Towards an Understanding of Environmental Aesthetic – Preeti Ranjan Ghosh

 

https://youtu.be/tSvFN2yIn_A

‘Environment’ means what surrounds us.  It may be living or non-living things.  It includes physical, chemical and other natural forces.  ‘Aesthetic’ that has come from the Greek word, ‘aisthesis’ means ‘perception by senses’.  Apart from the sensory awareness, to the mind, ‘aesthetic is the cognitive act of describing and explaining that experience.  That experience may be positive or negative.  So, aesthetic value is assigning a value to an object based on its appearance and emotional effect.

Though there were discussions and descriptions on the aesthetics of nature centuries ago, only in 20th century environmental aesthetics began to deal with the aesthetic values of the environment and began its role in going deep into the environmental issues. Actually in North America and in Europe, wild nature was often feared rather than appreciated for aesthetic qualities before 18th century. It was Immanuel   Kant (1724-1804) who talked about the disinterested pleasure that lays at the root of appreciating the aesthetic qualities of nature especially it's beauty and sublimity. Kant's ideas influenced romanticism and the 'nature worship' expressed through the literature, music, and visual arts of the 19th century. Kant's aesthetic theory elucidates that the beauty of nature is associated with delightful, pleasing perpetual qualities and tranquil contemplation whereas the sublime is associated with a 'negative pleasure' on one's seeing towering cliffs, raging seas and vast deserts.

The Poetry of William Wordsworth (1770-1850) was notable for its deep aesthetic engagement with nature John Ruskin’s (1819-1900) Modern Painters (1873) talked about the aesthetic scientific and spiritual sensitivity shown for nature in landscape paintings.  William Gilpin (1724-1804), with his theory of the picturesque influenced the conservation movement that developed in the United States in the nineteenth century.  The transcendentalist aesthetic of Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) brought reverence to wilderness. His Walden (1854) that narrated  his experiment  of living close to nature at Walden pond grew receptivity to untamed landscapes and wilderness worship.  Thus transcendentalists stood against the dehumanizing effects of technology and urban civilization.  Thus wild nature became a source of spiritual regeneration and a messenger of profound moral truths.  This environmental aesthetics is also found in Aldo Leopold’s (1887-1948) ‘A sand County Almanac’, where he combines ecological knowledge and aesthetic sensitivity in valuing environments.  Thus, the discussions of philosophical aesthetics, landscape theory and practice and early conservation literature together form the historical foundation of environmental aesthetics.

Environmental Philosophers like Rolston go deep into the principles of aesthetics and ethics and argue for environmental education.  It will promote a responsibility for well-informed aesthetic appreciation and will encourage people to care for the environment.  Thus environmental aesthetics has brought philosophical attention to issues in aesthetics as they relate to environments, natural objects within environments and natural phenomena and processes.  As the principal aim of environmental aesthetics is to seek a philosophically informed understanding of aesthetic value and judgment, it has had and it will have its significant role in environmental disciplines and practices.

----Thulasidharan V