Mere Exposure and Aesthetic Realism: A Response to Bence Nanay

Where does the quality of an artwork reside? Is it in the work or in the perceiver and her culture? Belief in the former can be called aesthetic realism, the latter aesthetic antirealism. Nanay suggests that Cutting is an antirealist because he has found that multiple brief exposures to an artwork enhance viewers’ judgments of it. In fact, Cutting is agnostic on the distinction, but as a scientist is unable to discern how quality might be objectively measured in art.