In recent years there has been a great deal of talk about a possible death of art. As the title of Heidegger s The Origin of the Work of Art suggests, the essay challenges such talk, just as it in turn is challenged by such talk, talk that is supported by the current state of the art-world. It was Hegel, who most profoundly argued that the shape of our modern world no longer permits us to grant art the significance it once possessed. Hegel s proclamation of the end of art in its highest sense shadows this commentary, as it shadows Heidegger s essay. Heidegger s problematic turn from the...