Structures of Feeling in Seventeenth-Century Cultural Expression

This book explores how artists in the 1600s engaged with cultural forms to express evolving human values. Structures of Feeling in Seventeenth-Century Cultural Expression provides a deep analysis of this transformative period.

The book Structures of Feeling in Seventeenth-Century Cultural Expression delves into how artists of the 1600s utilized various cultural forms to reflect on and navigate the complexities of human values during a time of significant change. This era, positioned between the decline of the Renaissance and the rise of the Enlightenment, witnessed dramatic shifts in human behavior, including evolving expressions of gender and perceptions of time. While some of these changes were documented in written form, many were captured through non-verbal mediums such as visual arts, poetry, theatre, music, and dance.

In Structures of Feeling in Seventeenth-Century Cultural Expression, essays by distinguished historians, musicologists, and art critics provide insights into the methods of non-verbal cultural expression. They explore overarching themes such as time, motion, the body, and global relations, revealing that the cultural outputs of the seventeenth century were not merely precursors to later artistic movements but rather represented a pivotal period of transformation in European subjectivities. The contributors argue that these cultural expressions were instrumental in shaping the ways individuals experienced and understood their world.

Through a comprehensive examination of these varied artistic forms, the book highlights the richness of cultural expression during the seventeenth century. It challenges the notion that this time was merely a transitional phase, positing instead that it was a crucial moment of profound change that laid the groundwork for future developments in Western art and thought.