Author: Koizumi, Tetsunori

Publication Year: 1979

Media Type: Conference paper/presentation

Summary:

Abstract:

The purpose of this paper is to explore possible way in which man's 'propensity to truck, barter, and exchange' is influenced by his propensity to paint, sculpture, and engrave, with special reference ot the mode of behavior of economic man in the Orient. The plan of the paper is as follows:

Section 2 develops a general discussion of how art, defined as a symbolic expression of the image of beauty, can serve as as exemplifier of humanistic ideals. The four representative ideals of humanity in art noted by Herbert Read in his classic The Meaning of Art - Primitive, Greco-Roman, Bryzantine and Oriental - are discussed in section 3, where the four corresponding images of man are inferred in relation to the psycho-physiological implications of the works of art which exhibit these ideals. Section 4 presents an illustration, within the context of the standard theory of production and factor demand, of how economic man in the Orient reflects in his economic behavior that he is committed to the realization of his humanistic ideal. Finally, section 5 contrasts Oriental economic man with Greco-Roman economic man who is the main character of contemporary 'Western' economics. (p. 55)

[For a comment on this article, see The Oriental Ideal in Art and the Art of Economic Man in the
 Orient: A Comment.]

Arts & Intersections:

Categories: Creative Economies