Philosophical Alternatives 6/2026

Ivan Stefanov ()
A Philosophical Perspective on Film Art
https://doi.org/10.58945/AGDW2205
Abstract: This article has a specific purpose: to reveal that, through his essay “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (1936), Walter Benjamin convincingly demonstrated that the birth and rapid development of the entirely new “seventh art” was not a random phenomenon. It had a historical mission. Cinema, as a new art form, through its rapid creative rise, pulled the outdated, millennia-old system of the classical arts out of a state of acute crisis and creative stagnation (art for art’s sake) and propelled it towards a new, shared existence within a different, new systemic whole with the new technical arts. Today, this new artistic whole includes not only photography and cinema but is also closely linked to television and other means of mass communication. This new function of cinema, simultaneously destructive and cathartic, has not yet been sufficiently explored as a basis for the renewal of classical philosophical theory of art. For this reason, W. Benjamin’s study holds a special place in contemporary aesthetic theory.
Keywords: Benjamin; Adorno; Vattimo; Hegel; Bazin; photography; aura; mass culture; shock effect

Nikolay Mihaylov ()
Fashion, Society and the Culture of Communication. Pierre Bourdieu on Haute Couture
https://doi.org/10.58945/HSXB1502
Abstract: In 1975, Pierre Bourdieu and Yvette Delsaut published their voluminous study The Fashion Designer and His Sign: A Contribution to a Theory of Magic, which they devoted to studying the development of the field of haute couture and various aspects of aesthetics, communication, and social interaction that follow from this development. The original approach of the scientists here is expressed in the fact that, analyzing the specifics of social relationships through fashion, they use the concept of magic. According to the French sociologist, haute
couture is a specific social field in which, among other things, there is opposition between different social groups. The desire to consume established fashion brands carries something from the field of magic, according to the French sociologist. The article explores the relationship between fashion, the high social interest in this phenomenon in contemporary societies, its mechanisms of influence, and the ever-growing importance of public communication in these processes.
Keywords: Pierre Bourdieu; fashion; communication; art, values; society; social field; creativity

Plamen Antov ()
Emiliyan Stanev and Nietzsche: Die Blonde Bestie
https://doi.org/10.58945/DKHX7089
Abstract: The article, a kind of continuation of a monographic comparative study on Emilian Stanev and Heidegger (volume 1, 2019; volume 2, 2021), explores in various aspects the similarities and common features between the Bulgarian writer and the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche – Stanev’s hidden Nietzscheanism, which at the first level has its direct influences. But even greater attention is paid to the deep, typological closeness, at the basis of which is the animal metaphor, the presence of a common biological substrate, although its origin is different in both. Although the “hidden Nietzscheanism” is manifested mainly in Stanev’s late work from the 1970s and his theoretical reflections in the metagenre of the diary, the writer’s experience as an animalist (in his early work), as well as as a hunter and nature lover, plays a major role. At the center of his philosophical system (which we call zooanthropology) is the figure of the animal as a philosophical figure. It is in this zoological plan that the main, spontaneous (by nature) closeness to Nietzsche is sought. This animal substrate is also the basis of major conclusions of an anthropological and cultural civilizational nature, towards which the study moves. The article specifically emphasizes Stanev’s national-historical philosophy.
Keywords: Emilian Stanev; Nietzsche; zooanthropology; biologism/animal; blonde Bestie; culture – civilization

Silviya Kristeva ()
Aesthetic Foundation of the Fantastic
https://doi.org/10.58945/WPLC1160
Abstract: The article will bring out the foundations and deep procedures of the fantastic as a universal environment and horizon of the aesthetic, of artistic creation. Placed for consideration as the internal reality of the aesthetic in general, the fantastic will require a foundation – as working principles of aestheticization and as a universal act and elaboration of its own ontology of the artistic, of the emergence of the aesthetic phenomenon, as a product of the ability to imagine. However, with this fundamentality of the fantastic, do we remain with such a definition of the ability to imagine, or does it grow and reveal itself as a broader ability for aestheticization and for making the artistic? We will follow this thread, which can
lead to one’s own aesthetic modalities of the fantastic and from there to its definition as a living and productive aesthetic process. This process unfolds in a new environment and through the creation of the artistic phenomenon in the aesthetic universum.
Keywords: philosophy of fantastic; Kant; faculty of imagination; aesthetic universum; aesthetic modality.

Nikolina Deleva ()
The Fantastic as a Productive and Reproductive Interaction Between Consciousness and Reality
https://doi.org/10.58945/OGRU2394
Abstract: The article explores the fantastic as a philosophical problem, conceptualized both as a question of being and as a question of knowledge. It presents various perspectives on the fantastic, including Tsvetan Todorov’s literary theory, Paul Ricoeur’s theory of productive imagination, and Cornelius Castoriadis’s reflections on radical imagination in the history of philosophy and the social imaginary, as well as the views of other philosophers. The study seeks to clarify the fantastic as an interaction between consciousness and reality. It also examines the definition, legitimation, and characteristics of the fantastic as outcomes of the interpretation and evaluation of sensory perception.
Keywords: fantastic; imagination; supernatural; creativity; social imagination

Vyara Popova ()
Fantasy and Imagination
https://doi.org/10.58945/TLMR8393
Abstract: Referring to the text “Fantasy and imagination in art” by Alexander Kruglov as a theoretical background, the differences between fantasy and imagination are deduced
and a classification is constructed; the derived positions are illustrated pictorially through works by Rene Magritte.
Keywords: fantasy; imagination; differences; classification; examples

Aneta Tumbeva ()
Fantasy Imagery From Fairy Tale “Kushkundalevo” From Nikolay Rainov
https://doi.org/10.58945/QPLO5863
Abstract: This article analyzes the fantasy imagery in the Bulgarian folktale “Kushkundalevo”, recorded and retold by Nikolay Rainov. The plot is built around intriguing fictional tales; the characters of the young man and the nymph from folk tradition come to life on the pages of this skilled narrator, who succeeds in interwining the new worlds full of magic and strange creatures with everyday life, thus leading the reader to the desired triumph of love. The young man and the nymph are the main characters, and the magical land of “Kushkundalevo” is a place where no one knows what sorrow or grief is. The tale presents a real-life problem that must, through magic, lead to the triumph of good over evil as a resolution, which is the typical traditional ending in the folk-tale genre, while shifting readers’ minds through an active mental adventure to the fairy world.
Keywords: philosophy of the fairy tale; Nikolay Rainov; Bulgarian folklore; the miracle; the magical

Nevena Krumova ()
Liminality and Abjection of “Baba Yaga” Fantastic Image
https://doi.org/10.58945/EWLH8866
Abstract: The text considers Baba Yaga as a liminal figure that is difficult to define, not because the figure itself is indefinable, but because defining her entails negotiating the boundaries between categories whose stability is thereby called into question. In a classical Tsvetan Todorov’s reading, Baba Yaga does not belong to the fantastic but to the marvelous. In another mode of reading, however, the hesitation associated with the fantastic re-emerges, rendering the figure once again fantastic, yet also liminal. Baba Yaga appears at a critical moment for the hero, at the stage when transformation becomes necessary. Thus, she does not bring about a transformation in the world; rather, her appearance signals an instability that has already emerged within the structure of the narrated world. The image of Baba Yaga will be examined both in classical folklore tales and in contemporary fantasy novels. The hesitation associated with the figure of Baba Yaga is brought into dialogue with Julia Kristeva’s concept of the abject, as both expose the instability of the categories and the order that constitute the narrated world.
Keywords: philosophy of the fantastic; hesitation; abject (l’abject); folklore; archetype; stability of the world; Baba Yaga

Jan Hrkut ()
Philosophical Aspects of AI-Generated Art and Fiction: Ontology of Machine Creativity
https://doi.org/10.58945/WDRS1634
Abstract: The paper asks whether AI systems – in particular large language models (LLMs) and generative image models – can be said to create in a relevant, philosophically grounded sense. The argument proceeds in four steps. First, it reconstructs the standard philosophical definition of creativity in terms of novelty, value, agency, and intentionality. Second, it
applies Searle’s intentionality framework, especially the distinction between original and derived intentionality, to AI generative outputs. Third, it engages functionalist responses, above all Dennett’s intentional-stance theory and Boden’s tripartite taxonomy of computational creativity. Fourth, it examines the consequences for the ontological status of AI art and fiction, with reference to Danto’s institutional theory, distributed authorship, and the flattening-threat hypothesis. The paper concludes that LLMs and diffusion models satisfy only weak, product-level criteria of creativity and fail the stronger process-and-agency conditions that most analytic philosophers treat as constitutive. It therefore proposes a constructive alternative: AI systems are best understood as creativity amplifiers rather than creative agents – a status with significant implications for authorship, aesthetic evaluation, and the ontology of artworks.
Keywords: aesthetics; creativity; LLMs and generative AI; creative agents; Searle; Dennett; Boden; Danto

Ivan Svilenov Stefanov ()
Notes on the Dynamics of Engagement with Art in the 2020s
https://doi.org/10.58945/NUGH6005
Abstract: The article examines how the digital environment, social media, artificial intelligence, and the accelerated consumption of images affect the contemporary individual’s capacity for concentration. The text focuses on how these changes transform the engagement with art, and, more specifically, the recipient’s ability to remain in a “slower”, contemplative mode of perception. In this sense, the article raises the question of whether the work of art preserves a shared language with its viewers or gradually turns into a decontextualized object, regardless of the size of the museum audience drawn into the culture of tourism.
Keywords: contemporary art; media theory; painting; artificial intelligence; the Internet; digitalization; social media; sociology of art

Shams Bunyatova ()
Richard Rorty’s Conception of Truth: From Representationalism to Social Justification
https://doi.org/10.58945/BFTJ1160
Abstract: This article examines Richard Rorty’s conception of truth within the framework of neopragmatist thought. The main aim of the study is to explain Rorty’s critical position toward classical epistemology, particularly toward the representationalist approach that presents truth as an accurate description of reality. The article shows that, for Rorty, truth is not a fixed and unchanging content obtained through the passive reflection of the world by human cognition. On the contrary, truth is a concept that acquires meaning within language, social relations, forms of justification, and historical context.
The article analyzes Rorty’s notion of epistemological behaviorism, the instrumental function of language, his relation to Wittgenstein’s theory of language games, and the connection between truth and social justification. Rorty’s position is interpreted not as a simple denial or relativization of truth, but as a transformation of its metaphysical status. Within this approach, the
central issue is not how human cognition reflects the world “as it is,” but how different claims can be defended within particular social and linguistic practices. The article also emphasizes, on the basis of Rorty’s fallibilist position, the future-oriented and revisable character of truth, as well as its role in preserving critical thinking.

Todor Petev ()
Freedom on a Pedestal: Art, the State and Cultural Property in German Aesthetic Modernity
https://doi.org/10.58945/ESCE8145