Friedrich Schiller’s on the Aesthetic Education of Man

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Furthermore, Schiller concludes that a person is only truly free when playing, that is to say when both these opposing drives are working in concert with each other in harmony when he is contemplating beauty. Letter XXII states the outcome of this mediation, which is the creation of a middle ground known as "The aesthetic state"10. The aesthetic emerges when sense and reason are both fully active and therefore self-annulling; it is "exactly the hinge or transitional stage between the brutely sensual and the sublimely rational"11. It is a state in which hegemony does not exist, reason no longer dominates nature. The aesthetic state is a state of absolute freedom and infinite potentialities. The mediated interplay of the Stofftrieb and the Formtrieb through the aesthetic reconciliation of man’s sense and reason can thereby be seen as the same means in which the formation of a liberal and organic society can materialize.

Critically, when reading there are a few clear inconsistencies present in Schiller’s argument. There is a sense of unresolved tension with his engagement with Kant. He simultaneously adapts Kant’s principles, whilst attempting to transcend them. Also the manner which he approaches the role the aesthetic plays is slightly ambiguous. It is not clear whether Schiller views the aesthetic as the means (to a higher moral state), or an end in itself, or simply whether it occupies both these functions. The complexity of his presentation is difficult to interpret, because on the one hand, Schiller speaks of the aesthetic as a pathway which leads us to the life of moral freedom. On the other hand, he speaks of the aesthetic as a realm of experience that mediates between the moral and the physical, resolving the tension between them in a higher unity that is both natural and moral, sensuous and rational. Secondly, the manner in which he approaches the definition of beauty is problematic. He begins to introduce the concepts of melting and energizing beauty in Letter XVI yet fails to deliver a satisfactory conclusion. Lastly, another concern is the lack of depth he enters into in addressing the issue of The Sublime, something Kant engaged with frequently within his Critique of Judgement.

Nevertheless, the merit of Schiller’s exploration of aesthetics, and in particular his notion of the unifying ‘aesthetic state’, lies within its ability to surpass its context. Influencing later philosophers with his relationship between politics and aesthetics, the evidence of which can be seen in Marxism’s belief in human self-realization and social harmony over disassociated industrial-capitalism, and even more recently, Jacques Ranciere’s critical concept of the ‘aesthetic regime’. For illustration, Ranciere’s ‘aesthetic regime’ attacks the entrenched distinctions forged by traditional art history narratives, drawing together the two fields of politics and aesthetics which he perceived as inherently belonging to one another rather than being autonomous. Referencing Schiller’s “intermingling of autonomy and heteronomy12” he attacks the hierarchical, domination of the rational faculty dividing ‘Modernism’ and ‘Post Modernism’ into categories for art to be logically distributed between. This clearly reflects his engagement with Schiller’s On the Aesthetic Education of Man and its continued reference in contemporary aesthetic debate.

In summary, Schiller’s argument of aesthetics within On the Aesthetic Education of Man (1794) was primarily his answer to the problematic question about what function art could and should have in society in the face of such a post-revolutionary political crisis occurring in Europe. Heavily influenced by Kant, Schiller utilized the dualisms put forth in his Critique of Judgment of nature and reason, proposing that the aesthetic could mediate the two and hence lead to a higher state of morality and freedom. His engagement with Kant’s philosophy is complex and somewhat paradoxical, yet his exploration of the dynamic relationship between beauty, aesthetics and the political sphere continue to infiltrate contemporary art historical debate.

References:

Chantler, A., ‘Friedrich Schiller (1759-1805)’ in Murray, C., Ed. Key Writers on Art from Antiquity to the Nineteenth Century, London: Routledge, 2003, 135-139, electronic resource

Eagleton, T., ‘Schiller and Hegemony’, in Eagleton, The Ideology of the Aesthetic, Oxford: Blackwell, 1990, pp. 102-19.

Sharpe, L. ‘Concerning Aesthetic Education’ in Martinson, S., Ed. A Companion to the Works of Friedrich Schiller, Boydell & Brewer, 2005, p. 154.

Podro, M., ‘Schiller’ in The Critical Historians of Art, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1982, 11-16.

Schiller, F., Letters Upon the Aesthetic Education of Man, 1794, Modern History Sourcebook: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/schiller-education.asp.

Tanke, Joseph J., Jacques Rancière: An Introduction, Continuum, 2011, pp. 93-99.