Participants of the International Kant Congress discuss Kantian Aesthetics and Contemporary Art

The second day of the International Kant Congress featured a number of plenary presentations and thematic panels discussing the impact of Kant’s teachings on various aspects of life — “Kant’s Philosophy of Law and the Modern Legal Theory and Practice”, “Kant’s Anthropology and Psychology”, “Kant’s Aesthetics and Contemporary Art”.

At the Contemporary Art panel, scholars from different regions of Russia presented their views on the relationship between the philosopher’s teachings and modern art, discussing, among others, the presentation by Vadim V. Vasilyev, Head of the Department of History of International Philosophy, Lomonosov Moscow State University — “Unsolved Enigmas of Kant’s Philosophy”.

Natalia Artemenko, associate professor at the Department of Cultural Studies, Philosophy of Culture and Aesthetics at St. Petersburg State University, who moderated the panel:
Our panel has succeeded in identifying several unsolvable riddles problems in Kant’s third critique, the Critique of Judgment," said Here we find out whether it is possible to put an “and” between Kant’s aesthetics and contemporary art. How Kant would view modern art is probably the most intriguing question.

Artem Radeev, Doctor of Philosophy, drew attention to the fact that Kant is not yet fully understood, and neither is contemporary art.

When we say “Kant and Contemporary Art”, the most interesting thing is the “and’ between Kant and contemporary art. Once certainly influences the other. For example, at one time there were even writings entitled “Kant and cinema”. Although cinema emerged 150 years after Kant, it turns out that even at the time of its inception, cinema already contained some hints of Kantian philosophy. On the other hand, modern art can be used to understand Kant, even the partly amorphous culture called “Kantian aesthetics”.