Dana Reynolds - Heidegger and Nietzsche

I had a difficult time understanding Heidegger’s argument, but in the introduction to this section of the book the Nature of Art admits that is difficult to tell what Heidegger is talking about when discussing art, and the only actual clear point is discerning what the origin of a piece of art is. Even the simplified introduction doesn’t really make any more sense than the actual excerpts. So instead, we will discuss Nietzsche. He doesn’t care so much what art is, but rather asks the question of why it exists and what function it serves. It serves as a coping mechanism, because life is inherently awful, and if we were to fully face this fact we would die of deep depression. Art is something that lifts the spirit and keeps us distracted from the horrible existence that is life. He looks at art divided between the Apollonian and the Dionysiac, the ordered and the chaotic. But ultimately, the are different aspects of the same whole and cannot truly be separated.