About the writer Roger Fry and the text “An Essay in Aesthetics”
Roger Fry
was born into a Quaker family in Great Britain. He graduated from Cambridge in
science, but his interest in the graphic arts grew, and he became an
established art critic. When Fry began to write art criticism, the dominant
critics in Great Britain were those who advocated "art for art's
sake." That is, they claimed that graphic artists need not represent
anything in the real world and that art has no ethical function in the lives of
those who view it.
Fry turned
away from this movement and helped to found the community of formalist art
critics. As a formalist, he found the primary justification for a painting in
its formal structure, in the spatial relations between the objects represented,
in its interweaving of surface structures, in the coherence of its tones and
colors.
To see and
understand all the relationships in a work's formal structure, Fry would say,
is to have an aesthetic experience. And he would add, an aesthetic experience
has an ethical dimension in that to experience a wonderfully arranged group of
forms is an uplifting experience for a human being.
Summary of the essay “An Essay in Aesthetics”
In the
essay, Roger Fry advocates that graphic arts (photograph, painting, etc.) need
not represent the real world. According to him, graphic arts are the expression
of imaginative life which is separated from real life. In such arts, the
audience should not involve in responsive action.
The writer
is against pure moralist and puritanical views. For pure moralists, art should
accept ethical values. Puritans view that imaginative and expressive art is
worse than sensual pleasure. The writer is close to a moralist, Ruskin who also
thinks that imaginative life is yet an absolute necessity.
According to
him, like graphic art, religion is also an outcome of imaginative life. He
supposes that a religious man if he is wise, cannot justify the effect of
morality on religion. He adds that by viewing or examining graphic art, the
human being can get emotion because art represents more or less mankind's
feelings and emotions.
Similarly,
he goes on to claim that the imaginative life of art can provide different
impacts on different people. Feeling, ideas or sense of the art can be changed
with the change of time. For example, for thirteen-century art, people may view
it as a barbaric man picture while today's educated man thinks that it is just
a concept of artist's view upon stone age's man.
At last, he
says that the desirability of the imaginative life does distinguish it very
sharply from actual life. For example, those dreams and imagination pass with
our control, it is desirable. Otherwise, it becomes undesirable (further
explanation: see rhetoric question number- 3 ). He ends his essay by saying
that art is the chief organ of the imaginative life. It means the essence of
graphic art is due to its expression of imaginative life which is distinguished
by greater purity and freedom of its emotion.
Frequently asked question from the essay “An Essay in Aesthetics”
1. How does Fry say that the graphic
arts arouse emotions in us?
Ans: In the graphic arts, the audience views imaginative
life which is separated from actual life. Such representation of human feeling
arouses emotion.
2. What Fry says is the justification
for arts?
Ans: The graphic arts are the expression of the
imaginative life in which the audience has no moral responsibilities. In this
way, he justifies the virtue of art.
3. What is the connection between art
and religion?
Ans: Like art, religion is also an affair of the
imaginative life. Fry thinks that art is the expression of imaginative life as
religion also does not entirely justify its effect on morality in actual life.
4. Is there an ethical dimension to
art, according to Fry?
Ans: According to him, art is an expression and stimuli
of the imaginative life in which we should not apply responsive action and also
does not present a copy of actual life. In this regard, in art, there is no
ethical dimension to interpret.
5. What does Fry say are the
advantages of the emotions in our imaginative lives over against those in our
real lives?
Ans: The advantages of emotion in our imaginative lives
over against those in our real lives are that we are just audiences so we need
not feel physical pain, agony, sentiment, happiness, or joy viewing graphing
art. We do have not any obligation and responsive action to be a part of
graphic art. On the other hand, in actual life, we will be the parts of
emotion, feeling, and sentiment of the event.
6. Fry often uses the pronouns we and
us. What effect does he seem to be striving for with these pronouns? Do you
think his strategy is effective?
Ans: The pronouns ‘we’ and ‘us’ are an effective strategy
to appeal to the writer’s ideas of graphic art to the entire human race. Due to
his use of first-person pronouns, help to clarify his concern about religion
and art. If he used, the third person (He, they, it), such pronouns would
address a certain person. Similarly, if he used the pronoun, “you”, it would be
his ego or command to the readers. So, to avoid the negative aspects, the
writer may have used, “we” and “us” pronouns.
7. “In dreams and when under the
influence of drugs, the imaginative life passes out of our own control, and in
such cases its experiences may be highly undesirable, but whenever it remains
under our own control it must always be on the whole a desirable life” (9). Do
you agree? Give reasons.
Ans: Yes, I agree. In graphic arts, we can view, touch,
and feel what their heart wants. In obligation, if we view, feel, touch, or
sense the arts, it does not give us happiness. In this regard, in the dream
too, the same thing might apply. In the dream, if imaginative scenes and events
move ahead without our control, it can be highly undesirable. If the dream
smoothly moves ahead and ends with our want, it always becomes desirable in our
life.
8. How should people judge the moral
nature of a work of art?
Ans: I think that art should be seen for art's sake. We
should view the art for life's sake. It means that we should not judge art from
an ethical dimension. Many contemporary arts seem morally out of control. Yet,
philosophers seem to have trouble finding the right way to morally evaluate
works of art. The moral nature of a work's contents does not transfer to the
work and, if we are to morally evaluate works, we should try to conceive of
them as moral agents.
9. Discuss your position on the
effectiveness of censoring works of art.
Ans: The censorship can filter the inappropriate
information online and protect children from disturbing websites, such as child
pornography, sexual violence, and detailed instructions on crime or drug use.
Censorship can help women. To get more clicks, rates, and benefits, many adult
websites advocate violent sexual abuse of women.
Censorship
can protect the life and privacy of people. Today there is much controversy
over whether there should or shouldn't be censorship of the media. Censorship
should not be imposed on citizens by the government or other agencies; adults
have a right to view or listen to what they choose. Additionally, if children's
media is censored, parents are the ones to monitor and regulate it. Censorship
of the media for children is necessary, but should not be handled by the
government or other groups. Instead, it should be directed and controlled by
parents with or without children.
10. In your opinion, what kind of
emotions are stimulated by works of art?
Ans: There is an ongoing debate about whether emotional
responses to artworks are similar to those produced by the stimuli experienced
in everyday life. The visual arts, such as painting and sculpture, are the most
prevalent forms of visual artistic expression in the West that are considered
to be creative products. In addition, the visual arts are often associated with
aesthetics; hence investigations into the neural processing involved in art
appreciation have rapidly evolved as an objective and scientific approach to
understanding aesthetics.
It was also
suggested, therefore, that aesthetic experiences with beautiful stimuli,
regardless of whether these are artistic or commercial stimuli, involve a
delayed dynamic and functionally integrated brain network, requiring a longer
reaction time to make a judgment compared with that induced by stimuli that are
not beautiful. The current literature has proposed that emotions produced from
viewing the arts are different from those experienced in everyday life.