In conjunction with the inaugural University of Toronto Festival of the Arts and the University of Toronto Art Centre’s exhibition of John Hartman’s Cities, Mark Kingwell delivered a lecture entitled “The City as a Work of Art” on March 13.
Kingwell, a philosophy professor at U of T, is the author of 10 books. The consummate Toronto flaneur had no problem filling every seat in the University College lecture theatre.
The city—from civitas, civilized life and citizenship—intrigues Kingwell, and his love shows. In his lecture, he made the case for the city as a work of art, using New York City and Shanghai as his primary examples. Cities, according to Kingwell, cannot be easily defined as one thing or the other, but rather as a confluence of things that collide together to create a sense of embodied consciousness— very much like the people who inhabit them.
He takes his cue from Heidegger, who asserted that “the mere object is not the work of art” but rather the space created by the object for reflection and contemplation. For him, the “city of the imagination,” more than the actual environs of the city, helps to justify the city as a work of art. More than the concrete that surrounds us, the city assimilates into our consciousness. His rejection of teleological ends and grand urban planning recalls the late Jane Jacobs.
Kingwell’s excellent conception of cities, which any city-lover would agree with, testify that the city is an organic, growing thing, though it is not biological. It represents the ultimate Freudian conquest of our natural environs: a centre of creativity and culture. A city, according to Kingwell, is not a symphony but a jazz riff—many parts coming together to make excellent music. And, just as his artful city is more a jazz piece than a concerto, Kingwell shone brightest in the Q&A, easily elaborating on many points.
Whether each person agreed or disagreed with Kingwell’s analysis, the lecture provided each of us with food for thought—just what city life should do.
