A Proto-Spinozan Critique of Cartesian Dualism in 17th-Century Dutch Art
Philosophy, religion, and artistic transformation in the seventeenth-century Dutch Republic.
Philosophy · Aesthetics · Education
Kevin Bethell
I am currently teaching as visiting faculty at Ohio University and as an assistant lecturer at the University of Akron. I am also a Ph.D. student in Ohio University's Interdisciplinary Arts program. My work primarily explores aesthetic and ethical questions surrounding body art, particularly tattooing.
Explore my research →
Current research
Tattooing at the intersection of aesthetics and asceticism
Across cultures, ascetic traditions have long employed bodily pain, discipline, and ritual as means to transcendence and knowledge. My dissertation examines tattooing alongside this broader history of aesthetic and ascetic practices, with particular attention to embodiment, pain, ritual, and aesthetic meaning.
Read about the project →Recently finished projects
A Feminist Defense of Canonical Revision
Artemisia Gentileschi, aesthetic value, cultural significance, and the philosophical stakes of revising the canon.
Virum Post Machina
AI-generated art considered within a Kantian framework.
Kant's Aesthetics: Tattoos and Fine Art
My master's thesis arguing for tattooing as a fine-art discipline within a Kantian framework.
Beyond philosophy
When I'm not doing philosophy, I enjoy reading manga, playing video games, Dungeons & Dragons, and spending time with my wife and son.