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The mystery of blue

by
October 2009, no. 315

The Art Instinct: Beauty, pleasure and human evolution by Denis Dutton

Oxford University Press, $49.95 hb, 279 pp, 9780199539420

The mystery of blue

by
October 2009, no. 315

If beauty is in the eye of the beholder and taste is subjective, why is there often overwhelming agreement that a particular thing is beautiful? Are tastes shaped by brain structure, unconscious psychic drives, society or culture? For almost half a century, the idea of innate, universal and cross-cultural aesthetics has been hotly contested in art theory and cultural studies. Now Denis Dutton argues that our aesthetic responses are instinctual. He has timed his book well. Freud has fallen from favour, post-modernism is generally despised and Darwin studies are on the rise.

The Art Instinct: Beauty, pleasure and human evolution

The Art Instinct: Beauty, pleasure and human evolution

by Denis Dutton

Oxford University Press, $49.95 hb, 279 pp, 9780199539420

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