Notes on Tolstoy, What is Art? Ch. 4

(Originally Written Feb. 29, 2008 in the Journal)

What is Art?
Leo Tolstoy

Ch. 4

All aesthetic theories of beauty lead us to one of two places:
1. Beauty exists in and of itself and has independent existence.
2. Beauty is pleasure we receive without it having personal advantage.

Thus, either beauty is something objective, mystical and complex or very simple, intelligible, and is something that pleases. Both definitions leave us with inexact results. Either beauty is metaphysical-mystical or a special type of enjoyment.

In fact though, the objective perception and the subjective perspective of beauty are on one and the same. "In its objective aspect, we call beauty something absolutely perfect, and we acknowledge it to be so only because we receive from the manifestation of this absolute perfection a certain kind of pleasure" (Maude, 113).

All attempts at defining absolute beauty either define nothing at all or only some traits of some artistic production. "There is no objective definition of beauty"(Maude, 114). All theories say the same thing: art is that which makes beauty manifest and beauty is that which pleases. Thus, the science of aesthetics fails what all science must do: define their concepts - in this case: beauty, art and taste.

Folgeldt denies that morality can be included in art because if it did it would exclude works like Romeo and Juliet and Goethe's Wilhelm Meister. But these pieces are in the canon of art and therefore unable to be called non-art. Folgeldt states we can consider importance instead of morality.

The error with aesthetic theories like this is that it first accepts a canon of art and then develops a theory of art to fit the canon.

In order to define any human activity one must understand its sense and importance by examining the activity itself, its causes and effects, not only its relation to how it pleases us.

Tolstoy defines beauty as that which pleases us. As such, he denies that it can serve as the basis for the definition of art in the same way as food's importance to man cannot be defined by the way certain mens' taste for particular items.

Could beauty then be defined as that which pleases God? For that which pleases God can also please man, but something that pleases some men does not please God. Therefore, whatever pleases man, but does not please God is not beautiful, but a distortion of beauty. Is this a possible definition of beauty?

People who assume the aim of art to be pleasure cannot realize the true meaning and purpose of art.

"People will come to understand the meaning of art only when the cease to consider that the aim of art is beauty, that is to say, pleasure" (Maude, 117).

To assume beauty as the basis of art makes us impotent in defining art.

If we discuss matters of taste in discussing art then we deny ourselves the chance of defining art. It is the same as trying to argue why one man likes pears and the other peaches. What are widely considered dfinitions of art are actually just ways of justifying certain works of art or genres of art.