The Middle Wittgenstein on Aesthetics

Abstract This article aims to challenge the idea that the ‘Middle Wittgenstein’ restricted himself to a so-called ‘calculus’ approach to aesthetics, i. e., to a conception of aesthetic language and judgement as rigidly determined by the rules of ‘autonomous systems’, and thereby allocated only a minor role to human practice and agency. The incompleteness of such a view will be addressed by highlighting the various ‘anthropological’ considerations that guided Wittgenstein’s treatment of aesthetics in his 1933 Cambridge lectures. This will be done by inquiring into his discussions about (1) the word ‘beautiful’. By reflecting on this ‘difficult case’, Wittgenstein came to illustrate the limitations of the calculus approach, anticipate the methods of the Blue Book, and direct his gaze to ‘actual aesthetic controversies and enquiries’, as well as (2) his ‘propaganda for a descriptive rather than explanatory method’ in aesthetics. By critiquing Frazer and the conflation of aesthetics and psychology, Wittgenstein argued for a descriptive aesthetics where perspicuous presentations and a person’s aesthetic puzzlement play a central role. Lastly, (3) Wittgenstein’s conception of ‘ideals’ in aesthetics will be clarified in relation to the judgements and the language of musicians, painters, architects, etc., as well as in relation to our own accounts of aesthetic practices.