Art of Play - Wonder by Design

Which "Aesthetics" Do You Mean? Ten Definitions

Which "Aesthetics" Do You Mean? Ten Definitions - Main image
$12 $24 In stock

Category: Architecture

Aesthetics, in its totality of meanings, is about where your mind goes--conceptually, analytically, imaginatively--when you engage with things designed, artistic, and the like. This book is about building a deeper understanding of this rangy mental terrain so that you can more productively think about and discuss aesthetic phenomena and experience in your life and in your work. Until now theoretical aesthetics has been a rather unwieldy and impractical subject. This lucid and easy-to-read book--rendered in a graphically engaging format--should be of genuine value to museum-goers, professional artists and designers, and students of the arts and crafts.

This book should be of particular interest to those who have enjoyed Wabi-Sabi: for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers, also by Leonard Koren.

Customer Reviews (4.6 / 5 · 5 reviews)

Abigail ★★★★★

I’m a practicing architect and I found the chapter on how aesthetic judgment differs from aesthetic experience genuinely useful for teaching my studio classes. The ten definitions are laid out clearly enough that I could actually follow the distinctions without getting lost in jargon. It’s a book th

Lucy Q. ★★★★★

The way it separates the ten meanings into clear, distinct chapters made me finally understand why my design arguments with colleagues kept going in circles. It's dense but written in a way that makes you slow down and actually think, which I appreciated.

Abigail Y. ★★★★★

The breakdown of ten distinct definitions finally gave me the vocabulary to untangle what I mean when I say something "looks nice." It's dense but never dry, and the way it traces conceptual threads across design and art feels genuinely eye-opening.