Beauty and art criticism. A proposal from A.C. Danto

Abstract

My aim in this essay is to critically analyse the usefulness of the term “beauty” for art criticism. This analysis follows in the footsteps of a proposal made by the influential philosopher and art critic Arthur C. Danto (1924-2013), set out especially in The Abuse of Beauty and some of his other later texts. However, Danto was not very clear about the phenomenology or conditions of beauty, and this ambiguity justified objections to his claim. By reviewing some of those objections under the spotlight of Danto’s view of art, my argument pursues the defence of a feasible employment of “beauty” in art criticism