spectator is, too, In

a state that Schiller defines as thar of 'free play',

While 'free appearance' tends at first to evoke the auron-

omy dear tomodernism, 'free play' is at first more flattenng

to postmodern ears. We know the place that the concept of

play occupies in the propositions and justifications of con-

temporary art. It figures as a way to distance oneself from

11 Friedrich von Schil ler) tetters Oil the Aesthetic Educatioll of Man,

trans, Elizabeth M, Wilkinson and L.A, Willoughby, Oxford: Clarendon

Press, 1967 (German original, 1795).


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modernist belief ill th d i 1 - f - -era rca rty 0 art and In Its powers to

tranform the world Th I di d _ II - e u ICan the humor ous are prac-tica y everywhere d- d '

d

,cre ue as characterizing a kind of an

presume to have abso b d - -he ararui r e Its contranes: on rhe one hand,

t e gratUitousness of'1

d -, 'h amusement an critical distance' andon t e other pi' ' ,d ' ' _opu ar entertammenr and the situationisterwe, Yet Schille ' ,

d' f r s sraging could not place us at a greaterIstance rom this di h: --' 'Sch-II II isenc anted VISion of play. Play IS,

I er te s us the h -fully a human b _ ver y urnaruty of man: 'Man is only

declare th t thi ell1g when he plays.' II,And he goes on to

the wh I a lific, apparent paradox is 'capable of bearinga e ern ce of th f I' 'more d iffi _ It _ f e art a t te beautiful and of the still

cu art a hVIl1 ' H h'gratuitous' _" g , ow to understand that t e

actrvrrv of [,I 'autonornv of ' if ay can simultaneously found the

a speer c1 -of forms for a I uomam of art and the construction

L b _new co lective life?et us egIn at th b - -

art means to d fi e cgmnmg. To establish the edifice off e n e a certam ' f h - ificatia art that I'St regime or t e identi cation

" a say a 'fi -practices, forms of "speci c relationship between the

that enable us t 'dVISlifbJlltyand modes of intelligibility

balent V tI delonging to art y tne pro ucts of these latter asor to an aIt 0 d f

a goddess mayo' ne an the same statue 0d ' r may not be a t - ,Iependmg on the ' , r ,or may be art d i ff er en t Y

firegime In w h i I ' -

rst place there - _, icn It IS apprehended. In the

'I ' ISareglme hi Isive y apprehended' , ,ll1 W IC, such a statue is exclu-t d as an lmag f di - - -I an the Conca _ _ eo ivuury, Perceptions at

dnuraru iudg

un er questions h "ements th us get s u bsumed

d i , , suc as' IS It 'bl, IVllllty?; is the depicted'd- _ POSSI e to form images of

ISIt depIcted as it should ~:~llIty a genuIne divinity?; if so,

erly speaklllg no art ' I' I n thiS regime, there is prop-d d - as suc 1 b 'IU ge m terms of tl '_ , lit ll1stead images that are

Ilelf mtnns' I

on tle w ays o f b eing f' d - , Ie trut, and of their impactTI' - 0 m IV 1 I1IS IS why I have p d I ( Ua s and of the collectivity,

, ropose th t h' -ente rs Int o a zo ne of ' d - , a t IS r egi me in wh ich art

eth' I' m IStmcti b 'ICa regime of images, on, e referred to as an

"'Ib'd( . , p. ]07.


Next, there is a r egime that fr ees the stone goddess

from judgements about the validity of the divinity that

is figured and the faithfulness of the depiction, This regime

places statues of goddesses and stories of princes alike

in a specific category, that of imitations. The Juno Ludovisi,

then, becomes the product of an art, namely sculpture,a name which it merits for two r easons: first, because

it imposes a form on a specific matter; and second, because

it is the realization of a representation - the constitution

of a plausible appearance that combines the imaginary

traits of divinity with the archetypes of femininity, and

the monumentality of the statue with the expressiveness

o f a p art icul ar god dess endo wed wi th t he trait s o f a

specific character, The statue is a 'representation'. It is

viewed through an entire grid of expressive conventions

that deter mine the way in which the sculptor's skill ingiving form to raw material is brought to coincide with

the artistic capacity of rendering the appropriate figures

according to the appropriate forms of expression. [ call

this regime of identification the representative regime of

arts.

Schiller's jU110 Ludovisi as well as Barnett Newman's

Vir Heroicus Sublimis and the installarions and perform-

ances of relational art, belong to a di fferent regime, which

Icall the aesthetic regime of art. In this regime, the statue

of Juno does not draw its property of being an artworkfrom the conformity of the sculptor's work to an adequate

idea or to t he c anon s o f r epresentat io n. It d ra ws i t

from its belonging to a specific sensori um. The property

of being art refers back not to a distinction berween the

modes of doing, but to a distinction between modes of

being. This is what 'aesthetics' means: in the aesthetic

regime of art, the property of being art is nO longer given

by the criteria of technical perfection but is ascribed to a

specific form of sensory apprehension. The statue is a 'free

appearance', It stands thus in a twofold contrast to ItSrepresentative status: it is not an appearance drawn from

a reality that would serve as its modeL Nor is it an active


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form imposed on 'hererogeneous t hassI ve matter, As a sensory form, it i s

that these dual'tO

t e frdmary forms of sensory experiencemes In orm Ir i " , '

ence which d . S given 11 1 a specific expen-, SUspen s the di

between appe or Inary connections not onlya ran ce a nd 'I' b

and matter a t" ' rea Ity, ut also between form, ' ,c IVlty and ' . ,sensIbility, passivrry, undersrandmg and

It is preci I I', . Ise v t lIS new fc "Sibl e t hat Schi li. orm o f di stribu tio n o f the se n

df er captures WIth h c I "IIe ned play , , , t e term pay'. MII11111a v

, " IS any actIVIt' h h 'Itself, that does' } t at as no end other than

I' not intend t '

t l ings or perso TI' 0gam any effective power over , ns, lIS trad" I

temaliZed in the K' mona sense o f play w as sys-

I ' h ' anttan analys' f heti 'Wuc 1 1 1 effect is h ,IS a aest e nc expenence,a ' c araetenzed b ' ,

suspenSIon of the ' , . y a twofold suspension:d' cogJ1ltlve p f etermlnes sensibl' < power 0 undersrandina thatri .und e givens 1 1 1 accord "bes, an a correl t' CCOI ance w ith Its carego, , halve suspel' f ' 'It} t at requires an 1.' ision a the power of sensibii:fac I " oOJect of de' Th'u tICS-1I1telle t I sire. e free play' of thewi h c ua and se ib] ' , '

. I t OUt goal; i t is ' n SI e - IS not only a n acnvujFlO I an actIvIty th ' " '

m tIe Outset the' ,at IS equal to lI1actlvlty.as ' suspen" Icompa red w ith a d' S10n tla t t he pl ayer e nact s,anoth . r 1I1ary ex" .

. el suspension I pellence, IS correia ted to

pOhwersbefore the ap'pname y the suspension of his ownw Ich I'k I earance of h "dl, let Ie godd ,t e I e' work the work to the f hess, owes ItS '.

Iact t at the will' , ' unprecedented perf ectI On

n SUm tl 'I IS wlthdr f' ', Ie payer' d awn rom ItS appearIng.goddess h stan sand d '

, ' w 0 herself d oes nothmg before thework ItS If b oes notl '

r' ,e eCOmes a bstj b d . lIng, and the sculptor'sIve act r e w th' h'IVlty. I 11 1 t IScircle of an inac-

Why does this 'art of I' , suspenSion si Iwords ~Vl11g,a new form of ~u taneously found a new

I' ow d oes It h app h Ife-Ill -co mmo n'? In o ther

su )stannal 'h . en t at a ''h' ,Wit the verv d fi " certain 'politics' is con-1 1 1 t IS reg, ) TI . e nItIOIl f h

Ime, Ie respon ' . 0 t e specificity of att

)e sta ted a f II se, In Its, I ' s 0 ows: bec ' most genera I form can

WIt 1111 the .' allse It defi I ', PIOVlIlce of a h nes t lat which c omessensotlum d'ff rt t rou h '

I erent t o th'u o f I g ItS adherence to a( - (01111nat' I 'Ion. n the Kanttal1


analysis, free play and free appearance suspend the power

of form over matter, of intelligence over sensibility. Schiller,

in the context of the French Revolution, translates these

Kantian philosophical propositions into anthropological

and political propositions. The power of 'form' over

'matter' is rhe power of the class of intelligence over the

class of sensation, of men of culture over men of nature.

If aesthetic 'play' and 'appearance' found a new commu-

nity, then this is because they stand for the refutation,

within the sensible, of this opposition between intelligent

form and sensible matter which, properly speaking, is a

difference between two humanities.

I t is here that the notion accor ding to which man is'

f ully human only when he plays takes on its meaning.

Play's freedom is contrasred to the servitude of work.

S ymmetrically, f ree appearance is contrasted to the

constraint that r elates appearance to a r eality. These

categories _ appearance, play, work - are the proper cat-

egories of the distribution of the sensible. What they 1 1 1

fact describe are the forms of domination and of equality

operative within the very tissue of ordinary sensory experi-

ence. In the Platonic Republic, the mimetician is as much

deprived of the power of 'free appearance' as the artisan

is of the possibility to engage in free play. There exists no

appearance without a r eality that ser ves to judge I t, no

gratuity of play compatible with the seriousness of work.

These two prescriptions are strictly linked to each other

and togethet define a partition of the sensible that at once

excludes both art and politics, and makes way f or the

direct ethical guidance of the commnnity. More generally,

the legitimacy of domination has always rested on the

evidence of a sensory division between different humam-

ties. Earlier [ quoted Volraire's assertion that the common

people are deemed not to have the same sense asreflned

people. The power of the elite her e is thus the power

o f edu cated sen ses over th at of u nrefined senses, o f activity over passivity, of intelligence over sensation

c iThe forms of sensory experience themselves were charge


9/15


with identi fying d ff . f . .dff . I erences 10 unction and place withI erences III nature

What aesthetic f .is th d i ib u ri ree appearance and free play challenge

e istn unon of th .bl I .d

. . e sensl e t ,at sees In the order of omlnatlon a diff b

. . erence etween two humanities. Both

notions mamfest a f d dI . h .. ree om an an equality of sense [sentif]w uc , in 1795 . I

F I R' stuoe 11 1 stark contrast to those that the

rene 1 evo] utlOn' ,. fTh . f s reign 0 the Law' strived to embody.

e reign 0 the L . ff .of fr f aw, 11 1 e ect, still amounts to the reign

ee orm Over sl . hmasses Th R I .aVIS matter, of the State over thebecaus~ ir etllevodhutlonturned to terror, in Schiller's view,

s I a ered t h d I . . Ian active . t II lOt e mo e accord mg to whic 1

< 11 1 e ectua fa' I . . . Imateria lity Th .e u ty constrall1S pa ssive sensib e

. e aesthetic . . f f form over rn : suspension 0 the supremacy 0

utter and of tivi . . . If thus into the . . I ac IVlty over passivity makes itse

revolution of PrInCblPI

e of a more profound revolution, asensl e exist . If I

ofrhe forms f S ence itse and no longer on y. 0 tate.

It IStherefore as an auart concerns ad' f' tonomous form of experience that

. n 11 1 nnges 0 the I .. . f Isens'ble The he r i n ie p o i ti ca l d i v is io n 0 rn eb . aest etlc re" f . . .

etween the fo f i glme 0 art msntures the relationfins 0 id if .

of politic al c om . entl ca tion of art a nd the forms

dmunlty In s h .

a vance everv op '. uc a way a s to challenge J[1h . POSition bet d

eteronomous a rt. f ,ween autonomous art an

of politics muset' art or art s sake and art in the service-' irn a rt a nd s t.nomy IS not that Ieer art. For aesthetic auto-

h autonomy f ", .y modernism It' I 0 artiStiC maklllg' celebrated. . IS t,e aut

experIence. And it' h onomy of a form of sensoryIS t at ex .

germ of a new h . penence which a ppears as the. U1nanIty of

collective life. ,a new form of individual and

. Thus there is no co fl' bt I . . n ICt etw h dI S po Itlclzation. TI een r e purity of art an

S h'll 1etwo ce .C I er testify to th _ ntunes that separate us fromI I

e COlltrary . b . .t lat t 'e materiality f. . It IS Y dInt of its puntytl . . 0


10/15


sensible existence as d . I ' 'Th

' Oppose to a revo unon of state forms,e revolution of p due 'Itl ' ro ucers IS a particu ar form of aes-

ieuc metapolitics.

There is no conflict b ,. 'I''B . etween art s pu nt y and this po I,ncs. ut there is a C fl' , h i ,, on ret Wit in punty itself in the con-

ception of this m t "I ' f . 'fi

' a erra ity a art which prefigures anotherCOn guratlon of th

I' e common, Mallarrne attests to this

a so. On the one ha d h IIn, t e poem las the consistency of aleterogeneous sens bl k "'If ' ory oc - It IS a volume closed onitse , matenally fu ri I

d ' if re utmg t te newspaper's 'unaltered' spacean um ann cast' f' k'the ill' mg am; on the other, the poem has

conSistency of a t I ich 'act of' " ges ure w uc dissipates in the veryInstituting a ' , '

h I'd' fi common space, similar to a nationala I ay reworks di I I' .

munity c bl ISP ay, t IS a ceremonial of the com-, o mpara e w ith ' h .

mass, On th h I ancient t eatre Or t he Chri sti ane one and th h II ., 'enclosed in th ' ' en, t e co ecnve life to come IS

e resrstanr I ' f h hother ' . , vo Lime ate artwork' on Ie, It IS actualIzed in h ' ,

outlines a diff ' t e evanescent movement whichIf I ,elent common space

!lere IS no conrr di .and politic al I" a icnon betwe en a rt for a rt's sake. art, t liS IS perl b 'ISlodged more de I' raps ecause the contradiction

eep y m th "ence and its 'ed " e very Care of a esthetic expen

ucatlon'.OI hi , - ' ,text clarifies the I ' f 1 t ISPOint, once agam, Schiller 5

ogre a " 'art and its polir , h an entire regime for identifymg

ICS,t at whi h '

contrast betwee" bli 1C IS conveyed today by thef b a su line a t f f a ehaviouts and f I ' r a arms and a modest art

k a re atlons Th io in Schil l 'war permits us to I . e scenario 111 Sc I e r s, d' see lOW the '

tallle 1 1 1 the salll ' , , se two opposites are con-

f e IIll tl al ke' I 0re e appearance is th me. n the one hand, inde ed,element. The statue le:o~er of a heterogeneous sensible

the - idle _ sub]'ecr " I elt e d,Vlllity, holds itself opposite. , III at ler wo 'd " . .

lion, to every co b" I S It IS foreign to all vo"_I ' m illatIOn f '

cased on Itself rh t ' 0 means and of ends. It ISd . , a. IS to say ,

eSlres and ends of the t' lIlaccesslble for the thoughr,

only by this strangeness s~ )]elct COntemplating it. And it isIt bears the mark of ' y tllS radical unavailability' rhat

f h man's full h' 'o a u manity to com umanlty and the promise

e, One at last'IIItune with the fullness


of its essence. This statue, which the subject of aesthetic

experi ence cannot in t he l east possess, promises the

possession of a new world. And aesthetic education, as the

compensation for political revolution, is the education

received through the strangeness of free appearance,

through the experience of non-possession and passivity

that it imposes.

However, from another angle, the statue's autonomy

pertains to the mode of life that is expressed in it. The

attitude of the idle statue, its autonomy, is in effecr a result:

it is the expression of the comportment of the community

whence it issues. It is free because it is the expression of a

free community. Only, t he meaning of this freedom is

inverted: a free, autonomous community is a community

whose lived experience is not divided into separate spheres,

which has no experience of any separation between every-

day life, art, politics and religion. In this logic, the Greek

statue is art for us because it was not art for its author,

because, in sculpting it, this author was not making an

'artwork' but translating into stone the shared belief of a

community, identical with its very way of being. What the

suspension of free appearance thus promises is a commu-

nity that is free insofar as it, too, no longer expenences

these separations, no longer experiences art as a separate

sphere of life.

Hence, the statue carries political promise because it is

the expression of a specific distribution of the sensible. But

rhis distribution can be understood in two opposite ways,

depending on how the experience is interpreted: on the one

hand, the statue is a promise of community because It IS

art, because it is the object of a specific experience and

thereby institutes a specific, separate common space; on

the other, it is a promise of community because ItIS not

art, because all that it expresses is a way of mhabJllng a

COmmon space, a way of life which has nO expenence of

separation into specific realms of experience. AesthetiC

education is therefore the process that transforms the

solitude of free appearance into lived reality and changes


11/15


aesthetic idleness ' h . f " ,1I1to t e action 0 a living communny,

The very structure of Schiller's Ober die iisthetische

ErZlehung des Menschen testifies to this shift in rationali-

ties. Where the first and second parts of his work insist on

the appearance's autonomy and the necessity of protectingmatenal' ", f

Ipassrvuv ram the undertakings of imperious

line erstanding tI hi d 'f

' " , ' le t Ir , conversely, describes a processo CIVI!tzatlon in I' h heti ,d

" W lIC aest etrc enjoyment amounts to aOmlnatlon of h I' ,I

uman vo man over a matter that it con-temp ares as the' 0' f '

TI' . [elJectlon a Its own activity.

ie polirie, of at' h heti ,'th' r 1 1 1 t e a esr etrc regIme of art, orra er Its rnerap I'd

, d ' ,0 ItICS, IS etennined by this foundingpara ox' In this te ' ,at' . , girne, art IS art insofar as it is also non-, r , or ISsomethin tl I

d . go ier nan art. We therefore have nonee to contnve an I' .

that ' y pat rene ends for modernity or imaginea JOyous e xpl . : . fto the osion 0 postmodernity has put an end

great modernist d f emancipat' h a venture of art's autonomy or 0

Ion t r ough art Th 'There' , , . ere [S no postmodern rupture.

IS a COntrad[ct" , .at work Th k' IOn t iar ISoriginary and unceasingly

. e Wor s solitu.] _. , 'pation. But th 1 lfil e carnes a prorruse of ernanci-

, e u menj 01 tl' Iehmination of iat prorruse amounts to rne, art as a separ t I " f 'Into a form oflf . a e rea Ity, ItS trans ormation

Ie.

On the basis of rh i faesthetic 'educ t' , IS, undamental nucleus, therefore,, a Ion spilt . d1 1 1 the sublime nl d' f s 1I1totwo figures, as witnesseI, 1 Ity 0 the I' . bt le phllosO!)her d' h a "tract work championed y

. an 1 1 1 t e pro " ,active types 01 I' . POSltlons for new 'lnd Inter-

d ' re atlonshlp' d . dto ay s exhibitio . propose by the artist an, n CUlator 0 h .

project for aesthet' " , n t e one hand, there IS a, d'f IC revo UtlO' h' .ItS I ference as art b n III w Jeh art, by effacmg

there is the resistan't fiecomes a form of life. On the other,

promise is negativel gure of the work in which political. y preserved I

ration between art' . f ' not On y through the sepa-I

IStlC orm d ha so through the I' an Ot er lorms of life but

nner COntr' d " _ . _ '

The scenario depicted bva

Jetlon of th,s form ItSelf.that p roposes to t f . a esthetic revolution is one

, rans orm a h . ,relations of dOminat' , es t et,cs suspension of the

Ion 'nro th 'e generat,ve principle for a


world without domination. This proposition entails an

opposition between two types of revolution: against politi-

cal revolution qua revolution of State in which the separa-

tion between two humanities is de facto renewed, it asserts

revolution qua formation of a community of sense [sentir].This succinct formula sums up the famous text wnrten

together by Hegel Schelling and Holderlin, namely Da s , d li lib 1ii/teste Systemprogramm des Deutscben Iea tsmus. n

this programme a c ontrast is ma de be twee n the dead

mechanism of state and the living power of the commumty

nourished by the sensible embodiment of its idea. This

opposition between death and life is too simple and III fact

enacts a twofold elimination. On the one hand, it causes

the 'aesthetics' of politics to vanish, i.e. the practice of

political dissensuality, promulgating in its stead the forma-tion of a 'consensual ' c omm unity, not a community In

which everyone is in agreement, but one that is realized as

a community of feeling. But for this to occur, 'free appear-

ance' must be transformed into its contrary, that IS the

activity of a conquering human mind that eliminates the

autonomy of aesthetic experience, transforming all sensr-

ble appearance into the manifestation of its own auto-

nomy. The task of 'aesthetic education' advocated by Da s

ii/teste Systemprograrnm is to rendet ideas sensible, to turn

them into a replacement for ancient inythology; 1 1 1 otherwords, into a living tissue of experiences and common

beliefs in which both the elite and the people share. The

'aesthetic' programme, thetefore, is essentially a metapoh-

tics, which proposes to carry out, in truth and 11 1 the s:n-

sible order, a task that politics can only ever accomplish

in the order of appearance and form. ,

We know: not only did this programme define an Idea

of aesthetic revolution but also an idea of revolution

tout court. Without having had the chance to read that

"'1 -1 - "O ld ( S tematic programegel Schelling and Holderl in T " " est 0 ys k( G ' , I J 1 d ld New Yor ,( ), J er ma n I de al is m , e d. E rn st B e 1 C [ , ,011 on < .1 .1

Continuum, 1987 {German original, 1797}.


12/15


forgotten draft M arx c h If Pose it

prec: I" harne, a a century later, to trans-Ise v mto t e - ' f

no longer pohrical b scenarro 0 a revolution that is

more is sup d ur h um an, a revolution that, once, pose to re aliz e h i h b " - '

and giving to h p I osop Y y eliminating It

man t e possess] fh '

formerly I essron 0 t at which he hadon y ever had rh 'w hat M ar x p ro p d e a pp ea ra nc e. B y t he sam e to ke n,

, ose was a new add ' id 'finon of aesrheri 1 1 en u rl l1 g I e nn c a-

rc man- narnelv d 'who at once p . d 'b }, pro ucnve m an , the aile, ro uces oth rh bi ,

tionshipg in wi 'I h eo jeers and the social rela-. UClt~are d d " , '

formed the basis On which, pro uce . ThIS idenrificationMarxist vangu d d a ] uncture em erged betw een the

ar an th "] 920s, since each id e arttsnr- avanr-garde in the

I " SI e adhered It ie iouu elimination of " to tre same programme:heterogeneitv' 1 political dlssensuaJity and aesthetic

d' . rn t re constru ti f f

e ifices for the lif . CIon 0 orrns o f l ife a n d o f . . new Ie.It ISnevertheless too sim I '

thetic revolut' c p e to reduce this figure of aes-

hIon to utopi ' d'

p e . T he proj ec t o f' _ b a n a n, total itar ia n' c atasrro-

Pan ecome If' , I" Irogramme of til 'I" _ I e IS n ot irnited to tn e

ti e e lmmatlO' f irne ago by constru ti , n 0 a rt , a n no un ce d som e

Or f' c IVIStengu d ', Utunst artists of IS' 1eers an the suprem atlsttl I 'h t le OVlet r I 'a Wlt the aesthet' , evo utlOn.It is consubstan-th ' d lC reglme at I

etc reams of th' art. t already inspired inA h ' e artlsanal a I ',' '

ges, t e artIsts of th A nr communltaflan MIddleta k ' e rts and C f

,en up again by tl' ra ts movement. It washad d' h' le awsans of h Ae In t el( time as d t e rt Deco movement,by the engineers and, proI ,ucers of 'social art '," as it wasBa h b a rc l Itec ts f Iu aus, efore again fl ,0 t le Werkb un d a nd theof Slt ' , Owetlng hUatlonlSt urban' Into t e utopian projectsB ut it I I ISts and Joseph B ", ' ,b a so launts tho

sS ' euys soual plastlc '

e as far from rev I e ymbohst artists reputed toNotw'tl ' a lltlOnarv '

I l sta nd ln gth ei rd 'ff - p ro ject s a s i s p os si bl e.and the e ' I erences th" ', n glne ers o f t il w, , e p ure p oe tMalla rm eart wi h b e werkb d I

IllC, Y supp ressing - , un s lare the idea of an

t le COllC' f Its slngul - ,Iete arms of amy, IS able to producea COITII11U' 1

I' nlty t lat has finallv dis-. Ruger Marx I 'A ' -

, ~ rt sooal p' ,, ans' Eu' '.. g e ne j "a s qu e IJ e, 1 9 "1 3.


pensed with rhe appearances of democratic formalism."

Here, there is no chant coming from' totalitarian sirens,

but simply the manifestation of a contradiction, that per-

taining to the meta politics rooted in the verystatus of the

aesthetic work itself, in the original knot it implies betweenthe s in gu la ri ty o f the 'idle' a pp ea ra nc e a nd the a ct tha t

transforms appearance into reality, Aesthetic merapolitics

c an no t ful fi l the p ro mise o f living t ru th tha t i t find s in

aesthetic suspension except a t the price of revoking this

suspe nsio n, tha t i s o f t ra nsfo rm in g the form into a form

of life. In this regard, we might think of the contrast made

by Malevich in 1918 between Soviet construction and

museum works. We might think of the endeavour to design

integrated spaces in which painting and sculpture are no

longer manifest as separate objects but directly projected

into life, thus eliminating art as 'something that is distinct

from our surrounding milieu, which is the veritable plastic

reality '." Or again we might think of the urban derive and

type of play that Guy Debord broughr to bear against the

totality of Capitalist or Soviet life, a lienated in the form

of the king-spectacle.!" In all these cases, the politics of

the free form demands that the work realize irself, that it

e liminate itself in act that it e liminate the sensible hetero-,geneity which founds aesthetic promise.

The other great form of 'politics' specific to the aesthetic

regime of art is precisely the one that refuses an elimina-

t io n o f fo rm in a ct , n am ely the p ol it ic s o f the resis ta nt

form., In such a politics, form asserts its politicity by dis-

tmguishing itself from every form of intervention into the

IJCollccrning this convergence I refer to my essay 'The Surface of

D~si.gn" in Th e f 'u tu re of t he ' I mage , London: Verso, 2007 (French

onglnal,2003),

1 1 Piet M Oll dr ia n , ' L' art p la st iq u e c t Pa rt p la sr iq u e p u r' , i n C h a ck s

H ar ri so n a nd P au l \ Vo od , e ds ., Art e11 thearie, 1900-1990, Paris:

Hazan, 1997 I' 42014 ,..'I?uy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle, trans. Donald Nicholson-

SITIlthJNew York: Zone Books 1999 (French original, 1967); a lilrn

ve ' ,[SIGn was produced in 1973.


13/15


mundane world A .t d Ilif a . I oes not lave to become a form of I e. n the contrary - " hat IiTh S h ill ' 'It IS III art t iat life takes its form,

e c I enan god des ' .'idle' 'Th .: .s carnes promise because she istc . he social function of Art', as Adorno will echo 'is

o no t av e one' E I' - - - ' 'w ork's If ffi: g a it anan p ro mise IS en closed III these -su clencv ' d'ff -I I" I _ " III ItS III I erence to every particu-ar po mea proJect\ d : - f ' -

decornri an III ItS re usal to get Involved Inecoranng the mund Id'-

ence that' h ane war . It ISowing to this indiffer-, In t e m id d l e f h .

work aboi t hi at e nin etee nth cen tu ry, t hatI not mg that k ' .-b h ,WOI supported on itself wnrten

y t e aesthete Fla bby the u crt, was straightaway perceivedcontemporary das a -f .' a vacates o f the hierarchical order

, m a r n e s r a tr o n of 'd 'nothing rhe k ,emocracy . The work that d esires

convey; no 11 w ar w it hou t any poi nt o f v iew, w hic hlessage and ha . h

Or for anti de s no care eu er for democracy, ,- mocracy thi k i " -'ir s very indl'ffe ,s WOr I S egalitarian' by dint of

rence by hi I 'all hierarch It - . ub w, I C1It suspends all preference,

r - IS su versl b -would discove b di ve, as su sequent generations

1', y tnt of t di I - hsensorium of art f his ra rca sep aratio n at t e

A contrast is ther~~m / at of everyday aestheticized life.

makes politics b liy , armed between a type of art that

I' y e Imlnatlng , I f

rnar IS political I , Itse as art and a type of artid on tIe ProVIS h .

avo. ing all forms of 1 '- 0 t at It retains its purity,

It is this form f P I- "-it ical Intervention.

f

a po iticrty ti d h ' i ference, that a hi' _ ' Ie to t e work's very IIldl -. woe pohtlcal -

to Illter nalize Th d- . avant-gardIst tradition came

I. e tra Itlon st b . - '

ca a vant-gardiSI d _rove to nng together polm-. . n an art . . .

very distance. Its pr , IstlStlC avant-gardism by theIr

cry: protect the hete ogramme lS encapsulated ina rallying

core of art's aUlono rogenelty of the sensible that forms ther' I f my and ther ( ..

la or emancipar'lo S ' e/ are constitutes JlS poten-- n. ave It f Its transformatio - rom a twofold threat: from. . " n IIlto a m t, \" 'aSSimil atio n in to th e f e ap o Itlca l a ct and from Its

demand that is enc orlms of aestheticized life. It is this

wo 'k' I' , apsu atedIII

Ad 'IS, p o Itl cal p ot ent ial is o rn o s aesth eri cs. Theseparat ion from the f associ ated wi th i ts radic al

and of the administeredorms

0

1f aestheticized commodiries

wor dB, h'. ut t I S potential does not


reside in the simple solitude of the work, no more than it

does in the radicality of artistic self-affirmation; The purity

that this solitude authorizes is the purity of internal con-

tradiction, of the dissonance by which the work testifies

to t he non -reco ncil ed w orl d. Th e au to nomy of th e

Schoenbergian work, as conceptualized by Adorno, is in

f act a twof old heteronomy: in order to denounce the

capitalist division of work and the embellishments of

commodities effectively, the work has [() be even more

mechanical, more 'inhuman' than the products of mass

capitalist consumption. But, in its turn, this inhumanity

causes the stain of the repressed to appear, thus disturbing

the autonomous work's beautiful technical arrangement

by recalling that which founds it: the capitalist separation

of work and enjoyment.

In this logic, the promise of emancipation is retained,

bu t t he cost of d oin g so entai ls refu sing every form

of reconciliation, or maintaining the gap between the dis-

sensual form of the work and the forms of ordinary experi-

ence. This vision of the work's politicity brings with it a

heavy consequence. It commands that aesrhetic difference,

guardian of the promise, be established in the sensorial

texture of the work itself; and thereby it in a way recon-

stitutes the Voltairean opposition between two forms of

sensibiliry. The diminished-seventh chords that enchanted

the salons of the nineteenth century calt no longer be

heard, said Adorno, 'unless everything is deception.'I '

If our ears can still listen to them with pleasure, the aes-

thetic promise, the promise of emancipation, is proved

a I re .

One day, however, we really must face up to the obvious

fact that we Can still hear them. And, similarly, we calt see

figurative and abstracr motifs mixed on the same canvas,

or make art by borrowing and re-exhibiting objects from

t.~Theodor Adorno, P hi lo so ph y o f Ne w M u si c, trans. l{obcrt Hullot-

K~ntor, lvlinncapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006 (Ge:rman

onginal, 1949). .


14/15


15/15


great politics of aesthetics: the politics of the becoming-life

of an and the p liti f h . . .f 0I lCS0 t e resistant form. The first ident i -es the forms of heti . ., . aesr etrc experience with the forms of an

other life The f lirv ir ascrih .f

. na Ity It ascn es to art IS to construct newarms of life in com d h ,,' f rnon, an enee to eliminate itsel as

a separate reality Th d bI.. . e secon, y contrast encloses the

po itical promise f heti . "" ,0 aest enc experience 111 art's very sepa-

ration III the resist f i f.'f ance 0 Its arm to every transformationInto a orm of life.

This tension do I, es not r esu t from any unfortunatecompromises '1 t Itwo' I': < r may lave made with politics. These

po ItICS' are in ff irnulicared i fb hi I . e ecr Imp icated 111 the same orrnsy w IC1 we idennf h bi '

ence F hi y art as teo jeer of a specific expen-. rom t IS ho . , b

concluel I "h wever, It IS Y no means necessa.ry toetlatterehasb d' 'f art b' I ' een a isasrrous captation 0

Y aest rencs' To ' I ' .specific fa. f .' " , repeat, tnere IS no art without a

it as such r~10 vIsibilIty and discursivity which identifies. Jere I S no art witl if d i ib .

of the sen 'II . , 1 rout a speer c istn unon51) e tyl1lg It to 'f f I "

Aesthetics '5 h di a certain orm 0 po incs.I su e a rstr bu ri Th

two politics th . Iution. e tension between thesereaten, the ae rheri ..

also what mak it f ' s enc r egime of art. But It ISes It uncno I I ' '

and the ext rem . n. so at mg these opposed lo gics.e POint at hi h b I ' 'nated by [10 W IC 011 of them are elirni-

, means obi'aesthetics as oth h iges us to a nnounce t he end of

fers ave the d f I" .

o utopias. But it can hel en 0 po ItICS, of history or

cal constraints th ' P us to understand the paradoxisimple, of 'critl'catl wel,gh on the project, so apparendy

I fa art a '. '

lle orm of the work ' h project wh Ich arranges, InOr a comparison b ' elt er an explanation of domination

might b e. I' et ween What the world is and what it

16Th is c ha pt er a nd th e f oi l .s c . : . OWl1lg O n e w b h

ll1mar on Aesthetics and P o{ ', ' I I ere o r d ev el op ed r h: 1I 1k sto ath. . lIes le d i ~"2 'c auspices of the Museu l 'A' C 11 1 'lay 002 ll1 B3fcelona underto' ( rt OntCITI ' .-~ da semlllar held On the . poram. 1 hey arc alsoindcbreC

. , . s a m e suble ' ,I'1tlctsm a/ld Theor), Co' IIU. Ct, In . UllC 200"] at the School (or

I tnt Oive j I[SHy, t laca, New York.

Problems and

Transformations of Critical Art

Inits most general expression, critical art is a type of art

that sets out to build awar eness of the mechanisms of

domination to turn the spectator into a conscious agent

of world transformation, The quandary that plagues the

project is well known. On the one hand, understanding

does not, in and of itself, help to rransforrn intellectual

attitudes and situations. The exploited rarely require an

explanation of the laws of exploitation. The dominated do

not remain in subordination because they misunderstand

the existing state of affairs but because they lack confi-

dellee in their capacity to transform it. Now, the feelingot such a capacity presupposes that the dominated are

already committed ro a political process in a bid to change

the configuration of sensory givens and to construct forms

o~a world to come, from within the existent world, On

~e other hand, the work which builds understanding and

t~~solvesappearances kills, by so doing, the strangeness of

reSistant appearance that attests to the non-necessary

Ot Intolerable character of a world. Insofar as it asks

v~,wers to discover the signs of Capital behind everyday

hJects and behaviours, critical art risks being inscribed inthe perepetuity of a world in which the transformation oft Ings int . . f o signs I S redoll bled by the very excess 0

Documents

7. Rancier Aesthetics as Politics