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Meaning of aesthetic in English:

aesthetic

(US esthetic)

Pronunciation /iːsˈθɛtɪk/ /ɛsˈθɛtɪk/

Translate aesthetic into Spanish

adjective

  • 1Concerned with beauty or the appreciation of beauty.

    ‘the pictures give great aesthetic pleasure’
    • ‘In this period, they occupied very much the center of aesthetic appreciation and social value.’
    • ‘We should strive to appreciate the aesthetic value of our names.’
    • ‘Women also appreciate the aesthetic value of a knife and may choose to combine function with beauty.’
    • ‘There are two traditional views concerning what constitutes aesthetic values.’
    • ‘Both terms were applied in all the arts in a neutral sense with no necessary implication for beauty or aesthetic value.’
    • ‘New York's film-making community shares the aesthetic appreciation.’
    • ‘The art on the walls was contemporary and unusual, creating an ambience of aesthetic appreciation.’
    • ‘This year the Scottish Executive appointed him captain of culture to teach the public some aesthetic appreciation.’
    • ‘This aesthetic appreciation extends to previous writers on the subject.’
    • ‘That may be partly true but it does not detract from a thorough aesthetic appreciation of his works.’
    • ‘At least with the monument, aesthetic appreciation justifies a lack of content.’
    • ‘Kashmir's contribution to the Indian thought has been of immense artistic, esoteric and aesthetic value.’
    • ‘There's an esthetic appreciation but no emotional context.’
    • ‘Does knowing this information contribute to an esthetic appreciation of the photograph?’
    • ‘They might be an expression of aesthetic appreciation, or they might be applied as part of a knowledge system.’
    • ‘It is also deeply involved in our aesthetic appreciation of the world around us, and there are many examples to draw on.’
    • ‘But beyond that there is an aspect that connects our aesthetic appreciation to that of Nature itself.’
    • ‘There is a disquieting aesthetic beauty and grace found in the war dead.’
    • ‘As for esthetic value, I would bet on the architect whose project reflects enduring human values in architecture.’
    1. 1.1Giving or designed to give pleasure through beauty.
      ‘the law applies to both functional and aesthetic objects’
      • ‘As of now, people in the State are hooked to just the aesthetic aspect of design.’
      • ‘They chose wood as their preferred blocking material because it offers more natural, aesthetic options for interior design.’
      • ‘The router itself is unlike any I have seen as of yet in its aesthetic design.’
      • ‘Quite apart from its aesthetic appeal, the design enhances the acoustics much as a cello itself does.’
      • ‘Conservation should be for aesthetic pleasure, forward-planning, improved crop and food productivity.’
      decorative, ornamental, graceful, elegant, exquisite, beautiful, attractive, pleasing, lovely, stylish, artistic, tasteful, in good taste
      View synonyms

noun

in singular

  • A set of principles underlying the work of a particular artist or artistic movement.

    ‘the Cubist aesthetic’
    • ‘The two married an industrial ethic to a modernist aesthetic, capturing an entire ethos in a single seat.’
    • ‘The graphic designs of Constructivism and the Bauhaus had their foundations in the collage esthetic.’
    • ‘Signed Henri Matisse lithographs on the lounge wall reinforce the Modernist esthetic.’
    • ‘Like those artists, she unapologetically pursues an esthetic of visual immediacy.’
    • ‘Modern artists like Kirchner explored the rough, expressive aesthetic of woodcut.’
    • ‘Thereby they imply that the sculpture is steeped in the same aesthetic as that behind our legacy of San rock paintings.’
    • ‘Here, the casually irreverent esthetic of a young artist was linked with literary notions of exploration and mortality.’
    • ‘Born in Japan, the artist brought the esthetic of ink painting on paper to his American subject matter.’
    • ‘At last she introduced a dance esthetic that was entirely new.’
    • ‘Making his brisk, wide-ranging way through the 1960s, Crow turns the esthetic into the ethical at every step.’
    • ‘He uses the ambiguity of passageways and transitional spaces to construct an esthetic of anticipation.’
    • ‘The rubbish esthetic was so ubiquitous in messy piles of wallboard and carpet that it began to seem a too-facile solution.’
    • ‘The other large upstairs gallery is devoted to a messier esthetic.’
    • ‘Although he has a pictorial esthetic, the pictures are completely isolated by their size alone.’
    • ‘Digital art has myriad complexities that make it all the more difficult to define a new esthetic.’
    • ‘He reminds us that the installation esthetic began in a spirit of rebellion against all that.’
    • ‘Chasseriau's attenuation of his figures certainly borrows a Mannerist aesthetic.’
    • ‘The documentary aesthetic lent itself to the popularization of photography at all levels.’
    • ‘What she saw, and what others in the art and quilt communities began to see, was a singular aesthetic.’
    • ‘Yes, but the people who produce it also think of it as a threatening aesthetic.’

Origin

Late 18th century (in the sense ‘relating to perception by the senses’): from Greek aisthētikos, from aisthēta ‘perceptible things’, from aisthesthai ‘perceive’. The sense ‘concerned with beauty’ was coined in German in the mid 18th century and adopted into English in the early 19th century, but its use was controversial until much later in the century.