The Founding of Aesthetics in the German Enlightenment The Art of Invention and the Invention of Art

When, in 1735, Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten added a new discipline to the philosophical system, he not only founded modern aesthetics but also contributed to shaping the modern concept of art or 'fine art'. In The Founding of Aesthetics in the German Enlightenment, Stefanie Buchenau offers a rich analysis and reconstruction of the origins of this new discipline in its wider context of German Enlightenment philosophy. Present-day scholars commonly regard Baumgarten's views as an imperfect prefiguration of Kantian and post-Kantian aesthetics, but Buchenau argues that Baumgarten defended a consistent and original project which must be viewed in the context of the modern debate on the art of invention. Her book offers new perspectives on Kantian aesthetics and beauty in art and science.

Introduction; 1. Wolff and the modern debate on a method of invention; 2. Wolff on the pleasure of invention; 3. Leibniz and Wolff on invention: hieroglyphs, images and poetry; 4. Poetry as revelation: Bodmer, Breitinger, Gottsched on the imitation of nature; 5. Invention, judgement, literary criticism; 6. The rhetorical shift: Baumgarten's founding of aesthetics in the Meditationes philosophicae; 7. Baumgarten's Aesthetica. Topics and the modern ars inveniendi; 8. Aesthetics and anthropology; 9. Aesthetics and ethics; 10. 'A general heuristic is impossible'. Kant and the Wolffian ars inveniendi; Conclusion.

This book explores the forgotten philosophical and conceptual origins of aesthetics in eighteenth-century Germany. It offers fresh perspectives on Kantian aesthetics and will appeal to students and scholars who are interested in the history of aesthetics and the beginnings of the German aesthetic tradition.

Stefanie Buchenau is a Maître de conférences in the German department of the Université Paris VIII.