Abstract

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Journal of Aesthetic Education 38.2 (2004) 38-52 [Access article in PDF] Artist-Audience Communication: Tolstoy Reclaimed Saam Trivedi Whoever is really conversant with art recognizes in [Tolstoy's What is Art?] the voice of the master.1There has to be some presumption that, as one of the greatest artists who ever lived, Tolstoy might actually have known what he was talking about.2It is widely accepted in contemporary Anglo-American aesthetics that, despite Tolstoy's own literary achievements, his "moralism" about art is a view without much merit. For the most part, I concur with this current consensus about Tolstoy. However, despite the many flaws in his view, I think Tolstoy was on to something, after all. In particular, I believe a concept of artist-audience communication similar to what Tolstoy had in mind can be fleshed out so as to avoid the problems that Tolstoy ran into, while reclaiming the insights in his view.3In what follows, I begin by suggesting briefly that recognizing a quasi-Tolstoyan concept of artist-audience communication may have important implications for how we should approach artworks, and thus also for aesthetic education. Next, I spell out this concept. I then offer trenchant criticisms of Tolstoy's view. Finally, I point out affinities between Tolstoy's concept and mine, while also distinguishing my concept of artist-audience communication from Tolstoy's concept of artistic communication. It will emerge, I hope, that while I disagree more than agree with Tolstoy, the issues where I agree with him may be more significant. Artist-Audience Communication I begin by discussing briefly how talk of a quasi-Tolstoyan artist-audience communication bears relevance for how we should approach artworks, and thus has relevance for aesthetic education. If I am right, then in approaching [End Page 38] and experiencing artworks, we should seek a correct experiential understanding of them that is shared between the artist and audience, and between ourselves and other members of the audience. This does not meanthat we seek what the artist did intend in creating the artwork, as actual intentionalism would have us do. Rather, as members of a competent audience, we should first analyze what a given artwork means by attending to the work itself.4 This includes the broad art-historical context of production (including the period, style, category, or genre of the work; the artist's public persona; the oeuvre of the artist; works by the artist's contemporaries; the social, cultural, and political milieu of the artist; and so on) and the public conventions that apply to it. In cases of irony, satire, and allusion, we may also need to broaden the context and appeal to artistic intentions. Then we should attribute this "work-meaning" to the historical artist as part of what she or he could have intended, so long as this was historically possible. If this historically possible work-meaning coincides with what she or he did intend in that artistic intentions are successfully realized in the work, then we have a real sharing of a correct, experiential understanding of the work between artist and audience, and thus real communication between them in the sense of artist-audience communication explained above. On the other hand, if what the artist did intend is not realized in the work and thus does not coincide with work-meaning as part of what she or he could have intended, then we still have at least a minimal, hypothetical sharing and communication insofar as our correct, experiential understanding of the work is shared with what the artist could have intended.This bears relevance for aesthetic education, assuming one of the purposes of aesthetic education is to teach children and other newcomers to art how to appreciate artworks.5 In teaching people how to appreciate artworks, I suggest we emphasize the shared, communicative aspects of the experience of artworks when they are understood more or less correctly. We should tell them that they should seek to communicate with the artist via the artwork, trying to understand the artwork correctly in the very experience of the...