Emmanuel Levinas defines obliteration as a central concept with which to think about art. The interview with Françoise ­Armengaud is one of Levinas rare statements focusing on the fine arts. Levinas has become influential in various disciplines through his ethics, which he thinks decisively from the face of the other. Yet his reflections on aesthetics are rarely engaged with, and when questions are asked about the face in artand thus about the interrelationship of ethics and aestheticsthe main focus has been on his comments on literature. In this interview Levinas talks about the work of the French sculptor Sacha Sosno, and the complex relationship between ethics and aesthetics becomes no longer aligned with the face and language, but with iconic thinking and artistic operations and practices. Levinas understands obliteration as an unavailable, an uncanny, disruptive concept. In doing so, he turns away from the ease and lighthearted casualness of the beautiful and to the processes of material wear and tear and the traces of their repair. He affirms these for their creative potential in developing a uniqueness of presence. The interview is supplemented by photographs by André Villers of Sosnos works, a foreword by Johannes Bennke and an epilogue by Dieter Mersch.

Emmanuel Levinas war ein jüdisch-französischer Philosoph. Er kann als einer der bedeutendsten Denker des 20. Jahrhunderts gelten. Insbesondere sein Denken und seine Ethik des Anderen sind es, die seine weitreichende philosophische Wirkung ausmachen. Als religiöser Denker übte er - etwa mit seinen Talmud-Kommentaren - großen Einfluss auf die christliche Theologie und den jüdisch-christlichen Dialog aus.