Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-ndmmz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-03T11:00:21.162Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Failures of Intention and Failed-Art

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 September 2020

Michel-Antoine Xhignesse
Michel-Antoine Xhignesse*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, Capilano University, North Vancouver, BC, Canada
*
Email: michelxhignesse@capilanou.ca
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper explores what happens when artists fail to execute their goals. I argue that taxonomies of failure in general, and of failed-art in particular, should focus on the attempts which generate the failed-entity, and that to do this they must be sensitive to an attempt’s orientation. This account of failed-attempts delivers three important new insights into artistic practice: (1) there can be no accidental art, only deliberate and incidental art; (2) art’s intention-dependence entails the possibility of performative failure, but not of failed-art; and (3) art’s intention-dependence is perfectly compatible with the role that luck plays in artistic creation.

Keywords

accidental artart-attemptscomplex plansfailed-artincidental artintentionplanning
Type
Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 50 , Issue 7 , October 2020 , pp. 905 - 917
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Canadian Journal of Philosophy

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Baxandall, Michael. 1985. Patterns of Intention: On the Historical Explanation of Pictures. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Bratman, Michael E. 1999. Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason. Cambridge, MA: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Davies, David. 2018. "Mag Uidhir on What Is ‘Minimally Viable’ in ‘Art-Theoretic Space’." Journal of Aesthetic Education 52 (2): 8–22.Google Scholar
Chrysostom, Dio. 2017. The Complete Works of Dio Chrysostom. Translated by J. W. Cohoon. Hastings: Delphi Classics.Google Scholar
Dutton, Denis. 2009. The Art Instinct: Beauty, Pleasure, & Human Evolution. New York: Bloomsbury Press.Google Scholar
Harris, James. 1765. Three Treatises. 2nd Edition. London: Novrse & Vaillant.Google Scholar
Hart, H. L. A. 1968. Punishment and Responsibility. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Livingston, Paisley. 2005. Art and Intention: A Philosophical Study. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lopes, Dominic McIver. 2007. “Art Without ‘Art’.” British Journal of Aesthetics 47 (1): 1–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mag Uidhir, Christy. 2013. Art & Art-Attempts. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mag Uidhir, Christy. 2010. “Failed-Art and Failed Art-Theory.” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 88 (3): 381–400.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nagel, Thomas. 1979. Mortal Questions. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Paul, Sarah K. 2014. "Embarking on a Crime." In Law and the Philosophy of Action, edited by Villanueva, Enrique. Amsterdam: Editions Rodopi: 101–24.Google Scholar
Pliny the Elder. 1634. The Historie of the World: Commonly Called, The Naturall Historie of C. Plinius Secundu, translated by Holland, Philemon. London: Adam Islip.Google Scholar
Empiricus, Sextus. 1996. Outlines of Pyrronism, translated by Benson Yates. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Williams, Bernard. 1981. Moral Luck. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Yaffe, Gideon. 2010. Attempts: In the Philosophy of Action and the Criminal Law. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar