Objects of Transcendence

The research identified the ‘Sublime’ as a tradition I was intrinsically drawn towards and focused on the critique in Edmund Burke’s Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of the Sublime and Beautiful. The significance of the concept was further supported by a range of readings that include, Kant, Wordsworth and the documentary prose of W.S. Sebald and P.Schrader’s account of the transcendent in film. Burke’s psychological enquiry traces the source of the sublime to experiences that excite and cause one to tremble with pleasure, combining fear with delight. He moves the Sublime encounter away from the object (nature) and towards the conception of the beholder. My own enquiry centres on his theory of aesthetic opposition, in which beauty is derived from pleasure and sublimity from pain. The paradox articulates my own perspective and forms the foundation of my creative discourse, which travels a precarious route until it finds a resolution in the Final Viva Exhibition.