Imperfectionist Aesthetics in Art and Everyday Life

Description

This book presents interdisciplinary research on the aesthetics of perfection and imperfection. Broadening this growing field, it connects the aesthetics of imperfection with issues in areas including philosophy, music, literature, urban environment, architecture, art theory, and cultural studies. The contributors to this volume argue that imperfection has value in being open and inclusive. The aesthetics of imperfection is typified by organic, unpolished production and the avoidance of perfect finish, instead representing living and natural change, and opposing the consumerist concern with the flawless and pristine. The chapters are divided into seven thematic sections. After the first section, on imperfection across the arts and culture, the next three parts are on imperfection in the arts of music, visual and theatrical arts, and literature. The second half of this book then moves to categories in everyday life and branches this further into body, self, and the person, and urban environments. Together, the chapters promote a positive ethos of imperfection that furthers individual and social engagement and supports creativity over mere passivity. Imperfectionist Aesthetics in Art and Everyday Life will appeal to a broad range of scholars and advanced students working in philosophical aesthetics, literature, music, urban environment, architecture, art theory, and cultural studies. Cover Half Title Series Page Title Page Copyright Page Table of Contents Contributors Preface 1 Imperfectionist Aesthetics, Broadening the Field and Clarifying the Definition PART I: Imperfection Across the Arts and Culture 2 Imperfectionist Aesthetics and the Inclusionist Ethos 3 Imperfection and the Unfinished Work 4 Art Proper, Perfectionism, and the Sacred Arts PART II: Music 5 Revisiting the Aesthetics of Imperfection after Thirty-Five Years 6 Close Enough for Jazz: Imperfection and Jazz Improvisation 7 A Social Aesthetics and Ethics of Imperfection: Insights from Karnatak Music, Jazz and Free Improvisation PART III: Visual and Theatrical Arts 8 The Necessity of Imperfection: Philip Guston in the 1950s 9 Thai Theatre and the Interplay of Perfection and Imperfection 10 Wabi-Sabi Aesthetic and Joseph Beuys's Badewanne (1960) PART IV: Literature 11 The Aesthetics of Weeds: A Case in Junzaburo¯ Nishiwaki 12 The Poetics of Ruins: Matsuo Basho and Nathaniel Hawthorne, a Comparative Study 13 The Aesthetics of Perfection and Imperfection in Iris Murdoch's An Accidental Man 14 The Triumph of Imperfection: Yeats's 'Among School Children' PART V: Everyday Life 15 The Role of Imperfection in Consumer Aesthetics 16 Imperfection and the Politics of Realism 17 Everyday Encounters with Aesthetic Imperfection and Perfection 18 Aesthetic Imperfection and Ethical Edification 19 Collecting What? Collecting as an Everyday Aesthetic Act PART VI: Body, Self, and the Person 20 Bodies, Functions, and Imperfections 21 Imperfection as a Vehicle for Fat Visibility in Popular Media 22 Imperfection and Beauty of Character 23 Art, the Self, and the Value of Imperfection PART VII: Urban Environments 24 Street Art, Graffiti, and Tags: The Value of Imperfection in Urban Aesthetics 25 The Aesthetics of Imperfection and Architectural Design for Memorial Sites: Four Documentation Centres on National Socialism in Germany 26 Urban Experience as Aesthetic Compromise 27 Grit and Urban (Im)perfection Index