A Theory of Art (review)

A Theory of Art. By Karol Berger. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. [xii, 287 p. ISBN 0-19-512860-5. $35.]

In this work, Karol Berger sets his sights on the global question of the nature of art. The title intrigues: is the author really going to present a new theory of art? Or, considering that all previous attempts in this direction have ended more or less in dismal failure, does he claim to write a first theory of art? Berger himself states neosocratically that he wishes to ask, "What should the function of art be?" and "How does art fulfill its functions?" (pp. viii, 165). Further, he will show "what the world represented in an artwork should consist of," "identify the elements that constitute an artworld," and "show how these elements may be formally arranged" (ibid.). The "shoulds," acting as imperatives, raise the possibility that other thinkers, following different imperatives, might develop theories at odds with that of the author. Yet nowhere is that possibility even suggested.

The sources Berger marshals to buttress his arguments are more than formidable. Seemingly everyone from Plato and Aristotle, via Immanuel Kant and Georg Hegel, to Max Weber, Jacques Derrida, Martin Heidegger, Richard Rorty, and E. D. Hirsch has been summoned to lend authority to his arguments. Only a few have escaped Berger's purview. The most notable of these is Leonard Meyer, whose contributions surely would have warranted some comment, even if antagonistic. I also missed Jürgen Habermas (considering that Hans-Georg Gadamer is found worthy of quotation), whose notions of intersubjectivity might actually support some of Berger's criticism of postmodernism. And if we cavil, why could he not find a modest place for Plotinus, who might have weakened his and Aristotle's argument that a whole requires a beginning, a middle, and an end?

The book opens with an introductory essay on the function and value of art. This is followed by the book's two main parts, entitled "Aesthetics: The Ends of Artworks" and "Poetics and Hermeneutics: The Contents and Interpretation of Artworks." In part 1, Berger discusses the nature and uses of art in successive chapters that are followed by a chapter on the history of Western art music. Part 2 likewise comprises three chapters: "Diegesis and Mimesis: The Poetic Modes and the Matter of Artistic Presentation," "Narrative and Lyric: The Poetic Forms and the Object of Artistic Presentation," and "Hermeneutics: Interpretation and Its Validity."

Berger's conclusion, touching on the function(s) of art and its value, would seem to be that all arts must edify in addition to giving pleasure, because "art that permanently gives up on its educational function is in danger of becoming frivolous . . . and ultimately sterile" (p. 103). Drawing on Hegel, Berger claims for modern art the ability to awaken in us an awareness of our "subjective freedom" (pp. 156, 159) and our "sense of dignity as free beings" (p. 102). Both art and history, he says, are "indispensable tools of the ethical life of justified choices"; they "allow us to make the first steps beyond immediate awareness, to compare real experiences with actual and fictional imaginary ones," an activity that is "a prerequisite to our being able to make choices among the objects of desire and among desires themselves" (p. 80). The reader is told that art allows us "continuously to reinvent ourselves," to develop "our capacity to imagine what it would feel like to achieve [various ends]. And this capacity is an indispensable component of any rational pursuit of an end" (p. 87). Further, "Art . . . keeps our world from becoming totally 'disenchanted,' flat, and devoid of significance" (p. 94). I am not sure that such arguments do not belong with the old justification for elementary-school music programs on the ground that they raise the mathematical aptitude of students.

As to the "nature of art," though both art and history are primarily concerned with "representation," art alone offers "representational worlds" that are also fictional. They spring from "an...