Aesthetics for Birds

Aesthetics and Philosophy of Art for Everyone

Category Archives: Interviews

March 16, 2014
by Aesthetics for Birds
0 comments

Conversations in Art and Aesthetics

What follows is a guest post by Hans Maes. Hans is Senior Lecturer in History and Philosophy of Art and co-director of the Aesthetics Research Centre at the University of Kent. He has authored papers on a variety of topics in aesthetics, including the role of intention in the interpretation of art, the notion of free beauty, and the relation between art and pornography. The latter is the subject of two essay collections: Art and Pornography(co-edited with Jerrold Levinson, Oxford University Press, 2012) and Pornographic Art and The Aesthetics of Pornography (Palgrave MacMillan, 2013). I’m currently working on a book with the title “Conversations on Art and Aesthetics” set to appear with OUP in 2015*. The book is modeled after Alex Voorhoeve’s Conversations on Ethics and will contain interviews with a number of prominent aestheticians.  Below is an excerpt from my 2011 interview with Jerrold Levinson. I thought it would be fun to include it … Continue reading →

March 5, 2014
by Aesthetics for Birds
0 comments

Interview with Philosopher & LEGO Sculptor Roy T. Cook

Roy T. Cook is an extremely nerdy associate professor of philosophy at the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities, a resident fellow of the Minnesota Center for Philosophy of Science, and an associate fellow of the Northern Institute of Philosophy – Aberdeen, Scotland. He has published over fifty articles and book chapters on logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of art (especially popular art). He co-edited The Art of Comics: A Philosophical Approach (Wiley-Blackwell 2012) with Aaron Meskin, and his monograph on the Yablo Paradox is forthcoming from Oxford University Press. He is also a co-founder of the interdisciplinary comics studies blog PencilPanelPage, which recently took up residence at the Hooded Utilitarian, and hopes to someday write a book about the Sensational She-Hulk. He lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota with his wife, two cats (Freckles and Mr. Prickley), and approximately 2.5 million LEGO bricks.

February 7, 2014
by Aesthetics for Birds
2 Comments

Interview with Film & Television Writer/Creator Kyle Killen

What follows is an interview with Kyle Killen. Kyle is a film & television writer and producer. He is the creator and showrunner for the critically acclaimed Fox television series Lone Star, Awake (NBC), and Mind Games (ABC premiere Feb. 24th). He also wrote the screenplays both for the films The Beaver (2011), starring Mel Gibson and directed by Jodie Foster, and Scenic Route (2013), starring Josh Duhamel and Dan Fogler and directed by Kevin and Michael Goetz.

January 20, 2014
by Aesthetics for Birds
1 Comment

Interview with Artist The Sucklord

SUCKADELIC is an evil arts organization based in Chinatown New York City. Specializing in Bootleg Toys, illicit remix records, and duffed out Supervillain Soap operas. More of a degenerate con-game than a real company, Suckadelic is universally regarded as the sleaziest brand in the game. Ruled from a hidden Sweatshop by the intergalactic criminal and self-serving megalomaniac, the SUPER SUCKLORD, Suckadelic has continued to pump highly addictive pop culture crap into the veins of willing victims since 1997. Greatest hits include the legendary STAR WARS BREAKBEATS album, The GAY EMPIRE Homotrooper action figure, and the epic TOY LORDS OF CHINATOWN misadventure serial. Despite revealing a softer side of himself on Bravo TV’s hit Show WORK OF ART: The Next Great Artist, The Sucklord remains a reviled gangster, feared for his smooth tyranny and the ruthless exploitation of his fans. He is the Greatest Supervillain ever to operate in the world of popular culture. Made in USA.

January 2, 2014
by Aesthetics for Birds
0 comments

Interview with Philosopher-Poet Troy Jollimore

What follows is an interview with philosopher and poet Troy Jollimore. Troy is Professor of Philosophy at California State University, Chico. He is the author of Love’s Vision (Princeton University Press, 2011) and On Loyalty (Routledge, 2012) as well as over a dozen articles in journals including Midwest Studies in Philosophy, Canadian Journal of Philosophy, and American Philosophical Quarterly. He is also the author of two collections of poetry: At Lake Scugog (2011) and Tom Thomson in Purgatory, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry in 2006. He is a former External Faculty Fellow at the Stanford Humanities Center and is a 2013 Guggenheim Fellow. Aesthetics for Birds recently featured an interview with poet and critic David Orr, author of Beautiful and Pointless: A Guide to Modern Poetry. Much of David’s work as a critic aims at demystifying poetry for a modern audience. Of course, philosophical enquiry can be said likewise to aim at the demystification of its … Continue reading →

December 16, 2013
by Aesthetics for Birds
2 Comments

Historian-artist Interview: Matt Kadane

Historian and Musician Matt Kadane interviewed by Christy Mag Uidhir for AFB Matt Kadane is a founding member of the bands Bedhead, The New Year, Overseas, and Consonant and played for five years with Silkworm. He is currently chair of the history department at Hobart and William Smith Colleges, and the author, most recently, of The Watchful Clothier (Yale UP, 2013).

October 10, 2013
by Aesthetics for Birds
2 Comments

Interview with Poet & Critic David Orr

What follows is an interview with poet David Orr. David is the poetry columnist for the New York Times Book Review. His first book, Beautiful & Pointless: A Guide to Modern Poetry, was named one of the twenty best books of 2011 by The Chicago Tribune.  Orr is the winner of the Nona Balakian Prize from the National Book Critics Circle and the Editor’s Prize for Reviewing from Poetry magazine.  His writing has appeared in The New York Times, The New Yorker, Slate, Poetry magazine, The Virginia Quarterly Review, and The Believer, among other publications. He holds a B.A. from Princeton and a J.D. from Yale Law School.

September 16, 2013
by Aesthetics for Birds
8 Comments

Interview with Philosopher-Artist Keith Lehrer (Arizona/Miami)

Keith Lehrer is the Regent’s Professor emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Arizona with an affiliation with the University of Miami (Florida). In addition to his numerous published articles in areas such as epistemology, free will, rational consensus, and Thomas Reid, Keith has also authored several books including Thomas Reid (1989), Theory of Knowledge (1990), and Self-Trust: A Study of Reason, Knowledge, and Autonomy (1997). Keith also has a research interest in aesthetics, with his most recent book being Art, Self and Knowledge (Oxford University Press, 2011), and can currently be found bridging the gap between theory and practice as an active painter and performance artist (the website for his paintings can be found here). It is truly an honor to have Keith as part of Aesthetics for Birds’ Philosopher-Artist series.

August 30, 2013
by Aesthetics for Birds
7 Comments

Interview with Philosopher-Artist Carrie Ichikawa Jenkins

What follows is an interview of artist and philosopher Carrie Ichikawa Jenkins. Carrie is the Canada Research Chair & Associate Professor in Philosophy at University of British Columbia and the Quarter-Time Chair in Theoretical Philosophy and Professorial Fellow at the Northern Institute of Philosophy, University of Aberdeen. She has published over two dozen journal articles and book chapters on issues in epistemology, metaphysics, logic, philosophy of language, and philosophy of mathematics, and is the author of the 2008 book Grounding Concepts: An Empirical Basis for Arithmetical Knowledge(Oxford). As if this weren’t enough, Carrie also happens to be a talented vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, and member of the musical group 21st Century Monads (website here) along with Syracuse philosophers Ben Bradley, Kris McDaniel, and Hille Paakkunainen. Most of The 21st Century Monads songs are about philosophy in some form or other—e.g., broad philosophical themes (“Death is Bad for a Cow”), philosophical positions (“There Ain’t No Gunk”), the profession of Philosophy (“My Paper Was Rejected Again”), and … Continue reading →