In Response to Katie's Question

Katie’s question “What if the painting of an object was created before the actual object then the painting would the painting be the imitation of the significant form and the object is an imitation of the imitation?” puts an interesting spin on the earlier topic of discussion in class, imitations of imitations. In the case Katie presented, I believe that even Plato would argue that the painting of an object would be the imitation of the original significant form and that the object (if based off of the painting) would be considered the imitation of the imitation. Multiple perspectives seem to argue on this topic expressing the idea that the further away from the original significant form one gets, the less valuable the imitation becomes, but I do not tend to agree with this idea. If a beautiful vase is sculpted, and a painter comes along and paints that very vase many people would still appreciate and place great value on the painting just as much or if not more than on the original vase. Many could argue that the painting might capture specific details that the vase itself did not solely express (i.e. the painting could show shadows or the way that light reflects off of the vase) which would be a unique property to just the painting and not particularly a property of the vase itself because although the shadows are caused by the vase, the vase moved to a different location would produce different shadows unlike the painting which will always reflect the same shadows from that one specific location. Do certain characteristics captured by paintings not present in the original object make it more valuable to the viewer?