Philosophical Review

The Transfiguration of the Commonplace by Arthur C. Danto

Review by: Warren Quinn
The Philosophical Review, Vol. 92, No. 3 (Jul., 1983), pp. 481-486
Published by: Duke University Press on behalf of Philosophical Review
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 BOOK REVIEWS

ures are Gadamer and his opponents (Habermas, Apel, etc.) and thecatch-
word is 'critique'.
Gadamer in his magnum opus "Wahrheit und Methode" (Truthand
Method)makes the most of the concept of 'Wirkungsgeschichte', meaning
the inevitablehistoricality
of our knowledgewhichis stamped by tradition
in a way not immediatelyrecognizable to us. One can easily detect the
inspirationof Heidegger, who transformedhermeneuticsfrom a meth-
odology of humanities (Dilthey) into a basis for reformulatingontology.
Now, however,the criticsclaim thatthe ontologicaltendencypreventsthe
theoryfromprovidingan adequate account of the methodicalapproach to
truthbased on intersubjectiveconsensus. They demand, moreover,that
the dominant role of traditionshould not preventa criticismof existing
prejudices.
Both objections indicate a disagreementwithregard to rationality.Are
the methodicalprocedures of science as well as humanitiesthe productof
reason or do theyrepresenta limitationof reason in the name of intersub-
jective communicationof researchers-a limitationthatis itselfthoroughly
historicaland has, therefore,to be made transparentby philosophical
analysis?As for criticalreflection,does it offeran effectivecure against
prejudices, or is a certain 'fore-structure'of knowledge necessary to a
degree thateven radical criticismpresupposes it? Such questionscould be
fruitfullydiscussed in the context of contemporaryhermeneuticsand
would open perspectivesto related positions,forexample, the late Popper,
Kuhn or Rorty.' Our author, however, restrictshimselfto a report of
'querellesd'Allemands'.This is a valuable "stepping-stone,"as the preface
modestlyunderlines,but makes sense only if furthersteps lie ahead.

RuOD1ER BUBNER
Universitdt
Tfibingen

The Philosophical
Review,XCII, No. 3 (July 1983)

THE TRANSFIGURATION OF THE COMMONPLACE. By ARTHUR C.

DANTO. Cambridge, Harvard UniversityPress, 1981. Pp. 212.

The most fundamental propositions of the theory presented in this

difficult,densely written,but fascinatingbook seem to me to be these: 1)

'Richard Rortyhas a long discussion of hermeneuticsin his remarkablerecent

book (Philosophyand theMirrorofNature,Princeton1979). The onlythingI dislikeis
that he seems to give up the rationalityof hermeneuticsin favour of its 'edifying'
qualities.

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That art is, genericallyspeaking,a formof communicationin whichsub-

jects are represented.2) That each mind is at bottoman idiosyncraticway
of takingin the world-a way that is not captured by the contentsof the
beliefsand perceptionstaken in. And finally3) That art is distinguished
fromother representationalmedia by its power to make an individual's
idiosyncraticway of registeringthe world manifestto others.Danto offers
ratherlittledirectargumentforany of these theses; he seems to preferto
let thememerge gradually,gatheringforceand significancein the discus-
sion of various familiaraesthetictopics.
The conceptionof art as essentiallyrepresentational,whichforDanto as
forGoodman means essentiallysymbolicand referential,showsup firstin
his explanation of whyart and philosophy,as we understandthem,arose
in the verysame places at about the same times.The answer given is that
art, with its gap between the represented and the representation,and
philosophy,with its obsession with all aspects of meaning, were clearly
made to stimulateand provokeeach other.The preoccupationwithrepre-
sentationalmeaning is furthersustained in Danto's wittytreatmentof the
time-honoredidea thatartworksare necessarilymade to be contemplated
in loving and attentionto detail. Twentieth-centuryidea art, on which
Danto continuallyrelies, has shown the contingencyof this approach.
Duchamp's "Fountain" (an ordinaryurinal) gets to be art because Duch-
amp makes a particular kind of' statement with it (no doubt a con-
temptuousbut wittystatementabout art as the contemplable).The gleam-
ing surfaces and subtlecurves of the particularurinal chosen are, or may
be, completelyirrelevantto that statement.It is worth remarkingthat
Danto here betraysno anxietywhateverabout the possible fraudulenceof
the urinal or other noncontemplable artworks.It is as if'this possibility
does not exist or is in some deep way uninteresting.
All thisfitstogetherwithhis general attackon formalism,which seems
to be defined (quite perceptivelyI think)as the idea that the statusof an
object as art makes no logical differenceto the sortof aestheticapprecia-
tion that must be brought to it. The formalistholds that interpretationis
merelyancillaryto aestheticappreciation. It findsthe multi-dimensional
objects representedin a paintingand the charactersand situationsrepre-
sented in a novel but there it ends. These shapes and situationsare not to
be regarded as furthervehiclesof'meaning; theyare to be distanced and
contemplatedin the way that a shape presented by a natural object or a
situationfromlife could be distanced and contemplated.But for Danto,
interpretationseems to penetrate all the way through to the end of'art.
The novel's charactersand situationsmay and perhaps mustbe treatedas
constitutinga parable for our own lives. And what is leftafter we have
squeezed all possible representationalmeaningout of the artworkis some-

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thingthatstill,in a way,refersus to something-not of'course to further

contentbut ratherto the way the artistconceives his content.
Danto's discussion of' the relation of an artworkto what he calls its
materialcounterpartis interestingbut not altogethersatisfactory.When
someone looking at Bruegel LandscapewiththeFall ofIcarus pointsto a tiny
blob of'paint and says,"That is Icarus," or when a 1950's "olfactoryartist"
insists,"This is (just) black and whitepaint,"a special artisticsense of the
is" of identityis, according to Danto, in effect.One does not withthese
sentences make the statementsone would make in pointing to the real
Icarus or to spilled paint on the floor.And the special sense of identityis
also supposed to be in effectwhen one identifiesthe sentencesof'a novel as
descriptions.In the firstcase, Danto may have in mind the special formof
make-believeidentificationin virtueof'whichwe say thatIcarus appearsin
the paintingand thatwe can see him there fallinginto the sea. And some-
thinglike make-believeis also clearlyinvolved in regardingfictionalsen-
tences as genuine descriptions.But when the painter says, "'This is black
and whitepaint,"it is not verylikelythathe means we are to make-believe
this.It is perhaps true thathe means to say somethingrelevantto aesthet-
ics. But ithardlyfollowsthatsome of his wordsmusthave a special aesthet-
ic sense.
The topics of metaphor and expression lie at the center of' Danto's
theory.Artrepresentsin large part by means of'metaphoricand therefore
expressive vehicles. For Danto, the functionof' metaphor and rhetorical
figures generally-whether linguistic,pictorial,or otherwise-is not to
point to some range of' fact about the subject beyond that which can be
conveyed by literal sense, but to convey the peculiar impact the subject
makes upon the author, his special way of'conceivingand feelingit. Meta-
phor does thisby gettingus to thinkabout the subjectthroughthe media-
tion of' symbolsor representationaldevices with their own connotations
and resonances.
Expression,to make a long and somewhatconfusingstoryshort,occurs
in art because every artworkcontains at its heart a metaphor through
whichits subject is meant to be viewed. Interpretinga workis a matterof
findingthis crucial pair, subject and metaphor. What is expressed in the
workis thatview of or about the subjectthatone gets withthe help of'the
metaphor. Danto does not seem to realize that the "aboutness" built into
his theoryof'expression precludes such standard examples as that of a
musicalwork'sexpressingsadness. In expressingsomethingabout itssub-
ject, it is hard to see how what an artworkexpressess could fail to be
somethingwhich,were it to be statedin paraphrase, would appear propo-
sitional. Of' course, it would be a pseudo-propositionbecause what it ex-
presses,the author's way of seeing the subject,is not for Danto any genu-

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ine furtherfact about the subject. So if a piece of music were about the
worldor about human lifeitmightexpress thatthe worldor lifeis sad, but
it could not express sadness itself.
Style,whichembraces artisticmetaphorand expression,includes every-
thingthatremainsof representationwhen contentis subtracted.For Dan-
to, a mind is not simplya collection of internalrepresentations,it is an
idiosyncraticstructurewhich surviveschange of content-a way of per-
ceiving or believingwhateveris perceived or believed. It is also, if this is
different,an emotional outlook on the world. "Structure,""way," and
"outlook,"are meant to conveyaspects of mind thatcannot be reduced to
some purelytransparentkind of belief,some diaphanous relationbetween
mind andzworld. The idiosyncraticmental structurein each of us is in
some deep waywhatwe reallyare, although itis not somethingthatwe can
become aware of except through a complex and difficulteffortat self-
identification.If art has a function,it is to make thisunderlyingstructure
of our consciousness manifest,to give our inner selves a public profile.
And it is style,the sum of the artist'sconscious and unconscious choices
between semanticallyequivalent modes of representation,thatmakes this
possible.
It should by now be clear thata beliefin the essentialrepresentationality
of art underlies virtuallyevery part of Danto's theory.How to treatsuch
apparentlynonrepresentationalarts as abstractpaintingand instrumental
music thereforebecomes a major problem for the theoryto solve. Danto
has surprisinglylittleto say about this, and not all of what he does say
appears consistent,but much of it is interesting.There seem to be two
differentstoriesscatteredthroughoutthe book. The firstleans heavilyon
an alleged analogybetweenthe representationalstatusof artand the status
of actions as having reasons. Although not everyaction has a reason, for
some we may do "forno reason at all," everyaction is such as to make the
question, "Whywas itdone?" applicable. Danto appears to thinkthisshows
that there is some interestingway in which even actions done for no
reason, in contrastto mere movementsof the body,remainconnectedwith
the scheme of reasons. (This cannot, however,come to the claim thatsuch
actions can only lack reasons contingently,for actesgratuitsseem to lack
them essentially.)In any case, nonrepresentationalart is held to lack sub-
ject matterin this same weak way, a way which is supposed to leave the
artworksuitablyenough connected withthe concept of subjectmatterfor
Danto's purposes. But this firstway of treatingnonrepresentationalart
raises two difficulties.First it is not clear what the differencebetween
categoricallyand noncategoricallylacking a subject comes to, and there-
fore not clear what work this distinctioncan do. Danto may be thinking
thatnonrepresentationalart uses representationalschemesin the waythat

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nonsense poetryuses natural language. This mightseem to explain how

such art could be expressive,deploying echoes or tracesof subjectmatter
forexpressivepurposes, ratherthan subjectmatteritself.But it is notclear
thatany of thiscould be made plausible foran art like instrumentalmusic
in which the basic scheme itselfseems nonrepresentational.Second, and
more important,Danto needs to show that the "weak" lackingof subject
thatthe analogy establishesprovides enough of a connectionwithsubject
matter for his own notions of expressivityand styleto get a purchase.
Expressivity, as we have seen, consistsof the waytheartworkis a metaphor
for its subject, and stylecaptures the way its subject is conceived. It is
unclear, therefore,how art that in any way lacks subject mattercould be
expressiveor show style.
For these reasons, I thinkDanto maybe betterservedby his second line,
the suggestionthatapparentlynonrepresentationalart in some wayrepre-
sents itself.His example of Michael Fried's illuminatingviewson some of
Frank Stella's paintingsis verysuggestive.And the idea of self-representa-
tion may also have musical application. In some music it mightbe possible
to regard development as an analysis of or commentaryon the thematic
materialswhichcould then be regarded literallyas the musical subjectsof
the workas a whole. But just how farthisstrategycould be pushed remains
unclear.
Danto's other two basic claims-that each mind has idiosyncraticwaysof
registering(conceiving and perceiving) the world, ways not captured by
the contentsof whatever internalrepresentationsit happens to contain,
and that art is the special formof communicationby which such ways of
internalrepresentationare made manifest-are presupposed in his treat-
mentof metaphor,expression,and style.They are more difficultto assess
because it is less clear what theymean. When Danto speaks of the artist's
attitudestoward his subject, for example, Rembrandt'smanifestlove for
Hendrickje,we feel on fairlyfirmground. To the extentthatthe way we
see the world consistsin the attitudeswe take toward it, Danto's project
begins to remind us of the famous noncognitivistinvestigationsof ethical
discourse. Attitudes,the noncognitivistsagreed, are not captured by the
contentsof one's beliefs and perceptions,and thereforerequire special
forms of expression. There is one respect, however, in which Danto's
project seems broader. Although his clearest examples of ways of seeing
are attitudes,the veryuse of such expressions as "way of seeing"suggests
thathe has somethingmore elusive in mind-some elementof subjectivity
thatpermeatesour conceptionof the world more completelyand is there-
fore less extricable from it than anythingwe would commonlycall an
attitude.Perhaps he has in mind somethingabout the arrangementof our
beliefs and perceptions,the way in which they organize themselvesinto

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fociof'importance.But however "waysof seeing" is finallyunderstood, I

suspect there is one furtherway in which the dialectic here will resemble
that of ethics. For there will no doubt be those who feel that the sharp
dichotomybetween manner and contentof'vision is artificialand thatthe
great artist is great not because he sees in some especially interesting
noncognitivemanner but because he sees more, more broadly and more
deeply. For such aestheticcognitivists, the importanceof art would always
lie in contentalthough not perhaps in any part of'contentthat could be
called subject matter.
As to the languages of art,one may wonder whetherDanto can be right
to locate theirdifferentiain the capacityto displaythe subjectivecharacter
of the mind. For surelyeverypiece of complex communicationdoes that,
revealingmuch more of its author than he may want or know. The Trans-
Jiguration oftheCommonplace, withits elaborate use of'rhetoricaldevices of
all sorts,is a conspicuouslystylishbook. Doesn't philosophicalstyle,no less
than painterlyor musical style,reveal the man and the way he sees the
world? Of course, to be interestedin Danto's work as philosophy is to be
interestedin its truthas a theoryof' art and not in its revelationof' the
author. Is the difference,then that our attitudetoward artisticcommu-
nicationdoes not exclude the latterinterestbut ratherputs itat the center?
If'so, thiswould be a curious and mildlyironicalresult.For it would mean
that the formalists,despite their many errors, got one importantthing
right.Lying at the heart of art is the special attitudewe take towardit,an
attitudewe may take toward other thingsas well (philosophical texts,for
example) but rarelyso profitably.

WARREN QUINN
of California,Los Angeles
University

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