Prickling fear mixed with wonder and awe was a delicious experience when felt in the safety of an art venue. For viewers of Romantic art, especially art that dealt with ideas of the Sublime, the beauty was a two-fold experience partly it was beautiful in an aesthetic sense, and partly it was beautiful in how it made the viewer feel. Herein lies the entertainment value of Romantic art. This could also encompass the grotesque and purposefully fearful, but often the fear was embedded in the grandiosity of the idea and scene. They meant to encapsulate the veneration, awe, and prickling anxiety caused by a human understanding of the ferocity of nature. And in this understanding of the all-enveloping nature of the natural scene before them the viewer feels a kind of horror.įor the Romantic poet and artist, the idea of the Sublime often defined what their works were meant to do. It calls to mind the reaction in the mind and soul of the viewer as they look at something bigger and more powerful than themselves. But it is also the idea of something experiential. The idea of the Sublime often relates to exciting, emotional, and uplifting vistas – like mountain scenes where unbridled nature sits in unbending grandeur in the face of puny human existence. It’s pretty clear that something that is ‘sublime’ is more than just a really good tasting piece of pie when it comes to the Arts.
#Picturesque landscape for free
Īll Smarthistory content is available for free at CC: BY-NC-SA (Pleasure from knowledge of observer’s nothingness and oneness with Nature).Įxcerpted from: Ben Pollitt, “John Martin, The Great Day of His Wrath,” in Smarthistory, August 9, 2015. (Pleasure from beholding very violent, destructive objects).įullest Feeling of Sublime – Immensity of Universe’s extent or duration. (Pleasure from perceiving objects that threaten to hurt or destroy observer).įull Feeling of Sublime – Overpowering turbulent Nature.
(Pleasure from seeing objects that could not sustain the life of the observer). Weaker Feeling of Sublime – Endless desert with no movement. (Pleasure from beholding objects that pose no threat, yet themselves are devoid of life). Weakest Feeling of Sublime – Light reflected off stones.
(Pleasure from a mere perception of an object that cannot hurt observer).
In his book The World as Will and Representation from 1818, Arnold Schopenhauer outlined the difference between Beauty and the Sublime as follows:įeeling of Beauty – Light is reflected off a flower.
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