Is there any use to examining aesthetics independently of medium?

Comments

Yes. Some aesthetic questions are about natural beauty, and the notion of medium does not apply in the natural context. There are philosophial questions about artistic genres (e.g., how do horror and suspense work?), and it may be worthwhile to consider those independently of the specific media in which those genres are instantiated. Philosophical investigation into the objectivity of aesthetic and artistic value seem largely independent of concern for medium. Also, an overemphasis on medium can be misleading. For example, film and television are plausibly different media, but they function in very similar ways. It can be useful to think of them as two species of a larger category (the moving image).

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