4 Fun in the Age of Consumerism: What Role Do Aesthetics and Criticism Play in the Consumer Game Marketplace?

Early (eighteenth—century) aesthetic theories focused on the relationship between the object and the person experiencing that object—a hermetically sealed vacuum chamber holding only the person and a thing created to provide an aesthetic experience (even if the thing wasn't really created for that purpose at all). Kantian aesthetics established an aesthetic determinism in which the experiential value was always—already present in the object and just awaiting release by its audience.
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This understanding conveniently brushed aside the fact that much of what drove the conversation about art were centuries— and even millennia—old objects no longer in their original contexts of use. More importantly, though, was the unspoken reality that fine art was an art of opulence and wealth; one could partake in a Kantian art experience only if one had the leisure time and access afforded by wealth, class, and social connection.