E.H. Gombrich famously observed that 'there really is no such thing as Art' (with a capital A).
The Truth about Art 1 - Mystery or Mastery
Instead he described the practice of art as 'mastery', which equates to the Quality recovered by Robert M. Pirsig in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1974). Quality is also a better word than 'virtue' to render the aretê that preoccupied Socrates in Plato's dialogues.
People:
Oxford Unit:
Keywords:
- aesthetics
- architecture
- arête
- aristotle
- art
- art historian
- art history
- Collingwood
- Doorly
- Genius
- hobbes
- liberal arts
- mastery
- mystery
- oxford
- Patrick Doorly
- philosopher
- philosophy
- Pirsig
- plato
- Plato's cave
- pre-verbal
- quality
- right
- sheldonian
- skill
- Streeter
- the Good
- The Truth about Art
- truth
- values
- Vasari
- virtu
- virtue
- Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
More in this Series...
A collection of audio and video resources of lectures, seminars and presentations from the Department's humanities' programmes.