The Splendor of Creation: Kant, Nietzsche, Lacan
\nAlenka Zupan\u010di\u010d 1999 UMBRA<\/p>\n
In his Critique of Judgment, Kant approaches the question of the beautiful in four steps, with four paradoxical definitions, which all revolve around the \u201csignifier of the lack\u201d \u2014 the word WITHOUT or DEVOID OF.<\/p>\n
Beauty is a<\/p>\n
Kant\u2019s basic operation in these definitions consists in what one might call essential subtraction<\/span>: in each of the definitions quoted above, Kant deprives the first notion exactly of that which is considered to be its essential characterization<\/span>.<\/p>\n Is it not the essence of every liking or pleasure (Wolhgefallen<\/em>) that it is bound with interest? Is it not the essence of universality and of necessity that they are based on concepts? Is it not the essence of purposiveness that it has a purpose? The beautiful thus becomes the quality of something organized around a central void, and it is this very void which somehow dictates its organization.<\/p>\n \u201cPurposiveness without purpose,\u201d for example, does not simply refer to something that, while having no purpose, nevertheless strikes us as if<\/em> (the famous Kantian als ob<\/em>) it had one.<\/p>\n The question is not simply that of the comparison or resemblance, and the opposition is not that of the appearance of a purpose versus the actual absence of any purpose.<\/p>\n The mystery of the beautiful does not reside in the question, \u201cHow can something that has no purpose produce such a striking effect of purposiveness?\u201d<\/p>\n The point is rather that the absence of the purpose in the \u201ccenter\u201d and the purposiveness of what is organized around this central absence are intrinsically connected.<\/p>\n It is not that we detect some purposiveness in spite of the absence of any purpose; that is, it is not that the relation between the two elements is that of contradiction, but rather the relation is that of a specific form of mutual sustaining<\/span>.<\/p>\n What we called essential subtraction<\/em> can be expressed even better in terms of extimit\u00e9<\/strong>, defined by Lacan as the \u201cexcluded interior<\/span>,\u201d as something which is \u201cexcluded in the interior<\/span>.\u201d<\/p>\n This is precisely what Kantian definitions aim at: the beauty names the effect of this excluded interior<\/span>. Where the excluded dimension remains included as excluded<\/em>, it is via its exclusion that it becomes operative as the organizing power of its \u201csurroundings.\u201d<\/p>\n It is quite remarkable that in his discussion of art in relation to the question of sublimation, Lacan accentuates almost the same structure as Kant.<\/p>\n He stresses that in every form of sublimation, emptiness (or void) is determinative, although not in the same way. Religion consists of avoiding this void, whereas science and\/or philosophy take an attitude of unbelief towards it.<\/p>\n As for art, \u201call art is characterized by a certain mode of organization around this emptiness<\/em><\/span>.\u201d<\/p>\n (Of course, the emptiness at stake is not just any kind of emptiness or void, but precisely \u201cthat excluded interior which . . . is thus excluded in the interior.\u201d<\/p>\n The other name for this void or emptiness is das Ding, the Thing.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Splendor of Creation: Kant, Nietzsche, Lacan Alenka Zupan\u010di\u010d 1999 UMBRA In his Critique of Judgment, Kant approaches the question of the beautiful in four steps, with four paradoxical definitions, which all revolve around the \u201csignifier of the lack\u201d \u2014 the word WITHOUT or DEVOID OF. Beauty is a \u201cliking without interest,\u201d \u201cuniversality without concept,\u201d … Continue reading “zupancic UMBRA pt 1 kant nietzsche lacan extimit\u00e9”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12109","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lacan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12109"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12109\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12120,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12109\/revisions\/12120"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.terada.ca\/discourse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}