Abstract

This article proposes to inspect the phenomenon of liberature from the perspective of the reconfiguration of aisthesis, as described by Wolfgang Welsch. In the German researcher's approach, this consists in questioning the primacy of vision in favour of other senses, and is, first of all, an effect of the dominance of the media. However, in a broader approach towards the reasons of transformations, aisthesis must be looked for in phenomena that are summarised in the formula of “new aesthetics”, as proposed by Arnold Berleant. One of the significant features of this concept is the constant expansion of the area of art and the appearance of forms that stimulate the audience's experience, requiring the activation of new sensory receptors. Without a doubt, liberature is one of those forms of art that re-quires interactivity and a special involvement. Being a unique example of the co-existence of various types of messages (verbal, iconic and material), liberature requires a polysenso-ry perception. This, in turn, can be a source of aesthetic satisfaction, but also a reason for an impoverishment of the aesthetic experience spanning between aisthesis and anaisthesis.

Key words: liberature, aisthesis, aesthetic experience, polysensory perception

Every culture and every age has its favorite model of perception and knowledge that it is inclined to prescribe for everybody and everything. The mark of our time is its revulsion against imposed patterns. (McLuhan 1964: 6).

Even the distinctions among the arts have broken down, and we are often un-able to decide where a new development belongs – whether, for example, envi-ronments are sculpture or architecture; assemblages are paintings or sculptures; Happenings are theater, painting (as an outgrowth of action painting), or an en-tirely new art form synthesizing elements of theater, sculpture, dance, painting, and music (Berleant 2004: 57).