On Oct. 21-24, Metro State sponsored the annual international meeting of the American Society of Aesthetics, an organization dedicated to the study of the arts in historical, critical and philosophical context.

Attendees hailed from across the globe, including Israel, Spain, Switzerland, New Zealand and Australia, according to Professor of Philosophy Tim Gould, who organized the meetings, with assistance from the School of Letters, Arts and Sciences. “This is a rare event as I don’t believe the group has held an international meeting in Denver in more than four decades.”

Meetings and receptions were held for about 250 people at the Warwick Hotel and the Center for Visual Art. Participants presented papers and lectures on topics ranging from improvisation in jazz, to evolution and the origin of beauty, to Chinese art in modern society. A plenary lecture was delivered by Denis Dutton, a philosophy professor at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand. The Inaugural Wollheim Memorial Lecture was presented by Peter Lamarque, a professor of philosophy at the University of York in the United Kingdom.

Metro State representation at the event included a host of faculty, students and staff, including the Dean of LAS Joan Foster, who delivered a welcome. In addition, music faculty member Ron Bland performed with the society’s jazz band “The Aesthetic Attitude.”

LAS helped to sponsor the meetings for the society, which is mostly made up of philosophers but also includes artists, architects, art and music historians and art critics. The American Society of Aesthetics was founded in 1942.