Does Traditional Aesthetics Rest on a Mistake  

"We are able to separate those objects which are works of art from those which are not, because we know English; that is, we know how correctly to use the word ‘art’ and to apply the phrase ‘work of art’. To borrow a statement from Dr. Waismann and change it to meet my own needs, “If anyone is able to use the word ‘art’ or the phrase ‘work of art’ correctly, in all sorts of contexts and on the right sort of occasions, he [or she] knows ‘what art is’, and no formula in the world can make him [or her] wiser”."--incipit to "Does Traditional Aesthetics Rest on a Mistake?" (1958) by by William E. Kennick

"Imagine a very large warehouse filled with all sorts of things - pictures of every description, musical scores for symphonies and dances and hymns, machines, tools, boats, houses, churches and temples, statues, vases, books of poetry and of prose, furniture and clothing, newspapers, postage stamps, flowers, trees, stones, musical instruments. Now we instruct someone to enter the warehouse and bring out all of the works of art it contains. He will be able to do this with reasonable success despite the fact that, as even the aestheticians must admit, he possesses no satisfactory definition of Art in terms of some common denominator, because no such definition has yet been found. Now imagine the same person sent into the warehouse to bring out all objects with Significant Form, or all objects of Expression. He would rightly be baffled ; he knows a work of art when he sees one, but he has little or no idea what to look for when he is told to bring an object that possesses Significant Form."--"Does Traditional Aesthetics Rest on a Mistake?" (1958) by by William E. Kennick