Art achieves what philosophy strives for, but only at the cost of illusion

Evidence

As distinct from philosophy, art contained a hidden promise of happiness. It achieved what negative-dialectical philosophy was striving for: that `something objective can be revealed by subjective effort’. 99 But it could achieve this only at the cost of illusoriness. That was why every philosophy of art must at the same time be a critique of it. This was also true with regard to radical works of modern art, which preserved illusion willy-nilly by making breakdown their constitutive principle. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 687

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines Adorno’s aesthetic theory: art as the refuge of the mimetic promising happiness, necessarily bound to illusion.
• XREF: Connects to Adorno’s dialectic of mimesis and reason in Dialectic of Enlightenment and to Benjamin’s aura thesis. — connects to: Romantic idealism located true reality in consciousness, elevating artists into prophetic seers — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 88; Adorno’s claim that artworks rather than authors possess knowledge carried an unacknowledged philosophical optimism — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 331; Artworks are protohistories of subjectivity that advance enlightenment through enlightened means. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 685 (+11 more)
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Romantic idealism located true reality in consciousness, elevating artists into prophetic seers — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 88; Adorno’s claim that artworks rather than authors possess knowledge carried an unacknowledged philosophical optimism — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 331; Artworks are protohistories of subjectivity that advance enlightenment through enlightened means. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 685 (+11 more)

Broader Connections

• Art achieves objective revelation through subjective effort only at the cost of illusoriness #expands (0.92) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2742
• Art that claims identity with reality doubly obscures mediation #complicates (0.75) — Anna Kornbluh, Immediacy, or The Style of Too Late…, 255
• Art redeems existence precisely by not striving to attain being #complicates (0.74)