Beauty and Science: Art and Aesthetics Between the Orient and West

Abstract

General aesthetics is the science of the aesthetic in general, and its domain comprises aesthetic phenomena both in art and nature according to the monistic principle. However, from the viewpoint of its history, aesthetics has not always been defined as the science of only beauty. In the latter half of the nineteenth century, following the intellectual trends amid the rapid progress of the natural sciences, the need to treat art as an general science was advocated on the grounds that art could be clearly understood as consisting of concrete and empirical facts rather than as an abstract and ambiguous concept of beauty. The controversy continues to this day. Therefore, this article compares the classic definitions of beauty and art in the Orient and the West and examines the aesthetic meanings of beauty and art. And point out that art is also a medium for communicating aesthetic value, which has a social function. And during the phase of its enjoyment, art is an activity involving the contemplator's inner re-creation that allows for social participation through the subjective emotional self-expression of its aesthetic value.