Truth and art

pp. 168-185

in: Joseph Kockelmans, Heidegger on art and art works, Berlin, Springer, 1985

Abstract

Heidegger begins the last part of his essay with a brief summary of the most important ideas developed in the preceding sections. We have seen there, he says, that art is the origin of both the art work and the artist. By origin we understand here the source of the essence, in which the Being of a being comes-to-presence. But what then is art? We have tried to discover its essence by examining works insofar as they are actually at work. The work-Being of the work in its actuality has been determined by that which is at work in the work, i.e., by the coming-to-pass of the truth. The coming-to-pass of the truth we have tried to understand in terms of the "fighting" of the battle between world and earth. Rest and repose come-to-presence in the concentrated agitation of this battle. It is here that the independence of the work has its ground.