There is no conflict between "the best of each other" and "the united states and the united states."
Source: China News Service (CNS1952)
China News Service: Yang Yanci
All characters: 2274
Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
What is aesthetics? This is a "beautiful discipline" that has been studied for thousands of years at home and abroad, starting from the Spring and Autumn Warring States in China and the ancient Greek era in the West. What is aesthetics? What is aesthetics? The "East and West Questions" column of China News Service recently interviewed Professor Pan Zhichang, an aesthetician and director of the Research Center for Aesthetics and Cultural Communication of Nanjing University, to discuss the differences between Chinese and Western aesthetics, and whether the beauty of the East and the West can bridge the differences and "beauty and commonality".
Source: Zhongxin Video
The interview transcript is summarized below:
China News Service: Aesthetics is an important branch of philosophy, in your opinion, what is the difference between the study of aesthetics in the East and the West?
Pan Zhichang: The exploration of beauty is the common pursuit of the whole world. In the West, Plato said in ancient Greece: "Since the birth of the god of love, people have had a love of beauty, and from the love of beauty is born all the happiness enjoyed by man and god." In China, there has long been a saying that "everyone has the heart to love beauty".
The Eastern and Western positioning of aesthetics is different. In the West, aesthetics has always been a subsidiary discipline, from the age of religion to the age of science, it is only an appendage of religion and science, and mainly focuses on the interpretation of literature and art, so it is also called "philosophy of art".
In China, however, it has always existed as an independent discipline. Mr. Cai Yuanpei found that in China, "aesthetic education replaces religion". In fact, in China, "aesthetic education is also used to replace science". Therefore, in China, aesthetics has always not been the "small aesthetics" of the West that are mainly concerned with literature and art, but the "big aesthetics" that are mainly concerned with the "great beauty of heaven and earth" and the beauty of life.
In the past hundred years, China has experienced "aesthetic fever" several times. From Wang Guowei, Zong Baihua, Fang Dongmei, Zhu Guangqian to the contemporary aesthetics of life, we have always diligently pursued the fundamental goal of aesthetics of "aesthetics and human liberation". Therefore, it is the same as the orientation of Western aesthetics in the past one or two hundred years, and unexpectedly in the focus of the century of "life aesthetics", there is an aesthetic space that can be dialogued and discussed with each other.
Therefore, the aesthetics of life can and should of course become a window for the aesthetic exchange between the East and the West. An "aesthetic era" with aesthetic values as the dominant value and guiding value is coming.
In contemporary times, the aesthetics of life in China and the West have gone beyond the attention to literature and art, and their eyes are focused on the fundamental issue of "aesthetics and human liberation". Obviously, this is a gratifying theoretical premise that the East and the West can "seek common ground while reserving differences" and seek "beauty and commonality."
Collection of the China Artists Association "East-West". Photo by China News Agency, Kyushu
China News Service: How can the publics of the East and the West bridge the differences and achieve mutual understanding and tolerance?
Pan Zhichang: For the public, we can start from a very interesting phenomenon, which is an aesthetic phenomenon.
The first is a keen concern for aesthetic phenomena. Aesthetic phenomena have not been the focus of common concern between the East and the West for a long time in the past. However, as the West moves from the age of religion to the age of science to the era of aesthetics, and as China goes from "standing up" to "getting rich" to "getting strong" to "becoming beautiful", "literacy" has become a hot spot of common concern between the East and the West.
Of course, in the past, it was to eliminate "illiteracy", because "knowledge is power", which is the mission of the scientific age. Today is the eradication of "beauty blindness". Because "aesthetics is the competitiveness of life", "beauty is the creativity of life", "aesthetic power is the soft power of life".
"Beauty lovers from all over the world united" may become the key to bridging the differences between the East and the West and achieving mutual understanding and tolerance. How the public of the East and the West grasps the "beauty and the united states" and "the beauty of each other" should be answered on this basis.
In April 2019, the "Rosewood Juju" immersive digital art exhibition was launched in Nanjing. China News Service reporter Yang Bo photographed
China News Service: How do you view the "harmony and difference" of eastern and western aesthetics?
Pan Zhichang: Due to the huge differences in history and culture between Eastern and Western aesthetics, there is naturally an element of "harmony and difference". Therefore, under the wave of globalization, it is necessary to face up to the convergence and differences between the two.
For example, the heroines of Chinese literary works are mostly young girls, which is often said to be "Nian Fang Er Eight". But in Western literature, beautiful young women often become eye-catching protagonists, such as Anna Karenina, the protagonist of Anna Karenina.
From a real life point of view, there are also differences in eastern and western aesthetics. For example, Western aesthetics emphasize the three-dimensional sense of the side type, while chinese aesthetics are biased towards the positive type, focusing on "apricot eyes and cherry lips".
After the reform and opening up, the aesthetics of the East and the West began to gradually blend. The West began to have a strong interest in the mysterious East, such as martial arts, calligraphy, and gardens. The East began to open the door to the world.
Suzhou Museum, designed by master architect I.M. Pei. Photo by Guo Zhihua, China News Service
For example, in the past, we only liked the Oriental folk dance with our feet on the ground, and now we have begun to appreciate the Western ballet "on the tiptoe"; in the past, we only appreciated the Taihu stone as the "ugly stone", and now we have also begun to accept marble as an artistic treasure. This undoubtedly reflects the more confident and inclusive aesthetic of our nation.
Aesthetics are never fixed patterns. The French Enlightenment philosopher Montesquieu said in On Fun: "There is only one way for a person to be beautiful, but she can make herself cute in a hundred thousand ways." The same is true of aesthetics, there is only "one way" of beauty, involving "beauty pageant", in fact, it has nothing to do with aesthetics, "aesthetics" is concerned with the cute "one hundred thousand ways".
China News Service: What kind of attitude do you think should be upheld in the exchanges between the East and the West?
Pan Zhichang: Of course, it is a dialogue, and it can only be a dialogue!
In the past, we were accustomed to distinguishing the Eastern and Western worlds as opposing sides, either as guests or as masters, and mistakenly thought that there was a concentric circle. So although there are small circles in the large circle and circles in the circle, the core is always a "dot", and all the circles revolve around the "dot". As a result, either the east wind overwhelmed the west wind, or the west wind overwhelmed the east wind. But in fact, the East and the West only have "intersection points" and no "circles".
In September 2020, the "Three-Body Space-Time Immersion Exhibition" was held in Chongqing. China News Service reporter Chen Chao photographed
In this way, the dialogue between the East and the West cannot be answered by right and wrong, but by asking questions and answering questions, answering questions at the same time is asking questions, and asking questions is answering at the same time. As Zhuangzi said, "Is it true that there is a fruit or another?" And what about it? ”
Moreover, the emergence of the East did not render the West meaningless, nor did the appearance of the West render the East meaningless. Ideas such as "solipsism", "who wins and who loses", and even "you die and I live" are extremely narrow and unnecessary.
All we need is "symbiosis", "co-existence" and "coexistence". For example, Schopenhauer drew heavily on Eastern Buddhist thought in his study of the aesthetics of life, and Heidegger quoted Laozi's Tao Te Ching several times in his writings.
Obviously, there is no conflict between "the best of each other" and "the United States and the United States."
Respondent Profiles:
Pan Zhichang, an aesthetician, strategic consulting and planning expert, enjoys the special government allowance of the State Council, is a professor at the School of Journalism and Communication of Nanjing University, a doctoral supervisor, and the director of the Research Center for Aesthetics and Cultural Communication. His main research areas include basic theories of aesthetics, Chinese and Western comparative culture and aesthetics, "Dream of the Red Chamber" research, strategic consulting and planning, etc. He has long been engaged in planning and creative work in the fields of enterprises, regions, governments and media.
Original title: "Can the Aesthetics of Things under the Wave of Globalization Move Towards "Beauty and Coexistence"|? Something to ask"
Editor: Zeng Xiaowei
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