PHENOMENOLOGY OF REASON AND AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE. EDMUND HUSSERL AND VASILY SESEMANN

Abstract

Phenomenological aesthetics should also be able to show how the structure of any given aesthetic object is connected with the experience of that object, as well as to demonstrate the necessary conditions for the aesthetic experience itself. In order to do so, one must argue against one-sided assumptions, such as the aesthetic objectivism’s supposition that beauty is exclusively the trait of reality not at all dependent on the subject’s experience of it; or its opposite belief that beauty is essentially and solely the projection of the subjective taste onto the things in the world. Sesemann analizes the aesthetic object and aesthetic act by emphasizing their connection. This connection relates to what is described in Husserls phenomenology as the correlation between the intentional object and the intentional act. This connection can be discovered only by using the phenomenological method: by doing phenomenological reduction. This paper will first explain the aesthetic perception in Sesemann‘s aesthetics. Later, it examine the conception of the aesthetic object‘s structure in Sesemann‘s aesthetic: composition of elements, sensations in connection with meaning; etc. Finally, the paper will argue that Sesemann‘s aesthetics is essentially based on the method of phenomenological reduction.