claude.iconHisashi Muroi (1951-) is a Japanese aesthetician and art critic. He took a course in aesthetics at Tokyo University of the Arts and is active in a wide range of fields including contemporary art and photographic theory.

Main Concepts:

  • Nomadic”: Muroi refers to a “nomadic sensibility” that resists “sedentarization” as “nomadic. This is not mere migration, but a “free deviation” from fixed values.
  • Relational Aesthetics”: A perspective that views art in terms of the relationship between the artwork and the viewer. It is the idea that the meaning of a work of art is created through interaction with the viewer.
  • intersubjectivity”: a concept that goes beyond the dualism of subjectivity and objectivity and focuses on the interaction between subjects. Muroi discussed the artistic experience as an intersubjective event between the artist and the viewer.

Main publications:

  • Nomadic - Floating Thoughts” (1986): A work that presents the concept of “nomadism” and explores the possibility of nomadic sensibility in contemporary society.
  • The Aesthetics of Relation” (1995): Developed an aesthetic theory that views art in the context of relationships. Provided a new perspective on the interpretation of contemporary art.
  • The Art of Intersubjectivity” (2001): A collection of essays examining the nature of artistic experience based on the concept of intersubjectivity.

Muroi’s philosophy questions the Western subject-object dichotomy and offers a more fluid and interactive view of the world. This is highly compatible with the philosophy of [Deleuze.

In particular, the concept of “nomadism” resonates with Deleuze’s nomadic theory. The nomadic sensibility that continually de-territorializes against sedentary thinking is a problematic consciousness shared by Muroi’s aesthetics and Deleuze’s philosophy.

Muroi, however, does not discuss the issue in the same political context as Deleuze, but rather explores the significance of a free-ranging sensibility in the realm of art theory and aesthetics. It can be said that the two philosophers’ ideas, while taking different directions, have a reciprocal relationship in the history of modern and contemporary thought.

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