Abstract

Eschewing questions of art's definition and essence, I focus on the question, "How is it that long-esteemed paintings are productive of happiness?" ;It seems to me that the right answer to this question primarily involves the spectator's direct awareness in these paintings of something like parity between internal relations of sameness and difference, similarity and dissimilarity. ;I begin by looking at the unity-in-variety theories of Hutcheson, Beardsley, Pepper, and Arnheim. I attempt to discern just what relations, in terms of primary kinds and secondary kinds , these writers identify as those holding among the formal elements of a painted surface. I go on to describe how each theorist attempts to connect his special brand of unity-in-variety to the production of happiness. ;I then introduce my own view, moderationism, and present my own formal analysis of the visual field in terms of such relations, and my view on the connection of unity-in-variety to happiness. ;Moderationism's two theses, S1 and S2 , are my fundamental claims. ;I then introduce a second, more general view, a view whose first thesis seems compatible with moderationism and with the views of Hutcheson, Beardsley, Pepper, and Arnheim. ;I evaluate the theories of these authors in order to discover whether moderationism, which involves a precise balance between sameness and difference relations, represents the correct specification of the general unity-in-variety thesis, or whether the correct specification will be more Beardsley-like, Pepper-like, or Arnheim-like---i.e., whether it involves only a rough-parity, of one sort or another, between sameness and difference relations. ;My final chapter addresses the work of three modern writers, Richard Wollheim, Michael Baxandall, and Arthur Danto. I take note of the apparent failure on their part to have grasped the notion of unity-in-variety, and suggest how, armed with the unity-in-variety thesis, we might assess their views