ANDREW WYETH

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EXISTENTIALISM
A complex philosophy emphasizing the absurdity of
reality and the human responsibility to make
choices and accept consequences!
ANDREW WYETH Christinas World (1948)
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Big Ideas of Existentialism
Despite encompassing a huge range of
philosophical, religious, and political
ideologies, the underlying concepts of
existentialism are simple
MARK ROTHKO Untitled (1968)
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Cogito ergo sum.
Existence Precedes Essence
Existentialism is the title of the set of
philosophical ideals that emphasize the existence
of the human being, the lack of meaning and
purpose in life, and the solitude of human
existence Existence precedes essence implies
that the human being has no essence (no essential
self).
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Absurdism

• The belief that nothing can explain or
  rationalize human existence.
• There is no answer to Why am I?
• Humans exist in a meaningless, irrational
  universe and any search for order will bring them
  into direct conflict with this universe.

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It was during the Second World War, when Europe
found itself in a crisis faced with death and
destruction, that the existential movement began
to flourish, popularized in France in the 1940s.
GEORGIO DE CHIRICO Love Song
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Choice and Commitment

• Humans have freedom to choose.
• Each individual makes choices that create his or
  her own nature.
• Because we choose, we must accept risk and
  responsibility for wherever our commitments take
  us.
• A human being is absolutely free and absolutely
  responsible. Anguish is the result. Jean-Paul
  Sartre

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Dread and Anxiety
MAN RAY Les Larmes (Tears)
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Dread and Anxiety

• Dread is a feeling of general apprehension.
  Kierkegaard interpreted it as Gods way of
  calling each individual to make a commitment to a
  personally valid way of life.
• Anxiety stems from our understanding and
  recognition of the total freedom of choice that
  confronts us every moment, and the individuals
  confrontation with nothingness.

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Nothingness and Death
EDVARD MUNCH Night in Saint Cloud (1890)
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Nothingness and Death

• Death hangs over all of us. Our awareness of it
  can bring freedom or anguish.
• I am my own existence. Nothing structures my
  world.
• Nothingness is our inherent lack of self. We are
  in constant pursuit of a self. Nothingness is the
  creative well-spring from which all human
  possibilities can be realized. Jean-Paul Sartre

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Alienation or Estrangement

• From all other humans
• From human institutions
• From the past
• From the future
• We only exist right now, right here.

EDGAR DEGAS Labsinthe (1876)
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Edward Hopper New York Movie (1939)
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Human Subjectivity
I will be what I choose to be. It is impossible
to transcend human subjectivity. There are no
true connections between people. My emotions are
yet another choice I make. I am responsible for
them.
Edward Hopper New York Movie (1939)
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All existentialists are concerned with the study
of being or ontology. TO REVIEW An
existentialist believes that a persons life is
nothing but the sum of the life he has shaped for
himself. At every moment it is always his own
free will choosing how to act. He is responsible
for his actions, which limit future actions.
Thus, he must create a morality in the absence of
any known predetermined absolute values. God does
not figure into the equation, because even if God
does exist, He does not reveal to men the meaning
of their lives. Honesty with oneself is the most
important value. Every decision must be weighed
in light of all the consequences of that
action. Life is absurd, but we engage it!
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Human existence cannot be captured by reason or
objectivity it must include passion, emotion
and the subjective.
Each of us is responsible for everything and to
every human being. Simone de Beauvoir
GEORGIA OKEEFFE Sky Above White Clouds I (1962)
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Some Famous Existentialists

• Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
• Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)
• Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980)
• Albert Camus (1913-1960)

A woman is not bornshe is created. de
Beauvoirs most famous text is The Second Sex
(1949), which some claim is the basis for current
gender studies.
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Nietzsche and Nihilism Every belief, every
considering something-true is necessarily false
because there is simply no true world. Nihilism
isnot only the belief that everything deserves
to perish but one actually puts ones shoulder
to the plow one destroys. For some time now our
whole European culture has been moving as toward
a catastrophe, with a tortured tension that is
growing from decade to decade restlessly,
violently, headlong, like a river that wants to
reach the end . (Will to Power)
Out, out, brief candle! Lifes but a walking
shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his
hour upon the stage And then is heard no more it
is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and
fury, Signifying nothing.
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Albert Camus dissociated himself from the
existentialists but acknowledged mans lonely
condition in the universe. His man of the
absurd (or absurd hero) rejects despair and
commits himself to the anguish and responsibility
of living as best he can.
Basically, man creates himself through the
choices he makes. There are no guides for these
choices, but he has to make them anyway, which
renders life absurd.
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You will never be happy if you continue to
search for what happiness consists of. You will
never live if you are looking for the meaning of
life.
It was previously a question of finding out
whether or not life had to have a meaning to be
lived. It now becomes clear, on the contrary,
that it will be lived all the better if it has no
meaning.