Reality in Aesthetic

As a student in the art department, Aesthetics is an important essence in our work. While I have always understood that everything about art is based on the aesthetics. In “The ideology of the Aesthetic”, it redefines that understanding. It talks about how art is not involved in aesthetics because aesthetics are in fact produced by the values of each individuals. May it be through Social, Physical or Political values, itself influences the aesthetics each individual perceives from the object/art, an aesthetic of its own.

Then to really understand art, we can’t really base it on aesthetics as aesthetics along with emotions itself is highly unpredictable like a pregnant woman going through mood swings.  When an aesthetic is perceived, it is then understood through their logical laws and values which really gives meaning to the aesthetic we feel.

Lets take the movie, “shallow hal” for example.

http://media.onsugar.com/files/2011/01/04/2/944/9444022/85b476ff06598c90_gweneth-paltro.jpg

Here Gweneth Paltro plays a role as an over weighted women who normally man sees as undesirable. But Hal a guy got hypnotized to actually see people for what they are inside but not for their outside appearance. Hal then see the, “truth” in Rosemary which is beautiful while other don’t because they don’t know they real rosemary which is not the appearance we see on the outside.

Just as it is related to art, the aesthetics of an art can’t really be perceived for what it is without really know the truth behind it, the history or the process that got it to become the way it is as emotions and values are highly unpredictable and the truth behind it will be loss. 

Take this picture for example. We can’t really understand the picture unless we find out the real truth in the photographers intention of the picture. To us it may just be a little girl eating an apple. But the photographer could just as well be portraying the  innocents of a girl before the tragedy of the forbidden fruit.

Profanity of what’s sacred

Sacred are the Gods who we give praise and worship on bended knees. Sacred is what we define as divinity which in theory is what separates the Gods from human beings. In today’s world, design has continued to evolve to a point where the reuse has become a social norm. Agamben’s, “In praise of Profanity” illustrates how profanity is the inappropriate use or reuse through play. This occurrence may be due to the fact that in our modern society, people are being more acceptable to things. The level of integrity are beginning to be lost as how we can see in television shows where the use of the word, “bitch” is highly inappropriate twenty years ago. But today it may seem to be a normal use of words despite these shows are easily available to kids at a very young age.

Now if you were to reflect this kind of profanity in architecture, the change in society can also be see in building elements or sacred temples itself like the Angkor Wat.

Angkor Wat

This place may be one of the most sacred places around its area. While still being used as a place of worship, it still works as a marketable asset for the country using it as a tourist attraction. To me, it seems that in its marketing that the value and sacredness of the place it lost in the true intentions of the business owners. Using the pictures of Angkor Wat for advertising and perspective views in the temple to attract tourist. In its loss of sacredness, this should then be considered as profanity.

Another example is the refurbishment of temples in Ayutthaya.

The intentions of the refurbishments was to preserve or rebuilt what was lost a sacred place of worship.  But in reality, the place is now used as a tourist location. The architectural elements may be in track but the use is a profanity to the ancient Thai culture. The board should consider that all tourist reasons to be illegal but rather use the temples as an actual place of worship.