EPLab • International Conference

Kant: Concepts, Imagination, and Aesthetic Appreciation

Two-day International Conference

Nova University Lisbon


Keynote speaker: Angela Breitenbach (University of Cambridge)


Kant’s requirements for a judgment to become a judgment of taste are often viewed as especially limiting. He has been taken to rule out almost any judgment of beauty that is grounded on concepts or aimed at them. And yet, a number of readings of the Critique of the Power of Judgment suggest that Kant’s aesthetic theory is particularly inclusive. From flowers to representational paintings, and from mathematical demonstrations to moral statements – anything, in principle, can become an object of aesthetic appreciation. A common denominator of such readings of the third Critique is reference to the freedom of imagination: as long as imagination acts freely and moves in a free play, then aesthetic appreciation is possible. This is despite the involvement of concepts – or indeed, some commentators even claim that this is due to the participation of concepts. ​It is the main aim of this conference to consider arguments in favor and against the possibility of aesthetic appreciation which takes concepts into account.


Download the programme here.


To join the sessions on Zoom, use this link.


kantimagination.weebly.com

Organisers
João Lemos, Nova University Lisbon
Rachel Siow Robertson, University of Cambridge / The Faraday Institute for Science and Religion
António Marques, Nova University Lisbon
Institutions
IFILNOVA (EPLab, Kant Reading Group)
NOVA FCSH
FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia
Programme
04/04/2022
09:00 – 09:30
Opening remarks
João Constâncio (Director of IFILNOVA), António Marques, João Lemos, and Rachel Siow Robertson
09:30 – 11:00
Keynote Lecture: Angela Breitenbach (University of Cambridge), ‘Aesthetics and cognition in Kant’
09:30 - 10:15 Lecture

10:15 - 11:00 Discussion (Chair: João Lemos)
11:30 – 11:15
Break
11:15 – 12:45
Session One
11:15 - 11:45 Selda Salman (Istanbul Kultur University), ‘Conceptual and nonconceptual contents and the fate of the imagination’

11:45 - 12:15 Robert Clewis (Gwynedd Mercy University), ‘How to Distinguish and Reconcile Sensitive and Conceptual Taste’

12:15 - 12:45 Discussion (Chair: Rachel Siow Robertson)
12:45 – 14:00
Lunch
14:00 – 15:30
Session Two
14:00 - 14:30 Luigi Filieri (Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz), ‘The Free Lawfulness of Kant’s Aesthetic Schematism’

14:30 - 15:00 Senthuran Bhuvanendra (University of Cambridge), ‘Exercising free lawful imagination through the dynamic feeling of life’

15:00 - 15:30 Discussion (Chair: Francisco Lisboa)
15:30 – 15:45
Break
15:45 – 17:15
Session Three
15:45 - 16:15 Lyra Ekström Lindbäck (University of Pardubice), ‘The Non-Conceptuality of the Aesthetic Judgement and the Conceptual Art of Literature’

16:15 - 16:45 Rachel Siow Robertson (University of Cambridge / The Faraday Institute for Science and Religion), ‘Kant on Embodiment and Aesthetic Appreciation’

16:45 - 17:15 Discussion (Chair: João Lemos)
17:15 – 17:30
Break
17:30 – 19:00
Session Four
17:30 - 18:00 Saniye Vatansever (Bilkent University), ‘The Cognitive Basis of Disinterested Pleasure in Kant: How and Why Works of Art Help with Mental Growth’

18:00 - 18:30 Lou Agosta (Ross Medical University), ‘A Rumor of Empathy in Kant’s Aesthetics and Critique of Judgment’

18:30 - 19:00 Discussion (Chair: Francisco Maia)

05/04/2022
09:00 – 10:30
Session One
09:00 - 09:30 Moran Godess-Riccitelli (Bar-Ilan University / University of Potsdam), ‘The Figurative Language of Nature. How to Represent Natural Beauty as Meaningful?’

09:30 - 10:00, Aviv Reiter (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin) & Ido Geiger (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev), ‘Kant’s Analytic of the Beautiful and the Question of its Application to Fine Art’

10:00 - 10:30 Discussion (Chair: João Lemos)
10:30 – 10:45
Break
10:45 – 12:15
Session Two
10:45 - 11:15 Tiago Sousa (University of Minho), ‘Is Kant a musical formalist? The problematic relationship between form, representation and expression in the Kantian musical aesthetic judgment’

11:15 - 11:45 João Lemos (Nova University of Lisbon), ‘Unpacking 5: 327 using Kant’s lectures’

11:45 - 12:15 Discussion (Chair: Rachel Siow Robertson)
12:15 – 13:30
Lunch
13:30 – 15:00
Session Three
13:30 - 14:00 Elena Romano (Freie Universität Berlin), ‘Can everything be beautiful? A Kantian puzzle’

14:00 - 14:30 Larissa Berger (Hannover Institute for Philosophical Research / Massachusetts Institute of Technology), ‘Why there must be a Kantian conception of ugliness, and why there cannot be one’

14:30 - 15:00 Discussion (Chair: Francisco Lisboa)
15:00 – 15:15
Break
15:15 – 16:45
Session Four
15:15 - 15:45 Fernando Silva (University of Lisbon), ‘“All inventions are the offspring of poetry”. Kant on the singularity of imaginative creation’

15:45 - 16:15 Júlia Vernet (University of Barcelona), ‘The Gemüt in the third Critique of Kant as a key to understand the relation between imagination and freedom’

16:15 - 16:45 Discussion (Chair: Rachel Siow Robertson)
16:45 – 17:00
Break
17:00 – 18:30
Session Five
17:00 - 17:30 Inês Salgueiro (University of Coimbra / Nova University of Lisbon), ‘A Kantian Defence of Environmental Concern’

17:30 - 18:00 Semyon Reshenin (University of Tartu), ‘Aesthetic experience as a condition for the moral practice’

18:00 - 18:30 Discussion (Chair: Francisco Maia)
18:30
Closing remarks
João Lemos and Rachel Siow Robertson