Abstract
This book started life as notes for the undergraduate module ‘Religious aesthetics’ and draws on research visits to several European countries and the United States. Its title and thesis are owed to Hegel who reckoned pagan art to be the art of the beautiful and Christian art to be that of the sublime. It is an exploration of Christian aesthetics which asserts a series of moral, theological and devotional considerations as criteria for aesthetic judgement. Some of the contentious arguments offered include a celebration of Gothic on the grounds of its honesty and a critique of connoisseurship, of academic canons, art history, galleries and the cult of the artist. It inclines more to the disciplines of theology and ethics than to any orthodoxies in the study of art.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Place of Publication | Aldershot |
| Publisher | Ashgate |
| ISBN (Print) | 0754650731 |
| Publication status | Published - 2006 |