Course detail

Aesthetics 4 – Critical Theories of Art and Visual Culture

FaVU-1EST-4Acad. year: 2025/2026

The Aesthetics 1-4 course series aims to equip learners with the concepts and strategies to understand their own and others' artistic motivations, intentions, and assumptions. The lectures are conducted in dialogue with the students so that the lecturer can respond to their attitudes and interests, and thus be all the more able to place the attitudes in the context of the tradition of European aesthetic thought, as well as non-European traditions of thought.

Aesthetics 4 aims to introduce students to contemporary critical approaches to art and culture in general. These approaches may be radically different from one another, but their common denominator is an emphasis on rethinking dominant Western narratives about the role, development, functioning, and transformation of cultural institutions (including but not limited to art). Lectures will focus on two sources of critical attitudes toward culture: first, an immanent critique of society from within, and second, a critique based on the study of other cultures and civilizations. 

Language of instruction

Czech

Number of ECTS credits

3

Mode of study

Not applicable.

Guarantor

Mgr. Jakub Bulvas Stejskal, Ph.D.

Department

Department of Art History and Theory (KTDU)

Entry knowledge

None.

Rules for evaluation and completion of the course

The following conditions are set for the granting of the examination:

  • active participation in class (3 unexcused absences allowed);
  • final written exam.

 

Teaching takes place in the classrooms of the FFA BUT in the hours determined by the schedule. Attendance is compulsory (3 unexcused absences allowed). Higher number of absences will be reflected in the number of questions on the final exam.

Aims

The course will equip students with the competence to form an informed opinion in the often opaque, yet heated debates that move not only the art world.

Study aids

Not applicable.

Prerequisites and corequisites

Not applicable.

Basic literature

Libora OATES-INDRUCHOVÁ (ed.), Dívčí válka s ideologií. Praha: SLON, 1998.
Marita Sturken – Lisa Cartwright, Studia vizuální kultury, Praha: Portál, 2009.
Marta FILIPOVÁ – Matthew RAMPLEY (eds.), Možnosti vizuálních studií: obrazy, texty, interpretace, Brno: Masarykova univerzita, Filozofická fakulta, Seminář dějin umění 2007.
Nicolas MIRZOEFF, Jak vidět svět, Praha: ArtMap 2018.
Nicolas MIRZOEFF, Úvod do vizuální kultury, Praha: Academia, 2012.
Terry EAGLETON, Idea kultury, Brno: Host 2000
Vincent DESCOMBES, Stejné a jiné, Praha: ISE 1995.

Recommended reading

Alain BADIOU, Manifest afirmacionismu (třetí nástin), http://www.sok.bz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=575&Itemid=28.
Anour ABDEL–MALEK – Chinua ACHEBE – Aimé CÉSAIRE – Achille MBEMBE – Edward W. SAID – Ngũgĩ Wa THIONGʼO, Postkoloniální myšlení II, Praha: tranzit.cz, 2011.
Antonio GRAMSCI, Sešity z vězení, Praha: Československý spisovatel 1959.
Boris BUDEN, Konec postkomunismu. Od společnosti bez naděje k naději bez společnosti, Praha: Rybka Publishers, 2013.
Bruno LATOUR, Nikdy sme neboli moderni, Bratislava: kalligram 2003
Bruno LATOUR, Stopovat a skládat světy s Brunem Latourem. Výbor z textů 1998-2013, Praha: tranzit.cz 2016
Donna HARAWAY, „Kyborgský manifest“, in: Helena BENDOVÁ – Matěj STRNAD (eds.), Společenské vědy a audiovize, Praha: NAMU 2014, s. 607–639.
Donna HARAWAY, „Tentacular Thinking. Anthropocene, Capitalocene, Chthulucene“, e-flux Journal, 2016, č. 75, http://www.e-flux.com/journal/75/67125/tentacular-thinking-anthropocene-capitalocene-chthulucene/.
Erich FROMM, Člověk a psychoanalýza, Praha: Aurora 1997.
Ernesto LACLAU – Chantal MOUFFE, Hegemonie a socialistická strategie. Za radikálně demokratickou politiku, Praha: Karolinum 2014.
Frantz FANON, Černá kůže, bílé masky, Praha: tranzit, 2011.
Fredric JAMESON, Postmodernismus neboli kulturní logika pozdního kapitalismu, Praha: Rybka 2016.
Gilles DELEUZE – Félix GUATTARI, Tisíc plošin, Praha: Herrmann & synové 2010.
Gilles DELEUZE, „Postscript on the Societies of Control“, October, 1992, č. 59, s. 3–7.
Guy DEBORD, Společnost spektáklu, Praha: Intu 2007.
György LUKÁCS, Umění jako sebepoznání lidstva, Praha: Odeon 1976.
Hakim BEY, Dočasná autonomní zóna, Praha: tranzit.cz 2004.
Herbert MARCUSE, „O afirmativním charakteru kultury“, Divadlo, roč. 19, 1968, č. 3, s. 46–55, č. 4, s. 47–57.
Herbert MARCUSE, Psychoanalýza a politika, Praha: Svoboda 1970
Jacques RANCIÈRE, The Politics of Aesthetics. The Distribution of Sensible, Londýn: COntinuum 2004.
Jean BAUDRILLARD, Amerika, Praha: Dauphin 2000.
Jean BAUDRILLARD, „Simulakra a simulace“, in: Jiří ŠEVČÍK – Pavlína MORGANOVÁ – Terezie NEKVINDOVÁ – Dagmar SVATOŠOVÁ (eds.), České umění 1980–2010. Texty a dokumenty, Praha: AVU 2011, s. 263–265.
Jean-François LYOTARD, O postmodernismu (Postmoderno vysvětlované dětem; Postmoderní situace), Praha: Filosofický ústav AVČR 1993.
Jodi DEAN, Slast a politika. Žižkova politická teorie, Praha: Filosofia 2014.
John BERGER, O pohledu. Praha: Fra 2009.
John BERGER, „Způsoby pohledu“, in: Pavel ZAHRÁDKA (ed.), Estetika na přelomu milénia. Vybrané problémy současné estetiky, Brno: Barrister & Principal 2010, s. 431–443.
Josef FULKA, Psychoanalýza a francouzské myšlení, Praha: Herrmann & synové 2008.
Louis ALTHUSSER, „Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses. Notes towards an Investigation“, in: Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays, New York: Monthly Review Press 1971.
Mark FISHER, Kapitalistický realismus, Praha: Rybka 2010.
Michel FOUCAULT, Dohlížet a trestat. Kniha o zrodu vězení, Praha: Dauphin 2000.
Michel FOUCAULT, Myšlení vnějšku, Praha: Herrmann & synové 2003.
Peter BÜRGER, Teorie avantgardy. Stárnutí moderny, Praha: AVU 2015.
Raymond GEUSS, The Idea of a Critical Theory, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press1981.
Roland BARTHES, Mytologie. Praha: Dokořán 2004.
Rosi BRAIDOTTI, The Posthuman, Polity 2013
Slavoj ŽIŽEK, Nepolapitelný subjekt, Praha: L. Marek 2007
Slavoj ŽIŽEK, The Sublime Object of Ideology, Londýn: Verso 1989.
Susan SONTAGOVÁ, O fotografii. Brno – Praha: Barrister & Principal – Paseka, 2002.
Terry EAGLETON, „Ideologie estetična“, in: Pavel ZAHRÁDKA (ed.), Estetika na přelomu milénia. Vybrané problémy současné estetiky, Brno: Barrister & Principal 2010, s. 301–311.
Theodor W. ADORNO – Max HORKHEIMER, Dialektika osvícenství, Praha: OIKOYMENH 2009.
Theodor W. ADORNO, Estetická teorie, Praha: Panglos 1997.
Tony MYERS, Slavoj Žižek, Praha: Svoboda Servis 2008.
Václav JANOŠČÍK – Lukáš LIKAVČAN – Jiří RŮŽIČKA (eds.), Mysl v terénu. Filosofický realismus v 21. století, Praha: AVU – Display 2017.

Classification of course in study plans

  • Programme VUM_B Bachelor's 2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory
    2 year of study, summer semester, compulsory

Type of course unit

 

Lecture

26 hod., compulsory

Teacher / Lecturer

Mgr. Jakub Bulvas Stejskal, Ph.D.

Syllabus

1. Western Marxism and the Critique of Ideology. Lukács, Gramsci, Benjamin, Frankfurt School (Adorno, Marcuse, Fromm), Althusser, Debord, Williams, Eagleton, Geuss 

2. The individual and emancipation at the intersection of humanism and postcolonial critique. Existentialism and Marxism – Sartre. The movement of négritude – Senghor, Césaire, Fanon 

3. Psychoanalysis as a critical theory of society. Freudomarxism. Lacan, Žižek  

4. Feminist philosophy and literary theory of the 1940s – 70s. Feminist appropriation of psychoanalysis. Beauvoir, Kristeva, Cixous, Irigaray, Mitchell, Mulvey. Feminist critique of art history and aesthetic categories – Nochlin, Pollock, Korsmeyer 

5. From structuralism to post-structuralism. Discourse and the production of the subject. Barthes, Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze and Guattari. 

6. Critical studies of visual culture and critical media theory. Eco, Sontag, Berger, Hall, Mitchell, Mirzoeff 

7. Postmodernism and the dispute over the emancipatory legacy of modernity. Habermas, Jameson, Lyotard.  

8. The influence of poststructuralism in postcolonial philosophy and cultural theory. Said, Spivak, Bhabha 

9. Postmodern feminist thought and queer theory. Haraway, Butler 

10. Critical social theory after postmodernism. Agamben, Laclau and Mouffe, Žižek, Badiou, Rancière. 

11. Critique of the tradition of critical thought. Latour, speculative realism and new materialism. Critical posthumanism – Haraway, Braidotti 

12. Student presentations and discussions on topics covered during the semester 

13. Student presentations and discussions on topics covered during the semester