Beauty Discourse and the Logic of Aesthetics

    In a general, casual conversation, beauty is as subjective as the individual. Therefore, a mutual consensus of what is and isn’t beautiful isn’t necessarily prioritized, but is ultimately impossible, regardless. Arts’ beauty from a professional perspective like those with jobs of an art historian and art critique, however, tend to abide more traditional guidelines which give arts their status and value.
    What we read in “Beauty Discourse and the Logic of Aesthetics” by Amelia Jones addresses the falsehoods made by Dave Hickey in claims of being an absolute authority in the judgment of creative beauty as implied in his book “The Invisible Dragon: Four Essays on Beauty” and contending it against some of the world’s most influential, notified artworks that contradict his claims. Jones later in her paper suggests a more politically conscious perspective in an attempt to shift from the traditional but ineffective approach to aesthetics.

    Hickey claims that his perspective of beauty is the absolute authoritative and anything else he doesn’t approve of isn’t worth paying attention to. But, the question stands: how does his biased perspective contribute anything productive to academia let alone his distinguishing/consideration of any factors of culture which contexts the arts that are and/or aren’t “beneath him.” Lastly, it is up for debate whose interests it serves best with his over simplistic interpretive desire surrounding artistic beautification, or whether sexualization of exclusively white women being the pique of beauty. 

    The passage “Yo Mama! Renee Cox's Phallus” from our text gives further insight to Hickey’s unjust and contradicting position. He continuously insists “his own preferences as inherent rather than ideologically motivated… privileges Mapplethorpe’s work for their ‘enfranchise[ment] of the non-canonical beholder’” (Jones, 321). However, he does so “with no consideration of who this beholder might be and under what circumstances she or he would become ‘enfranchised’” and instead retain self-consciousness, “purge himself of the senses which endanger autonomy not only because they unavoidably entangle him in the world, but, specifically, because they make him passive… instead of active…, susceptible, like 'Oriental voluptuaries,' to sympathy and tears” (Jones, 321). Amelia Jones follows up with her suggested response of critiquing art with a “compelling, politically astute, entertaining, and beautiful” interpretation of Renee Cox’s “Yo Mama!” And continues her lapse into self-consciousness. 

The Yo Mama, 1993, Archival Digital ink jet print on Cotton Rag 4 x 7ft

    Jone’s interpretation, as she stated, was an impassioned response to HIckey’s dismissal of political correctness. She spoke to the true essence of the artwork with a sense of subjective responsibility. With her last comment, she brushes that political correctness “profoundly oversimplifies the complexity and heterogeneity of the vast range of politicized and informed positions on art and culture which Hickey and others attempt to join together under its rubric” (Jones 233).  

    Something I find relevant to this reading is a quote from the super bowl red bull commercial with the parrot, saying “Individuality often complicates things.” I unfortunately agree, and believe there is no way to make a definition of beauty that isn't ethnocentric, elitist, racist, sexist, or that of the sorts. I think within our rapidly forward progressing society, woke culture, cancel culture, things almost inconsiderably minuscule can spark infinite levels of controversy and debate. Creatively speaking, I believe that there are niches for a reason: because not everything is for everyone. Individuality and subjectivity can give any artwork so much more dimension than the intent of the artist and interpretation of the viewer. 


Jones, Amelia, Beauty Discourse and the Logic of Aesthetics. Fort Lewis, CO. EBSCO Publishing, 2019