Dispositionalist accounts of value properties in general and of aesthetic properties in particular have become standard in contemporary analytic aesthetics (today often labelled "response-dependence"). These accounts are sometimes presented as a novel achievement of the 21st century. However, a dispositionalist account of aesthetic properties was, in nuce, already held by Bernard Bolzano in 1843 and was developed in much detail and with great acuteness in 1905 by the German philosopher Edith Landmann-Kalischer, who is almost forgotten today. In this paper, Landmann-Kalischer’s account, along with its forerunners and its reception within the Graz School, will be presented and discussed.
Keywords: Aesthetic properties, Aesthetic realism, Bolzano, Dispositions, Landmann-Kalischer, Meinong