Janneke Wesseling –The Perfect Spectator: The Experience of the Art Work and Reception Aesthetics

What happens between a spectator and an artwork? How do we experience “meaning” in a work of art? How can the process of interpretation be understood and articulated? To address these questions, art critic Janneke Wesseling, director of the international doctorate programme in visual art and design at Leiden University in the Netherlands, explores the field of reception aesthetics. Based on her own doctoral dissertation, the book’s central premise deepens the field of thought surrounding the contemplation of art as a matter of interaction between the artwork and the observer.