Heidegger, nature philosophy and art as poietic event

Abstract

This paper undertakes a reading of Heidegger’s later writing in terms of nature philosophy. Nature philosophy is a thinking with nature “otherwise” in open possibility. Heidegger’s writings on art and technology indicate a way of thinking with technology otherwise, in the openness of the event of Being (Ereignis). In its singularly resistive stance within technology, art partakes of the “other beginning,” or the turning of technology out of itself and towards the event of Being. Art keeps open the possibility that human being might be otherwise than as the being destined for technological enframing. The paper counters another way of reading Heidegger’s writings on art and technology which argues for a leap out of technology into poetic dwelling with nature, arguing that this Romantic view overlooks crucial aspects of Heidegger’s concept of Gelassenheit: the non-willing “letting be” that enables humans to be with the things of nature in their otherwise possibilities – other than as ordered by technological enframing. Gelassenheit does not mean simply returning to the things of nature in poetic dwelling, but a twisting free from technology in poietic openness. To think with nature as a poietic event of openness requires a reawakened trust in Being and a recovery of the ontological bearing of art.