

The Pleasures of Regret - Art and Emotion The National Gallery
I completed my PhD in Philosophy at King's College, London in 2020.
Currently, my research focusses on the malleability and adeptness of our perspective-taking. In particular, our imaginative shifts, both in terms of spatial changes (imagine you are looking down on yourself) and temporal changes (imagine you are sat exactly where you are but in 10 years time).
Understanding how this works help us get to grips with empathic shifts. That is, shifts into the shoes of others (whether now or at a different point in time).
This knowledge contributes to our understanding of art. Because these kinds of shifts enable us, as competent appreciators of art, to disclose the affective content and value of specific works.
Alongside my research, I co-Direct the Centre for Philosophy and Arts (CPA). The Centre is a major multi-disciplinary initiative whose aim is to bring together academics, artists, curators and gallerists to explore the connections between philosophy, theory and the visual arts.
Publications & Films
Academic Writing & Conference Papers
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Academic Journals & Books
​​​Brassey, V. (2023). The Pictorial Narrator Estetika
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Brassey, V (2022) . Affect in Artistic Creativity: Painting to Feel (Book Review), British Journal of Aesthetics
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Brassey, V. (2021). The Expression of Emotion in Pictures, Philosophy Compass,https://doi.org/10.1111/phc3.12767
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Brassey, V. (2020). What Makes a Painting Sad? Thesis, King's College London.
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BRASSEY, V. (2020). Still Moving. Debates in Aesthetics, Volume 15,(1), pp. 35-50.​
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BRASSEY, V. (2019). The Implied Painter. Debates in Aesthetics, Volume 14,(1), pp. 15-29.
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Teaching
Guest teacher King's College London
Guest teacher The National Gallery
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Popular Philosophy Films
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Time for Twofoldness
(request due to licensing)
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Time For Beauty:Depictions
(request due to licensing)
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Time for Musical Expression
(request due to licensing)
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Time for Expressiveness
(request due to licensing)
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National Gallery Series
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Is Love Moral?
National Gallery Series
(request due to licensing)
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The Sublime
National Gallery Series
(request due to licensing)
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Euphoria
​National Gallery Series
​(request due to licensing)
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Residency
The Forty Hall Vineyards
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Postdoctoral Project
'Time for Beauty'
BSA Fellowship 2022-3
I am thrilled to have been awarded the BSA Postdoctoral Fellowship 2022-3. My project will be to explore the poorly defined concept of time-based aesthetic properties in (still) pictures, which I claim, helps to explain the representation and the expression of sophisticated emotions, such as regret, nostalgia, and euphoria. This challenges a longstanding assumption that expressiveness in a picture (and other aesthetic properties) depends solely on spatial extension - a curve here or a line there – while musical expressiveness depends on temporal properties namely, rhythm, melody, and cadence. However, given that sophisticated emotions such as nostalgia point to the past, it seems that the expressive qualities of at least some (such as nostalgic) pictures are interestingly time based.

