The Aesthetics of Artistic Collaboration

Abstract

This chapter relates the Western Romantic concept of artistic genius to the nexus of collaborative relations involved in the production of art-producers of artistic materials, buyers, patrons and art lovers, as well as artists themselves. The Romantic conception of the individual artistic genius remains dominant in Western culture, and in those cultures that seek to emulate it-modern, and modernist, aesthetics assume an individualised artistic vision. But these Western conceptions can also embrace modes of collective production. In particular, the chapter addresses the collaboration implicit in architecture, in particular vernacular architecture, and examines the concept of organic unity.