Brian Harrell: Plato 9/20/17
9/20/17
Art as Imitation: Plato
It can be seen that Plato has a love/ hate relationship with art. His belief that Art is a form of Imitation was revolutionary but, this belief was still very strong in the Renaissance, when Vasari, in his Lives of the Painters, said that "painting is just the imitation of all the living things of nature with their colors and designs just as they are in nature."
Plato forms a thought experiment known as the Allegory of the Cave . In this example, he paints a scenario where there are prisoners who are chained, permanently faed away from the cave entrance. The prisoners see only shadows of forms on the wall, projected from a fire burning behind them. This is the closest the people can come to perceiving reality and is the only thing they have to base reality outside of the cave on. For the philosopher, Plato finds that they are freed from this cave and that the philosopher sees the true reality rather than the shadows.
This is Plato's argument for art. I argue that he sees the importance of art in our world but, he also finds a work of art to be a copy of a copy of a Form. It is even more of an illusion than is ordinary experience. I find that his overall argument on art is that, he finds art to solely be a form of entertainment but, their form can be seen as a true delusion of existence.
Art as Imitation: Plato
It can be seen that Plato has a love/ hate relationship with art. His belief that Art is a form of Imitation was revolutionary but, this belief was still very strong in the Renaissance, when Vasari, in his Lives of the Painters, said that "painting is just the imitation of all the living things of nature with their colors and designs just as they are in nature."
Plato forms a thought experiment known as the Allegory of the Cave . In this example, he paints a scenario where there are prisoners who are chained, permanently faed away from the cave entrance. The prisoners see only shadows of forms on the wall, projected from a fire burning behind them. This is the closest the people can come to perceiving reality and is the only thing they have to base reality outside of the cave on. For the philosopher, Plato finds that they are freed from this cave and that the philosopher sees the true reality rather than the shadows.
This is Plato's argument for art. I argue that he sees the importance of art in our world but, he also finds a work of art to be a copy of a copy of a Form. It is even more of an illusion than is ordinary experience. I find that his overall argument on art is that, he finds art to solely be a form of entertainment but, their form can be seen as a true delusion of existence.
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