Back in the distant days of my first spell of University life a friend of mine doing a fine art degree was forced to take a first year additional course in philosophy. This was long enough ago that it was considered important for first years on a very specific degree to keep their options open at least for a while, but what was interesting was that this friend of mine, who was a reasonably bright lad, was able to cope with the whole course but was stumped by one question, the title of this blog...."What is beauty?" You would think that as an artist himself he would have had an insight into what beauty was. as an artist he was tremendously visually aware, and had a strong aesthetic sense but neither of these seemed to help with this question.
I have some pretty clear ideas on beauty, but I'm not sure if my answers would make sense from a philosophical viewpoint. I am very much of the opinion that form should follow function and that beauty is found in a cleanliness and simplicity of the conveying of an idea or concept. Whether that be fine art from the great masters, or industrial design of an interesting product, or a well designed web site but I'm not sure that this is what the question from a philosophical viewpoint is trying to establish. If we consider the question itself, are we looking for an insight into what philosophers consider "Truth"? If so, does a definition move us any closer to that aim? My idea of conflation of form and function works in the sense of defining an aspect of beauty that works for me but it doesn't cover the way beauty makes me feel.
True beauty causes a vast array of emotional and physiological responses that can transport ones mind to an altered state of conciousness and I'm not sure that my simplistic definition does this justice. I guess it is up to you, dear reader, to do better....
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