The Split and the Structure: Twenty-Eight EssaysRudolf Arnheim's great forte is his ability to illuminate the perceptual processes that go into the making and reception of artworks—painting, sculpture, architecture, and film. Over the years, his pioneering mode of "reading" art from a unique scientific/philosophic perspective has garnered him an established and devoted audience. That audience will take pleasure in Arnheim's most recent collection of essays, one that covers a range of topics and includes titles such as "Outer Space and Inner Space," "What Is an Aesthetic Fact?," "As I Saw Children's Art," "Two Ways of Being Human," "Consciousness—an Island of Images," and "From Chaos to Wholeness." The notion of structure is Arnheim's guide in these explorations. Most of the essays examine the nature of structure affirmatively: how it comes about, its incentives and objectives, its celebration of perfection. He is interested in how artists grope for structure to shape powerful, enlightening images, and how a scientist's search for truth is a search for structure. Writing with enviable clarity, even when deploying complex arguments, Arnheim makes it easy and exciting to follow him as he thinks. America is not abundantly supplied with "public intellectuals" such as Rudolf Arnheim—to have his writings with us is cause for celebration. "The word 'structure' appears for good reason in the title of this collection. . . . Structure seems to be needed as an arbiter wherever this civilization of ours is split by selfish interests and fighting for either/or decisions. The essays want to speak with the voice of reason, because they want to show how the parts require the whole." |
Contents
Learning by What Is Around | 13 |
The Way of the Crafts | 33 |
Drawings in Design | 52 |
What Is an Aesthetic Fact? | 65 |
The Symbolism of Light | 78 |
Gauguins Homage to Honesty | 85 |
A Maverick in Art History | 104 |
Saw Childrens Art | 120 |
A System of Expressive Movement | 133 |
Form as Creation | 151 |
Two Ways of Being Human | 165 |
Acknowledgments | 179 |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
abstract action aesthetic Albert Michotte Angeles approach architecture Art Berkeley artists artwork Baruch Spinoza basic beauty behavior body building California Press called causality chaos church cognition concepts conscious creative dealing Denise Levertov derived described designer deus ex machina dynamic early entropy equilibrium Ernst Mach Essays example experience expression eyes fact figure forces function Gauguin gestalt Gestalt Psychology happens Henri Cartier-Bresson human mind individual inside interaction learning light limited look Mario Botta means medium mental images movement nature objects observed organized outer painter painting particular Paul Gauguin perceived person photographic physical world physicists pictorial picture principle problem Psychology of Art Pythagorean theorem realm refers relation Rudolf Arnheim says sense sensory shape social space spatial strivings structure style symbolic theme theory things tion tradition ture University of California vectors viewer Visual Perception Visual Thinking whole Yanagi York