Any part of a painting can be a detail but not all the parts are details. What, then, are the grounds for identifying a part as a detail? Analysis of the formal properties of parthood and composition offers a useful starting point for examining the relation between a detail and the larger whole to which it belongs. However, the concept of a detail and the concept of a part are not co-extensive. Consideration of the differences in the way in which we employ these terms provides a means of elucidating some of the distinctive features of the detail-whole relation and the problem of individuation to which this gives rise.
Aesthetics Seminar Convenors: Catharine Abell and David Collins
