Monday, April 29, 2013

Class Reading#4 - Abby Hogge


Plato’s view on art: 

When studying Plato and his view on art, we learned that he looks at art as an imitation; an imitation of an ultimate reality, therefore lesser. Plato believed art to be powerful and therefore dangerous and to move people behaviorally, spiritually and emotionally. Because of the power of art, many should be on guard. The problem with imitation is that if people only know these imitated images, then they will have a distorted view of the way things really are. Images are so far from the reality they seek to depict. Plato wants to “strip” artists of the power and prominence they enjoy in his society. For Plato, art imitates a world that is already far removed from the authentic reality of Truth. Truth is “intellectual abstraction”. Plato was not to keen on art except for certain types of music and drama for he believed that the field of art was a poor representation of the ultimate form. Because he believed it was a poor representation, he believed we couldn’t know the true reality of that which was being depicted. 

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