ABSTRACTIn this paper, I will show that classical Chinese artists adopted either Daoist or Chan Buddhist meditation to cultivate their mind to be in accord with the Dao, and that their view of the...

We define aesthetic emotions as emotions that underlie the evaluative assessment of artworks. They are separated from the wider class of art-elicited emotions. Aesthetic emotions historically have been characterized as calm, as lacking specific patterns of embodiment, and as being a sui generis kind of pleasure. We reject those views and argue that there is a plurality of aesthetic emotions contributing to praise. After presenting a general account of the nature of emotions, we analyze twelve positive aesthetic emotions in four (...) different categories: emotions of pleasure, contemplation, amazement, and respect. The emotions that we identify in each category, including feelings of fluency, intrigue, wonder, and adoration, have been widely neglected both within aesthetics and in emotion research more broadly. (shrink)

In appreciating paintings, what we experience is either a result of their medium or object, regardless of whether the object is an actual thing, a fictional thing, an internal emotion, an abstract idea, or something else. However, the conceptions of ‘betweenness’ in traditional Chinese aesthetics and ‘twofoldness’ in contemporary Western aesthetics tell us that our experience of paintings might not be simply from the object or the medium itself but rather from a relation between the two. This study considers the (...) intercultural value of the above concepts while examining how our aesthetic pleasure might derive from awareness of the object, the medium, and the play of our mind and body. (shrink)

This paper looks into Tsujimura Kōichi’s notion of the “circumspective,” which not only indicates a type of composition in traditional Chinese landscape painting but also a way of seeing and relati...

Once known as the city of silk, Suzhou 苏州 has become the centre of wedding dress production, selling paradise on earth for one day, including copies of the last royal wedding dress, out of shops at the foot of mythic Tiger Hill. Suzhou is also the host of what is known as the Silicon Valley of the East. It has attracted millions of migrants searching for a better future; millions of tourists visit every year to experience the past, strolling through (...) the gardens and courtyards of its Old Town. The contrasts could hardly be more apparent. Slow time, and fast time, and the time of the in-between, are woven into the city’s complex spatial fabric. This is a conversation by eight authors in eight frames on a city that connects them. (shrink)

"[..] flowing with the waters, halting with the mountains. In the images of light and wind the ephemeral is inscribed. Time is part of space. The scene performs." -/- The essay "Chinese Landscape Aesthetics: the exchange and nurturing of emotions" by Claudia Westermann included in "New Horizons: Eight Perspectives on Chinese Landscape Architecture Today" introduces ideas of landscape in traditional Chinese thought. Following the etymology of the Chinese terms for landscape and recognizing that their conceptual focus is on the exchange (...) and nurturing of emotions, which is not captured by the English term 'landscape,' one may gain a new understanding of contemporary works of Chinese landscape architecture. (shrink)