Beauty

Abstract

In western art and culture, “beauty” was long considered to be the decisive goal of human creativity. In precisely the same way, the connections between the concepts of “beautiful,” “good” and “true” were part of the core of Western educational concepts—just as their deconstruction or rejection is inscribed in the DNA of European concepts of the Modern. The worldwide diffusion of what people perceived to be “modern” or “art” could serve as a case study for Europe’s contribution to globalization: having long been identified with “Western,” the concept of “modern” also came to be equated with “progressive.”

The dismantling of this hegemony and these prejudices, the revision of Western concepts is one positive effect of globalization. In light of the increasing commercialization of every aspect of life and the proliferation of aggressive consumer marketing, it is not surprising that nowadays, the worldwide “ideal of beauty” is still determined by Western fashion and cosmetic companies. But non-Western artists in particular reflect on the saturation of their living environments by Western ideals of consumption and marketing. Artists and art-historians worldwide work at larger and broader ideas and concepts of art and “beauty”, which are outside the limitations of national specifications or conventions and of the laws of commodification.