Chinese Journal of Literary Criticism

No.4, 2020

From “Art for Life” to “Art of Life”: The Internal Transformation of Value Pursuit in China’s Modern Aesthetic Education

(Abstract)

Tan Haozhe

In the theoretical development of modern Chinese aesthetic education, the problem of the relationship between aesthetic education and life naturally arises, which is further transformed into the relationship between art and life. Both of them take the promotion of human beings and the improvement of human life as their aims, so both of them have the connotation of humanity, reflecting the value pursuit and orientation of modern Chinese aesthetic education. In the diachronic evolution, the relationship between art and life has experienced an internal transformation from “art for life” to “art of life.” Under the proposition of “art of life,” the relationship between art and life is not how art serves life, but what life should be and what kind of life is the ideal one.