Living Art – Pragmatism and Aestheticalisation of Life

Abstract

The objective of Richard Shusterman’s Pragmatist Aesthetics (1992) is to show that the book Art as Experience (1934) by John Dewey is a key reference for contemporary aesthetics, due to the fact that the latter allows for the analysis of the continuity between the aesthetic experience and the normal processes of life in the core of the so-called post-modern society. Shusterman opposes pragmatic aesthetics to analytical aesthetics, since the latter privileges the analysis of the art object in detriment of the aesthetic experience. He also opposes it to continental aesthetics, in particular to the austere, shady and elitist Marxism, attributed to Theodor W. Adorno. Our objective in this essay is to show that the autonomy of the authentic work of art, defended by Adorno was interpreted by Shusterman as the isolation of art from the material world and the real praxis, what would imply the neutralization of its potential social criticism. Shusterman’s judgment derives from his identification with the work of art’s autonomy and the artistic esoterism, disregarding the fact that the defense of the autonomy of modern art is non-separable from the vanguardist blueprint of the beginning of the century – aestheticalisation of life. In contrast to this vanguardist body of ideas, Shusterman thinks the aestheticalisation of reality at the level of the consumption society, that is, at the level of mass media. According to the author it is the popular culture (pop) such as rap that, assuming an eminently political character, can violate the ideals of purity and integrity of certain artistic formalisms. We finally remark that the intention of Pragmatist Aesthetics is to react to the criticism of the analytical and the continental aesthetics asserting the aesthetic reality of popular art, as well as its political dimension. In addition, we also highlight that the consolidation of the pragmatic aesthetic in the core of American philosophy, since its publication, depends on the production of essays that interpret singular popular art works placing them in carefully constituted historical contexts. If this occurs, this book of Shusterman will have performed its duty: a blueprint for further works.