Tiziana Andina

Exemplarity in Contemporary Arts

Abstract Contemporary art seems to be a domain almost completely devoid of exemplarity. This is because the replicability and reproducibility of artworks seem to have reduced them to mere objects, largely indistinguishable from ordinary ones – Marcel Duchamps ready-mades being the first clear example of this. Nevertheless, this paper will show that exemplarity is still alive in contemporary art, even though normativity has taken a new configuration. It explores the specific character of exemplarity, as well as its normativity, in the contemporary visual and performing arts, showing that art is still the place in which ordinary life transfigures in a new dimension.

The Domain of Social Ontology

What are the theoretical issues that social ontology deals with? What are its historical origins? What are its relations to general ontology and philosophy? In order to answer these questions, Andina offers a presentation of contemporary ontology starting from its historical origins and showing how the discipline became what it is—namely, the study of the constitutive elements of social reality—describing its structure and identifying its underlying normativity. In addition to reconstructing the theoretical foundations of the discipline, the chapter identifies and discusses its basic notions: covenants, promises, relationships, transgenerationality, institutions, states and meta-states.

A Cross-Section of Power

Is it possible to define power? What is document bureaucracy, and how is it different from Weber’s bureaucracy? Based on what discussed in the previous chapters, this chapter analyses the notion of power—which is the foundation of the transgenerational actions performed by states and meta-states—and the concept of document bureaucracy. These two elements, for Andina, characterize society in an age of globalization. However, she claims, they are not sufficient conditions to create a state that corresponds to some sort of social identity: artistic documentality and memory are equally necessary conditions.

Denkweg o di un certo gusto per la narrazione in arte

Ever since the last century art seems to be characterized by a powerful metareflective vocation. The works of Mimmo Paladino represent an effective barrier in this deconstructive movement and allow art to preserve the memory of its own narrative vocation.

L’importanza degli affetti note per una ontologia sociale incorporata

In its mainstream analysis, social ontology seems to make use of the modern idea of subjectivity. Margaret Gilbert, and David Lewis in his previous book on conventions, consider the subject as an auto transparent postulate. The thesis I will discuss in this paper is based on the idea that the ethical position outlined by Friedrich Nietzsche, which remains problematic in its positive outcomes, becomes a useful instrument for the comprehension of the pre-institutional components of the social world when applied to an entirely different and more articulate framework such as those offered by contemporary social ontologies.

3.3. Il mondo dell’arte come istituzione sociale

The essay has two main aims: (a) to provide an explanation of the ontology on which is based the concept of the “art world”; and, on the basis of that account, (b) to inquire whether the so-called Institutional Theories of Art are well founded. I will argue that it is not possible to consider the art world as a social institution and that, because of this, the so-called Institutional Theories of Art lack a secure foundation.

Una vita contro. Conversazione con Lucia Pizzo Russo

The research Lucia Pizzo Russo carried out all over her academic and scientific career is focussed on a the following idea: human mind and behaviour make up a cognitive device from whose complexity stems an evolutionary advantage. Hence, the psychological study of mind should take into account all those cognitive functions that underlie man’s ability of perceiving structures and affordances in the visual world as much as of solving problems, where perception and thought deeply interact, and of giving shape to representations, be they artistic forms or scientific theories. But for an adequate psychological account to obtain that complexity must be traded off against the assumption that mind and behaviour are a psychophysical unity. That means that cognition does imply a neurobiological basis, and at the same time that a phenomenological stance is required just as that instanced by Gestalt psychology. In this interview a picture of a piece of life is meant to be given as it goes along with a research whose reference are issues in psychology, psychology of arts and such figures as Brandi, Piaget, Gombrich, Arnheim, Bozzi.

No Appreciation without Interpretation

Il 1964 e una data importante per la filosofia di Arthur C. Danto. Durante la tarda primavera di quell’anno i responsabili della Stable Gallery di New York esposero una gran quantita di scatoloni, di dimensioni diverse e del tutto simili a quelli che si potevano vedere negli scaffali dei supermercati americani. Danto dice spesso di intendere quell’evento come la sua personale rivoluzione copernicana. Non dobbiamo dimenticare che ancora durante gli anni Sessanta del secolo scorso i filosofi an...