The Dignity of Contemplation
 
At the end of the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle examines what happiness is. Perfect happiness, he finds out, is a life of contemplation. His proof is as follows: Happiness can only consist in some form of activity, and reason is our true self and the highest virtue in us. Thus, the activity concerned has to flow from reason. And the specific activity of reason is active contemplation.^[i]
But what is contemplation, and what does its specific dignity consist in? Does it consist in exerting its power and superiority with respect to the object, for example by saying that what appears to us is the only thing which has reality, and that the thing in itself (Ding an sich) is just a limit concept (Grenzbegriff), but not a real object? Or in a continuous exploration of its relation to the object, in becoming more and more neutral, thereby achieving higher insights and a deeper sense of reality?
Both options have been tried out in philosophy as well as in art history, and they continue to be explored. Each option is regarded by its advocates to be the provisional culmination of a historical development which starts from (and is possibly founded in) the Renaissance. Not surprisingly, then, the character of the Renaissance itself is also subject to lively debate. There is agreement on the fact that the Renaissance is characterised by an emphasis on the artist’s inner conception. The production of a painting or a sculpture is no longer understood as a mere act of imitating an external object, but primarily as the unfolding of an inner idea of the artist.
Now the first understanding of contemplation (which we might call the power-oriented understanding) would suggest that man creates reality in the process of cognition,^[ii] and that the world possesses “no being in itself”.^[iii] “That which is represented becomes … a function of the mind’s power and an expression of its effective faculty.”^[iv]
The second conception of contemplation (which we might call the neutrality-oriented conception) would lead to a completely different interpretation of the Renaissance. It is true that the inner idea becomes crucial for the artist’s productivity. But the artist does not consider himself superior to the object, but rather comes closer to it – not by negating his own view, but rather by affirming and clearly presenting it, for example in the form of central perspective: The tile pattern is distorted, oriented on a vanishing point, and at first it becomes less similar to the real tiles. But by presenting the view this way the object to which the view is directed comes to light all the more clearly.
And the Baroque era continues with this approach. The Baroque is characterized by “a conception which is able to give itself over to the mere optical appearance and to do without the ‘tangible’ drawing.”^[v] Thus, even more weight is put on the view itself, and less weight is put on the depiction.
To be more precise, one would even have to say that the depiction plays no role at all and that the work of art is only the matter for a mental form. The similarity of the image to another form (a possible model) is completely external to the image, and the productive process is not driven by this similarity. If there is a reason to say that Renaissance art is more realistic that Gothic art, it is because the purity of the view makes the separation between reality and appearance disappear. 
This implies that the presentation of the artist’s own view, made possible by reflection, is a means to come closer to reality. It is not associated with the attitude of presenting some individual truth which only becomes apparent from the point of view of the artist. At least this would be the interpretation according to the second conception of contemplation.
And in general, according to this conception, there would be no object in the mind opposed to the object in reality. Rather, knowing would merely be an act of focusing, without any production of an intramental representation. And art would be neither an imitation nor a production of reality, rather it would open up the view of a new space which everyone can explore for himself.
It seems to me that it is this neutrality-oriented understanding of contemplation which best corresponds to Dieter Detzner’s art, and it may be that the best formulation of this understanding is still Paul Klee’s statement: “Art does not reproduce what is visible, but rather produces visibility.”^[vi] The painting or the sculpture is then a pure reference, and it does not matter very much whether the object or motif you are using is concrete or abstract – it might be an advantage if it is abstract, because this will reduce distractions through individual, personal associations.
If art is some kind of focusing, it will – at the same time – let reality emerge as something which is independent of this focus or view. But if art means holding on to appearances, identifying reality with what we are able to know about it or negating the world that must exist outside of these appearances as their source, then this might bring some temporary relief in the sense that it gives us power, but it is foreseeable that some crisis or some misunderstanding will come to show that there is another, deeper reality.
Thus, art is not only a light that opens up a new room, rather art also shows what dimensions the wonderful activity of contemplation can have.
 
Michael Renemann


_{^[i] Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics X, 7 sq. – Cf. Wolfgang Hübener, “Der Praxisbegriff der aristotelischen Tradition und der Praktizismus der Prämoderne,” in: Studia leibnitiana Suppl.-Bd. 19 (= Akten des III. Internationalen Leibniz-Kongresses, Hannover 12.–17. November 1977), Wiesbaden 1980, p. 41–59 (reprinted in: id., Zum Geist der Prämoderne, Würzburg 1985, p. 25–41).
^[ii] Thomas Leinkauf, “Kunst als proprium humanitatis. Zum philosophischen Verständnis künstlerischer Gestaltung in der Renaissance,” in: Erzählende Vernunft (Festschrift for Wilhelm Schmidt-Biggemann), ed. by Günter Frank, Anja Hallacker and Sebastian Lalla, Berlin 2006, p. 221–235, here p. 229.
^[iii] Id., “Selbstrealisierung. Anthropologische Konstanten in der Frühen Neuzeit,” in: Bochumer Philosophisches Jahrbuch für Antike und Mittelalter 10 (2005), p. 129–161, here p. 136.
^[iv] Id., “Kunst als proprium humanitatis,” p. 225.
^[v] Heinrich Wölfflin, Kunstgeschichtliche Grundbegriffe. Das Problem der Stilentwicklung in der neueren Kunst, München ¹1915, p. 15.
^[vi] Paul Klee, “Schöpferische Konfession” (1920), in: id., Das bildnerische Denken (Form- und Gestaltungslehre, Bd. 1), ed. by Jürg Spiller, Basel – Stuttgart ³1971 (¹1956), p. 76–80, here p. 76.}