Le boeuf écorché by Rembrandt
The Department of French & Italian
presents a Horizons of Knowledge
Lecture by
GÉrard Dessons
Art as a Problem
Wednesday,
February 28, 2007
5:30 pm
College Arts & Humanities
Institute
1211 E. Atwater Ave
This talk contends that Art cannot be reduced to an essence or a particular practice, but rather it designates the activity though which some works (pictorial, verbal, auditive, etc.) or practices reveal, question and change the public values that they solicit through their own existence. Therefore, the question of art cannot be asked pertinently in terms of an aesthetics – in the strict sense of the word – but rather in terms of a poetics, in as much as these works and practices have the critical characteristic of questioning the discourse that they inevitably engender. This question will be discussed starting from the example of a classical painter, Rembrandt, to whom Dessons has recently dedicated a book.
Gérard Dessons is Professor of French in the Department of French Literature at the Université Paris 8, where he leads the Doctoral School “Disciplines du Sens”. His scholarly works deal with theories of language, literature, translation, art and its interactions with other disciplines. He has published works on 19th and 20th century literature, in particular poetry, theatre and plastic arts. His publications include : Introduction à l’analyse du poème (2005), Maeterlinck, le théâtre du poème (2005), and L’Art et la manière. Art, littérature, langage (2004). In 1998 he co-authored Traité du rythme : Des vers et des proses with Henro Meschonnic. His most recent works are Rembrandt, l’odeur de la peinture (2006) and Emile Benveniste, l’invention du discours (2006).
Sponsored by the Department of French & Italian, West European Studies, Comparative Literature and the Horizons of Knowledge. Lecture to be followed by discussion and refreshments.
If you have a disability and need assistance, accommodations can be made to meet most needs. Please call 855-5458.
