Metodo

International Studies in Phenomenology and Philosophy

Journal | Volume | Article

174857

Aura e libero gioco

Stefano Velotti

pp. 221-233

Abstract

Although with “aura” Benjamin designates more a “family”, or a “constellation” of phenomena, than a univocal concept, the analogical traits of these phenomena are grounded in an aesthetic unity of sense. The aesthetic (as distinguished from the “artistic”) understanding of “aura” is not juxtaposed to the “anthropological, perceptual-mnemonic, and visionary” dimension of it (Bratu Hansen), but it is rather its root. As a transcendental aspect of perception and imagination, though, the aura marks our experience in different ways, according to determinate historical conditions. If, in a post-traditional society, every attempt to produce auratic experiences is doomed to produce phony auratic phenomena, the potentialities of the aura are nevertheless not exhausted: the “room-for-play” (Spielraum) of experimentation invoked by Benjamin can be maintained open only in the interplay of auratic and non-auratic polarities: attention vs. distraction, distance vs. nearness, tactile vs. optical, determined vs. undetermined.

Publication details

Published in:

(2013) Aura. Rivista di estetica 52.

Pages: 221-233

DOI: 10.4000/estetica.1624

Full citation:

Velotti Stefano (2013) „Aura e libero gioco“. Rivista di estetica 52, 221–233.