Philosophy Seminars - “Thinking with Paintings”
The Collective Voice of Paintings at Historical Thresholds: From Images of Desire to Utopian Landscapes
Time: 18.30 - 20.00
Speaker: Toros Güneş Esgün
Moderator: Emre Şan
How do paintings narrate the new and what does not yet exist? For Ernst Bloch, who searches for manifestations of hope in art history from an archaic-utopian perspective, the answer to this question lies in the definition of images of desire. Images of desire, which at historical thresholds depict an era’s deprivations and its expectations of the future together, form landscapes of desire in paintings and thereby project utopia. This utopian surplus, produced by a dialectical movement that begins inside the painting and extends beyond it, is established through the historical and social interpretation of the artist’s expression. In this seminar, starting from the distinctive understanding of painting within the Critical Theory tradition, I aim to systematize Bloch’s fragmentary readings of paintings and to exemplify a way of seeing and interpreting that I call “utopian-realist art criticism.” First, I will take up the paintings of artists at two great historical thresholds: Giotto, at the threshold between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, and Franz Marc, one of the German Expressionists at the threshold between the 19th and 20th centuries. Alongside these names, we will look at the exceptional productions of the critical imagination that painting brought into being at moments of crisis in history. While interpreting the fertile discussion opened by the overarching title “Thinking with Paintings” within the framework of the question “How can we think society through paintings?”, it will also be possible to see what this question offers for a critique of ideology directed at visual culture within today’s aesthetic regime, and how the utopian-realist way of seeing can transform the relations between painting and society, image and reality. In this way, we will try to follow the light of images of desire in paintings against the dark cynicism of our age, and to listen to the story of the utopian landscapes within them by questioning paintings and heeding their collective voice. On this journey, the seminar invites listeners to jointly discover the promise of happiness hidden in the phantasmagoria that the art of painting has built up throughout history.
Toros Güneş Esgün is an Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Hacettepe University. He received his master’s degree in 2010 with a thesis on “Carl Schmitt and the Anthropological Foundations of Political Theories,” and his PhD in 2016 with a dissertation titled “From Authority to Autonomy: Law and Freedom.” During his doctoral studies, in 2011, he continued his work as a visiting researcher on the University of Basel’s project “Human Life/Autonomous Life” with a Swiss Government Scholarship. Esgün’s main areas of work are contemporary philosophy, critical theory, political philosophy and philosophy of art. He has taught courses such as Philosophy of Art and Philosophical Problems in Works of Art at undergraduate and graduate levels for more than ten years, and his writings focusing on the relationship between art and society have appeared in journals such as Cogito and Moment as well as in various edited volumes. Esgün is one of the founders and editors of ViraVerita Journal, which publishes in the field of Philosophy and Social Sciences. His article on images of desire, published this year, titled “Images of Desire against Promiseless Sentimental Style: The Relevance of Bloch’s Utopian-Realist Critique of Painting” (Vaatsiz Duygusal Tarza Karşı Arzu İmgeleri: Bloch'un Ütopyacı-Gerçekçi Resim Eleştirisinin Güncelliği), can be accessed at the following link: https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/pub/moment/article/1910358
* The seminar will be held in Turkish. To attend this seminar, you can create your registration by using the "Register" button on the page and receive your free event invitation. Registrations will open 1 week before the event date (08.04.2027, at 18:30) and the "Register" button will become visible. Participation is limited to a quota of 70 people.
* Participants who have completed the event registration and received their invitation are kindly requested to be at the venue at least 15 minutes before the event. The doors will be closed at the event starting time.