Art’s Claim to Truth

From the perspective of ontology, Heidegger’s most thorough definition of the artwork appears, as is well known, in the essay Der Ursprung des Kunstwerkes (“The Origin of the Work of Art”),¹ according to which a work of art is the “setting-itself-into-work of truth.” Heidegger works out this definition with a view toward specifying the ontological meaning of art, but he does not do the same with aesthetic enjoyment.² This essay and the following Heideggerian works remain quite vague on the encounter between the reader/spectator and the work, on how to conceive of aesthetic enjoyment. To attend to this question we can draw some indications—though merely as starting points for a theoretical proposal that cannot in any way claim with any certainty to be “faithful” to Heidegger’s teaching—from Heidegger’s own practice as a reader and interpreter of poetic texts: ranging from the commentary on Hölderlin to the most recent Unterwegs zur Sprache.³ Accordingly, it is not so much a matter of interpreting his thought as it is of further developing and continuing it.

In regard to the literal meaning of the expression “setting-itself-into-work of truth,” with respect to which the concept of aesthetic enjoyment is to be examined, I can only refer to the illustrations Heidegger himself provides in the essay mentioned above. Let me recall here that Heidegger is not speaking in any way of the setting-itself-into-work of truth as though to manifest or make known a truth that is already given, established, as he would if it were a truth about a situation or an actually present structure of the entity; instead, the setting-itself-into-work of truth for Heidegger has the same pregnant meaning as the Italian expression “putting a building to work” (messa in opera di una costruzione), where the meaning is that it has been put in a condition to function. The artwork sets-itself-into work in the same sense. Or to put it better: in the work, truth sets-itself-into-work in the same sense: in fact, the work opens a new “epoch” of being as an absolutely originary event, which cannot be reduced to what it already was, and it grounds a new order of relationships within beings, a true and actually new world. This is why, if there is a term that can define the encounter between the reader and the work, it is “Stoss,” shock or quake: the artwork suspends in the reader all natural relationships, making strange everything that until that moment had appeared obvious and familiar.

It is clear enough, though, even from such a cursory description of the way in which Heidegger poses the problem, that such an encounter with the work—understood as the Stoss of encountering a new world—cannot be reduced in any way to the traditional concepts of aesthetic enjoyment.

The terms in which the encounter with the artwork has been conceived throughout the history of aesthetics are basically two: representationalism and formalism. Such an antithesis is not only and mainly a convenient polemical schema; rather, it is linked in the same manner with the way in which metaphysical thought (ontic thought) states (or fails to state) the question of truth. If the question of truth is not posed radically, when attempting to state it philosophically, and instead continues to be conceived in terms of correspondence with a “given” state of affairs or (a variation of the correspondence theory) of syntactic and formal correctness, it will always necessarily oscillate between representationalism and formalism.

If art’s relationship to truth is emphasized but still conceived metaphysically, the value and meaning of art will consist in manifesting—making more visible on the plane of sensibility—a propositional truth that somehow would supply information regarding the “state of things,” be it the emotional condition of a human being, the social configuration of an epoch, or the very structure of being. Instead, to the extent that one is willing to recognize for art an original function that is irreducible to knowledge, still metaphysically thought, art is viewed as a purely formal construction of objects that “impose” themselves and their validity. This is so because they are equipped with a structure whose recognition produces a delightful experience. In either case, pleasure has to do with recognition (a key term in Aristotle’s poetics, which contains the two coexisting or oscillating meanings discussed here). In the first instance, it is a truth that is recognized insofar as it is already known by other means (hence the provisional and inessential character of art for all representational perspectives); in the second instance, it is a much more subtle fact that entails an evaluation of the successful outcome of the form: the beautiful structure gives pleasure because I “recognize” that it is what it should have been. Very often this sort of pleasure seeks to further ground itself without revising the metaphysical concept of truth, thus reducing itself to psychological or vitalistic positions.

While defending genuine demands, representationalism and formalism isolate (as they have to within the domain of metaphysics) and, therefore, reveal the internal contradictions and insufficiencies around which much of the history of aesthetics has busied itself. The basic difficulty of every representational attitude is the already mentioned provisional and inessential character of art. As is well known, these are the characters that art takes on in Hegel’s thought, where it is justified precisely because it is aufgehoben, overcome and sublated, by philosophy. Now, what in Hegel’s system happens to art as a form of Spirit—hence at the level of Spirit’s history—in relation to philosophy occurs in every form of representationalism at the level of aesthetic enjoyment. If the work is only the manifestation of a truth, once I obtain the information it wants to give me, it no longer has any meaning for me. The persistence of such an interest could be justified only by the argument that the work has not been thoroughly understood. In fact, this is how a representationalist view accounts for the persistence of the living presence in history of the great works of art: they—it is argued—contain a truth that still remains to be understood. However, the fact remains that the ideal posits a condition for which no further interest in the work is either necessary or possible.

For representational views, there are multiple elements related to the inessentiality of the work. For example, if the work is the bearer of a message of truth, it will address itself principally to the intellect; all the interest drawn from the sensible and physical presence of the work—an interest that at different levels engages our sensibility—is once again something that is not essential, the provisional covering of a truth whose ambition, however, is to appear entirely in its pure abstraction and impersonality. I speak of impersonality because at the level of truth recognition for a metaphysical conception of truth as objectivity, the person can be put only in parenthesis, or at most revealed as a provisional and unnecessary instance. So a consistent representationalism would have nothing to say about the characters of individuality and personality of aesthetic experience.

Furthermore, the inexorable logical consequence of arguing that the work in its concrete physical nature is inessential proves the impossibility of theorizing aesthetic judgment in a satisfactory manner. What matters in the work is the truth of which it is a carrier, a sign, a mythical representation, a mystification, etc. Nothing else counts once such truth is recognizable. Now, to discuss the most popular and pervasive form of representationalim—sociological representationalism—it is beyond doubt that the truth concerning the social context of a given epoch can be revealed just as well by works that are universally held to be mediocre in comparison with the masterpieces. The only way out of this would be to refer to the lesser or stronger evidence or force by which such a truth is presented or manifested in the work. The outcome, though, would be the reduction of every aesthetic judgment to the level of rhetorical questions or psychology of persuasion.

The consequences of taking on a consistently formalist view are no less problematic. Formalism more often than not keeps returning to representational positions to the extent that it pretends to radically ground itself. For example, the pleasure supplied by a beautiful structure can be led back to the necessary way in which our intellect or sensibility works, or as certain positivist intellectuals have done, to the perceptual, intellectual, and evaluative habits that are induced in us as a result of our belonging to a determinate social group. In all these instances, the work is viewed as a more or less provisional incarnation of forms, which are otherwise given, and which only find in the work the occasion for recognizing and explicating themselves.

If it does not intend to go back to these positions, formalism must necessarily remain within the domain of an aesthetic of play (as we have seen in the preceding chapters, this aesthetics, too, can be linked back to a substantially vitalist scheme) that affirms the value of recognizing the beautiful form as a value as such, a value that is connected with the very exercise of our faculties. This is much more widespread than one might think among many critics whose reflection on the work lies basically in putting emphasis on certain mechanisms through whose knowledge—it is held—the work can be more fully enjoyed.

When these mechanisms are exhibited in a definitive manner, it is clear that the work cannot be exhausted by such manipulations. As in the case of representationalism, in formalism, too, there is a true insufficiency: it consists in the fact that after every Aufhebung and every analysis, once the truth of which it is the bearer has been recognized, the work presents itself as something that does not allow itself to be put into parenthesis; the work does not allow itself to be exhausted by analytical and structural considerations. Although it is not useless (in the domain of a “science of art,” though not so much in that of criticism, which instead intends to be of service to the most enjoyment of the work), the analysis of the work’s mechanisms does not explain nor above all does it suppress our always renewed and “vital” interest in the work. If such an interest really resided in the perception of a structural play, it could not but collapse once the mechanism on which the play is grounded were uncovered. As in a detective novel where the murderer is already known, when we read the novel the second time around we no longer have the same interest in it we once had. Indeed, the reader of detective novels who is not a grammarian, a stylist, or a theoretician of the mass media no longer reads it at all.

These, together with all the other insufficiencies and contradictions that are internal to formalism and representationalism do not arise, as I have already shown, because each view isolates its own defense in an exclusive manner, even though each does present valid demands. In fact, this way of isolating each demand is more deeply linked to metaphysical thought, and to its conception of truth. Representationalism and formalism cannot be “overcome” by means of their synthesis; rather, they can be overcome only by revising the presuppositions on which they are grounded.

It seems clear enough from an in-depth analysis of the concept of “setting-itself-into-work of truth” that for Heidegger it is not a matter of purely and simply synthesizing these two demands. Rather, the point is to state the problem in a new way. On the one hand, the idea that the work is inessential and provisional is constitutive of the representational attitude: since the truth is given prior to and outside of the work, the work itself is only a contingent manifestation or representation. The relationship between truth and the work’s contingency, or that of every event, is linked, ultimately, to a perspective that continues to take truth as correspondence with the given, in order to guarantee the validity of knowledge and of the manifestations of truth because of its being fully given, established once and for all, subtracted from the event.

Now, Heidegger thinks of truth as event. To the extent that truth happens as the opening of historical horizons within which beings come to being, it has a “tendency to set itself to work,” as Heidegger says.⁴ Being at work is not a contingent feature of truth, and precisely because it is an event. As such, it must somehow happen, and it is nothing outside of or above this occurrence. If in the work of art truth happens, the work remains inexorably linked to it, just as truth remains linked to the work. It is possible to conceive at a certain moment of leaving the work only because of the supposition that truth is always already pre-given, independent of the work. The ontological concept of truth as event excludes every contingency of the incarnation of truth with respect to truth itself, and every possible Aufhebung. Truth is the truth of the work; therefore once the work is removed or forgotten, the truth that happened in it is forgotten as well.

This close link between truth and work could collapse into formalism at a certain point. If the truth that sets itself to work in the work belongs solely to the work, it could be confused with the pure and simple factuality of the work in its physical nature, with its own formal structure. However, what keeps Heidegger from falling into the dangers of formalism is his attempt never to lose sight of the ontological rooting. The work—he says in “The Origin of the Work of Art” (Der Ursprung des Kunstwerkes)—is a Gestalt, a form insofar as it is gestellt, that is placed, installed. The form does not define the thing in its particularity and isolation by enclosing it within its structural perfection. Nor are we to conceive of installation in a purely physical sense, as the dialectics of form and background in the terms of Gestaltpsychologie. This is not what Heidegger means. Instead, the work is form to the extent that it is placed in the Riss, the rift joining and separating world and earth, Welt and Erde.

In regard to the meaning of Riss and its related terms, Heidegger makes etymological and philosophical elaborations that I will not discuss here. More important than those elaborations are the coupling terms “world” and “earth.” Here it should suffice to say that the world is the system beings give rise to within a specifically given horizon or opening of being.⁵ The earth, which is not identical with nature (in contrast to the world as culture), represents the permanent ontological reserve of meanings, which makes is so that the work cannot be exhausted by interpretation. Every interpretation defines a world that is opened and founded by the work. However, the work as such is a permanent reserve of new interpretations, and for this reason Heidegger sees in it the presence of the earth, which is always given as that which withdraws and holds itself in reserve.

This definition of the form as installation of the work into the rift between world and earth serves to bring to light that the form is an opening of the world. The work is form precisely insofar as it happens as the first event of a world, which it opens and founds. On the one hand, since truth is inexorably linked to the work’s happening as a specifically singular event, the work is not emptied of its individuality. On the other hand, such individuality does not close the work on itself nor reduce it to the level of a “thing,” whose presence would be a formally perfect object offered to aesthetic enjoyment. By contrast, the form can be conceived solely by virtue of its being situated (gestellt) between world and earth. As an event, the work opens and founds a world. As a founding event that cannot be derived from other intraworldly events, the work has a privileged link to Being in that it connects the world to the earth as permanent reserve of meanings, and thus to Being itself in its originating force.

In this way, Heidegger defends the two demands of representationalism and formalism without making recourse to a simple synthesis, instead revising the metaphysical concept of truth. On the one hand, then, he renews the interest in the work’s physical concreteness much more radically and much more productively than formalism would allow. On the other hand, he views the work as a genuine bearer of truth, one that is much more present when conceived as arising and instituting itself together with the work.

Perhaps Nietzsche was one of the first thinkers to feel the cogency of the problem of a genuine synthesis of representationalism and formalism (and to attempt to find a solution for it at the ontological level). In the first chapter of The Birth of Tragedy, Nietzsche defines the man who is aesthetically sensitive as someone who feels the fascination of the definite apollonian form, lingering by it with overly caring and passionate attention; yet he is also able to see the same form as pure appearance. This dialectic—attending to the form and seeking out its meanings beyond it (though not in the same Schopenhauerian sense that Nietzsche saw it in)—is constitutive of aesthetic enjoyment, and Heidegger’s idea of the work as the setting-itself-into-work of truth gives ontological reasons for it.

True, on the one hand, enjoying the work always implies or in some sense even comes to a head with an act of aesthetic contemplation, in which the work imposes itself by virtue of its formal perfection, without further referring to anything that might disturb the satisfaction and stillness connected with such a state. On the other hand, it is equally true that the encounter with a great art work always represents not only an “aesthetic” but also a theoretical, moral, and emotional experience, which engages the person at all levels and leads us to speak of art’s truth, of its cosmic nature, and of its ontological meaning. Hence, in concrete experience the work resists being confined within the limits of the formalist view of beauty, it moves out of the “aesthetic sphere” in which it was enclosed and holds its truth appeal, in the broadest and fullest meaning of the word.

Heidegger’s view of the work as the setting-itself-into-work of truth meets both demands, which were initially brought to light in the field of aesthetics, to be isolated and tightened under representationalism and formalism. At the same time, however, it runs the risk—if it really is a risk—of no longer being able to speak of “aesthetic enjoyment.” On the other hand, this is precisely the meaning of Heidegger’s polemic against aesthetics (and furthermore against ethics) understood as the attempt to isolate a type of experience in which the encounter with the artwork would be given in a very specific manner and that would be distinguished from experiences of a different kind, though equally specific, isolated, and specialized.

In regard to the enjoyment of the artwork, Heidegger speaks of dwelling in the opening opened by the work, that is to say, in the world that it founds.⁶ Indeed, it is the artwork, in Heidegger’s mature thought, that opens and founds historical worlds, which ultimately exist precisely to the extent that one makes an effort to live, interpret, and imitate it. For this, consider the epochal significance of some of the great masterpieces of art fostered by the Western tradition. After all, every artwork can have an epochal significance as testified to by the alternating history of taste, by the devaluations and reevaluations of works, authors, and styles that the history of art and of criticism is full of. To dwell in the world founded by the work is to live in the light of it. The history of an epoch is, in the end, solely an exegesis of one or more artworks, wherein a certain “epoch” of being was instituted and opened.

The aesthetic enjoyment outlined in this view is neither a pure enjoyment of the work in its formal perfection nor a movement beyond the work in search of the truth, of which it would be the manifestation or revelation. Nor is the work to be understood as pure form, to be suppressed or overcome by means of a theoretical act that would go beyond the work to absorb it completely in itself. Nonetheless, since dwelling in the world founded by the work signifies rearranging one’s own existence and “vision of the world” in light of the disclosure of being that has happened in the work, this means also that the work should be conceived as an announcement of truth. And since the effort to understand and actualize the world founded by the work leads not so much to definitions as to clear-cut formulations in which an interpretation of such a world is given, the encounter with the work always is a consummation of, and aesthetic satisfaction for, the form.

However, what matters in this conception of the artwork is that both elements are always present. Just as, for Heidegger, the work is the setting-into-work of truth insofar as it stages the original conflict between world and earth, so is the enjoyment of the work—and history in its broadest meaning—an endless articulation of definite formulations that never exhaust the artwork (the epoch of being). Instead, they live precisely insofar as the work remains their Boden, their background that is never totally resolved into the stated foundation (Grund), which therefore still remains in need of founding.

Thus, on the one hand, Heidegger’s view of the encounter with the artwork—understood as dwelling in the opening instituted by the work—offers a way out of the difficulties in which the traditional, that is, representationalist and formalist, perspectives of aesthetic enjoyment are entangled. On the other hand, however, there arises the problem of whether one can still speak of aesthetic enjoyment, and of an “aesthetic” experience as a something distinct and distinguishable from other kinds of “experiences.” If the whole historical life of humanity comes to be seen as a movement in the light of the artwork, as an endless act of interpretation of poetry (and thinking is such only insofar as it dialogues with poetry), then it is no longer possible to isolate and describe the enjoyment of art in the same terms of aesthetics. Perhaps, though, it is the very notion of aesthetic enjoyment—in the narrow meaning in which the tradition attributes to this term—that we should renounce, in order to recover the possibility of more authentically understanding the “truth” of art.