`A boundary-breaking book, mobilizing art for philosophical purposes with exciting and enlightening results.' Ivan Gaskell, Harvard University --

What is art? What counts as an aesthetic experience? Does art have to beautiful? Can one reasonably dispute about taste? What is the relation between aesthetic and moral evaluations? How to interpret a work of art? Can we learn anything from literature, film or opera? What is sentimentality? What is irony? How to think philosophically about architecture, dance, or sculpture? What makes something a great portrait? Is music representational or abstract? Why do we feel terrified when we watch a horror movie even though we know it to be fictional? In Conversations on Art and Aesthetics, Hans Maes discusses these and other key questions in aesthetics with ten world-leading philosophers of art: Noël Carroll, Gregory Currie, Arthur Danto, Cynthia Freeland, Paul Guyer, Carolyn Korsmeyer, Jerrold Levinson, Jenefer Robinson, Roger Scruton, and Kendall Walton. The exchanges are direct, open, and sharp, and give a clear account of these thinkers' core ideas and intellectual development. They also offer new insights into, and a deeper understanding of, contemporary issues in the philosophy of art.

Portraits have for centuries been one of the most important art forms. But what do portraits tell us? What do they mean? And what makes a picture into a portrait? In this book, leading art philosopher Cynthia Freeland addresses these questions and more. As she shows, portraits have served two fundamental functions throughout the ages. Firstly, they preserve identity, bringing us closer to loved ones who are either absent or dead. And secondly, they tell us something about the subject being portrayed: not just external things such as what they are wearing, but also about the subject's emotions and inner state. Along the way, she addresses a whole host of fascinating problems posed by the art of portraiture. Can a picture of an animal truly be a portrait? How exactly have artists through the ages managed to depict the inner state of the subject being portrayed? Is it in fact possible for an artist to capture someone's individual 'air', their unique aura? And how has science been used to help in this quest? As Freeland shows, portraits are far more than just pretty pictures. They are a fundamental way of looking at ourselves and others, raising profound questions about our identity, how it is revealed, and how it can be preserved even after death.

Learn to mix virtually any skin tone in oil, acrylic, and watercolor paints with the recipes and acrylic mixing grid in Color Mixing Recipes for Portraits Oil - Acrylic - Watercolor.

Stories that explore the tragicomic aspects of romantic love.

Portraits of Imaginary People highlights a series of portraits produced by artist Mike Tyka utilizing a generative adversarial network (GAN).

This star-studded tribute to the kings and queens of comedy draws together such legendary names as Steve Martin, Tina Fey, Steve Carell, Eddie Murphy, Robin Williams, Ricky Gervais, and many more. Granted extraordinary access, photographer Matt Hoyle has captured his subjects in portraits that are works of art in themselves—by turns zany and deadpan, laugh-out-loud and contemplative. Accompanying them are first-person reflections from each of the comedians on life and laughter that always cut straight to the heart of comedy: it's funny because it's true. Page after sidesplitting page in Comic Genius offers prose as engaging as each portrait is memorable. Here, in one handsome package, is the gift of laughter itself. Comic Genius is proud to support Save The Children.