The Aesthetics of the Ordinary and Familiar

Abstract

Capturing the realm of everyday aesthetics requires a wide net. The defamiliarized familiar certainly is its major ingredient. However, everyday aesthetics contains diverse modes of experience beyond defamiliarziation. The familiar experienced as familiar, often yielding a sense of comforting security and stability while at other times felt as sheer drudgery, also comprises an important dimension of everyday aesthetics. The only aspect of daily life that does not belong to everyday aesthetics is inattentiveness, as it prevents one from having any ‘experience’ to speak of. Everyday aesthetics thus embraces a rich array of different experiences, sometimes by turning the ordinary into something extraordinary, while at other times illuminating the familiar texture of daily life, and at other times exposing instances of negative aesthetics in everyday experience.