O objecto estético como mundo, na phénoménologie de l’expérience esthétique i, de mikel dufrenne

With this article we intend to explore the concept of «esthetical object» proposed in Dufrenne’s text entitled La Phénoménologie de l’experience estéthique I.

The potentiality/activity binomial appears as the ground for Dufrenne’s definition of esthetical object as perceived work of art. According to this, the happening of any artwork truly finds its proper place in esthetical experience, which arises as the meeting point of art’s expressive potentiality and the spectator’s perception act. Establishing an accurate distinction between esthetical perception and other kinds of human perception, Dufrenne sees the former as the pure presence of the sensitive. Advocating the inseparability of significant and signification for the esthetical object, the author declares the meaning of esthetical experience as immanent to its own sensitive presentation.

Dufrenne presents authentic esthetical perception as something, which has the power to, engage subjectivity in a radical experience. Under the light projected by the work of art, human beings are enabled to actualise other modes of being-in-the-world. With expression as its proper signifying mode, the esthetical object reveals itself as a world beginning, proposing an affective atmosphere, which opens the subject of esthetical experience to new existential possibilities.