makes clear, however, a work of art does not merely copynature, for it
instantiates ideas more fully than any single example could do in reality.
That mimetic art does much more than merely mirror the surface
appearance of reality was recognized even by Plato, it seems—despite a
persistent impression to the contrary created by the often-quoted “art as
mirror” passage from Book 10 of his Republic. Moreover, Aristotle’s
account of artistic mimesis, in the Poeticsand other writings, reveals a
yet deeper understanding of the complexity and richness of mimetic rep-
resentation in art.^10
In the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, of course, the
previously commonplace idea that mimesis is a defining attribute of the
arts was increasingly challenged—most dramatically so with the advent
and growing acceptance of abstract painting and sculpture. Mimetic rep-
resentation as a necessary, if not sufficient, condition of art was rejected
outright, first by the pioneers of abstract art (who attempted to convey
their worldview without mimetic reference to recognizable objects), and
subsequently by the postmodernists, who began by misconstruing and
therefore flouting or denying the distinction between representation and
reality inherent in all works of art. In the process, the intelligibility of art
was sacrificed, on the altar of total “artistic freedom”—thus severing, I
would argue, the former nexus between art and cognition.
Anyone wishing to understand art more fully in relation to “sensuous
cognition,” therefore, should begin by noting that the sorts of objects
Baumgarten, Kant, and other eighteenth-century aesthetic theorists had
chiefly in mind when they spoke of “art” or “the arts” were the mimetic
arts, also called the imitative arts—which by the middle of the century
came to be known, however misleadingly, as the beaux arts, or “fine
arts.” What basic forms of expression did they include? According to a
broad consensus from antiquity until about 1750, these were primarily
painting and sculpture in various media (i.e., two- and three-dimensional
visual representations), “poetry” (which in effect included all imagina-
tive literature—dramatic, narrative, and lyrical), music, and dance.
Neither the ancient concept of the mimetic arts nor the earliest defini-
tion of the term “fine arts” included either architecture or objects of
“decorative art.”^11 Nor, obviously, did they anticipate the invention of
myriad new forms.
If the nature of art is now to be examined scientifically in relation to
cognition, researchers must first ask, Which, if any, of the new forms—
from “abstract art” to “conceptual art”—legitimately qualifies as art
in the sense formerly intended? Do any of them constitute a medium
of “sensuous cognition” in the manner suggested by Baumgarten?
Mimesis versus the Avant-Garde: Art and Cognition 41