Hyperion Announcement
The first installment of The Nietzsche Circle’s Hyperion: On the Future of Aesthetics, The Phenomenological Loss of the Soul, is now available online. The first essay is written by Mark Daniel Cohen and is an examination of the Edvard Munch show, which occurred at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City from February 9th to May 8th, 2006.
Hyperion is a monthly web publication which will feature philosophers writing on art; eventually, it will be transformed into a print journal. The concern of Hyperion is the future of art, art as it is and art as it is becoming, or arts futurity. Of the revelation and expression of our very being. How do we live with art? How does it inform our lives? And what does it do to us? How should we engage with art? What is it that the artist wants for the work of art and how can we receive the gift of art with an energy equal to that with which it was created, for that is what is necessary to truly receive such a gift? It is our desire to pursue these questions and to open up debates, instigate further questions, and provoke dialogues on art; we encourage our readers to engage with Hyperion through the Nietzsche Circle discussion board. Now, though an online publication, Hyperion is based in New York; in the future, we will expand the scope of Hyperion and offer essays from writers in Europe and beyond to investigate art as it is and art as it is becoming around the world. A statement regarding the first installment by Mark Daniel Cohen:
It is a privilege to be involved as a contributing writer for Hyperion, and in particular, as the first contributing writer, helping to launch what promises to become an important publication. Hyperion is dedicated to offering art criticism that is intended to be distinctive in two ways: it will present the thoughts on art of writers with backgrounds in the writing of philosophy rather than professional art criticism, and it will offer exclusively content that has not been tailored to reflect a “house style,” a standardized “voice” that marks the publication and is calibrated to suit an established readership of art enthusiasts. Hyperion will present the authentic voices of independent writers, trained and professional thinkers with a broad background of intellectual concerns who will be turning their minds to the matter of art and its implications.
As the first contributor to a publication that permits me to set my own protocols, I should make clear what my policy is going to be. Throughout my career as a professional art writer (and likely, the one initial exception to the editorial policy of Hyperion regarding contributors), I have held to the proposition that a work of art is significant only if it is pertinent to considerations beyond those of the making of art. Works of art that do nothing more than instigate reflections on the nature of art, or that dilate the boundaries of what can be considered legitimate practices for making art, are by definition insignificant. At best, they prepare the ground for something to be said by later works they make possible, but in themselves, they say nothing. It is thus the responsibility of one who writes about art to set such considerations in a larger context, to indicate what are the serious-minded concerns of the works under scrutiny, to demonstrate that such works of art command and justify the attention of serious thinkers and not merely of those who are enthusiasts about art and who approach art solely as an insulated subject, inoculated for all reference to the hopes and worries of the world beyond art. Such a readership is simply too easy to entertain and is capable of nothing more than entertainment.
The subject matter appropriate for one to raise in the contemplation of serious art is not limited to issues specifically of aesthetic concern. Such subject matter has no impenetrable perimeters. It is a truth, I believe, that all serious-minded consideration leads into all other, that the approach of an adult mind to any matter worthy of its attention tracks legitimately to all other issues of mature concern. To approach one thing mindfully is to approach all things mindfully, and the profundity that serves as our polestar, that sights the realization and expression we would achieve were we ever to acquire all our potential powers of reflection and assertion, is a single intellectual precinct. Profundity, could we manage it, would prove itself its own subject and would demonstrate the investigation of art for its own sake to be nothing more than a poor, pallid, spectral approximation.
The future plans for Hyperion are enormously encouraging. The appearance of additional writers will begin an implicit, and perhaps overt, debate on the aesthetic issues raised by Modern and contemporary art, issues that are rarely addressed now in professional art writing. The opportunity to deal with art beyond the limitations of the roster of current gallery or museum exhibitions promises to enhance the debate further, as do the inherent opportunities of a web publication: to be truly international in scope and to post the reactions of readers to the published texts. And when Hyperion is transformed into a print journal, which will occur at the first opportunity, the chance of the publication becoming a significant influence in the arena of contemporary art criticism will be evident. Hyperion looks to be one of the few art journals to which I have contributed that I look forward to reading myself.
http://nietzschecircle.com/hyperion.html
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