Art and Ethics

The merited response argument is an argument in favour of artistic ethicism. According to this view, the interaction between art and morality is such that a moral defect in a work of art negatively influences the work's artistic value (and a moral merit, when relevant, is always an artistic merit). I contend that the argument relies on a criterion of aesthetic and artistic relevance that, when properly understood, fails to constitute a premise that either the artistic contextualist or the autonomist would accept. I then offer a version of the merited response argument that supports artistic contextualism and argue that, given certain controversial assumptions, immoral art in the Western tradition is more common than typically acknowledged in the recent literature on the topic.

What might an interactive artwork look like that enabled greater expressive
potential for all of the components of the event? How can we radically
shift our idea of interactivity towards an ecological conception of the term,
emphasising the generation of complex relation over the stability of objects
and subjects? Gathering Ecologies explores this ethical and political shift in
thinking, examining the creative potential of differential relations through key
concepts from the philosophies of A.N. Whitehead, Gilbert Simondon and
Michel Serres. Utilising detailed examinations of work by artists such as Lygia
Clark, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Nathaniel Stern and Joyce Hinterding, the
book discusses the creative potential of movement, perception and sensation,
interfacing, sound and generative algorithmic design to tune an event towards
the conditions of its own ecological emergence

Some works of architecture have remarkable aesthetic value. According to certain philosophers, part of this value derives from the appearance of such constructions to fulfil the function for which they were built. I argue that one way of understanding the connection between function and aesthetic value resides in the concept of functional beauty. I analyse a number of recent accounts of this notion, then offer a better way of understanding it. I then focus my attention on the relation between aesthetic and moral values and claim that, if the notion of functional beauty makes any sense at all, then we have a pro tanto case for holding that moral defects in works of architecture can have aesthetic merits.

The aims of this paper are (1) to reconstruct the dialectic between two rival theories on the relation between art and morality, (2) to argue against Berys Gaut’s recent defense of ethicism, and (3) to elaborate some of my critical remarks and propose new considerations in favor of immoralism. To a first approximation, an ethicist maintains that the moral value of a work of art, when relevant, is an important element of its artistic value. In particular, assuming that the moral value of a work, w, is relevant for its artistic value, if w has an immoral character (in a sense to be specified), then its aesthetic value is lessened. In addition, if w has a morally positive character, then w is also artistically more

"Voice is a component in three of Smithson's 1969 artworks: an audio lecture and slideshow (Hotel Palenque (1969/72)), a video recording with voice-over (Swamp) and an improvised conversation between the artist and his wife, Nancy Holt (East Coast, West Coast). Also during 1969, Smithson undertook a planned journey to Mexico, travelling the Yucatán peninsula with Holt."

Digital media presentation for the 16th International Conference on the Arts in Society, held at the University of Western Australia, School of Design, Perth, Australia.

Theme: Special Focus—Voices from the Edge: Negotiating the Local in the Global

June 16, 2021

Speaker: Dr. Rose Vickers
PhD Graduate 2020, The University of Sydney

Produced by the National Academies Keck Futures Initiative (NAKFI), the over-arching goal of this conference was to bring together scientists and artists in a space that supported collaborative work on social and scientific research problems connected to topics that included climate-related change, biodiversity and technology. From the outset, a cloud of qualm and uncertainty hung over the conference as the day before Donald Trump had been elected President of the United States. The vision and purpose of the conference, indeed the life work of many of the participant's was suddenly, overnight, in jeopardy. Throughout the