The Concept of the Animal and Modern Theories of Art
Routledge Advances in Art and Visual Studies Series

This book examines the importance of the animal in modern art theory, using classic texts of modern aesthetics and texts written by modern artists to explore the influence of the human-animal relationship on nineteenth and twentieth century artists and art theorists. The book is unique due to its focus on the concept of the animal, rather than on images of animals, and it aims towards a theoretical account of the connections between the notions of art and animality in the modern age. Roni Grén?s book spans various disciplines, such as art theory, art history, animal studies, modernism, postmodernism, posthumanism, philosophy, and aesthetics.

Table of Contents

List of Figures

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Part 1 The Exceptionality of the Human Spirit

The Human Exception

Natural Aesthetics

Origin and Language

Nature Created in Man’s Image

To Have and Have Not

Part 2 The Animal and the Image

Introduction: Discourse and Imagicity

Condillac and Animal Imagination

Rousseau and the Noble Visual

Diderot’s Suspicion

A Concluding Note

Part 3 Art and Evolution

Introduction: Darwin’s Century

The Subjective and the Objective

The Crisis of Symbolism and the Violent Other

Evolution of the Species and the Creative Sentiment

Nietzsche

Part 4 The Poetic Lie

The Primitive Origin of Art

Gaze and the Invisible

The World of Abstraction and the Revolution of the Beasts

Dream, Debauchery, Myth

Part 5 Conclusion: The Modern Other

Animalization of Art

The Formalist World of Creation

The Surrealist Solutions

The Animal Itself

Afterword

Bibliography

Index

Table of Contents

List of Figures

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Part 1 The Exceptionality of the Human Spirit

The Human Exception

Natural Aesthetics

Origin and Language

Nature Created in Man’s Image

To Have and Have Not

Part 2 The Animal and the Image

Introduction: Discourse and Imagicity

Condillac and Animal Imagination

Rousseau and the Noble Visual

Diderot’s Suspicion

A Concluding Note

Part 3 Art and Evolution

Introduction: Darwin’s Century

The Subjective and the Objective

The Crisis of Symbolism and the Violent Other

Evolution of the Species and the Creative Sentiment

Nietzsche

Part 4 The Poetic Lie

The Primitive Origin of Art

Gaze and the Invisible

The World of Abstraction and the Revolution of the Beasts

Dream, Debauchery, Myth

Part 5 Conclusion: The Modern Other

Animalization of Art

The Formalist World of Creation

The Surrealist Solutions

The Animal Itself

Afterword

Bibliography

Index

Ph.D. Roni Grén is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Turku, Finland. His topics of research have been centered on modern art theory and French culture. Formerly, he has written a book on Georges Bataille’s writings on art, and is currently working on research entitled "Prehistory and Modernism."