Arto Haapala is a Finnish philosopher, aesthetician and Professor of Aesthetics

Aesthetics

Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty, art, and taste, and with the creation and appreciation of beauty. It is more scientifically defined as the study of sensory or sensori-emotional values, sometimes called judgments of sentiment and taste...

 at the Department of Philosophy, History, Culture and Art Studies at Helsinki University, Finland

Finland

Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...

. Haapala received his PhD from Birkbeck, University of London

Birkbeck, University of London

Birkbeck, University of London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It offers many Master's and Bachelor's degree programmes that can be studied either part-time or full-time, though nearly all teaching is...

 in 1985. He is also active in the work of the Finnish Society for Aesthetics and the International Institute of Applied Aesthetics

International Institute of Applied Aesthetics

The International Institute of Applied Aesthetics is an institute operating under the Palmenia Center for Continuing Education of the University of Helsinki...

 in Lahti

Lahti

Lahti is a city and municipality in Finland.Lahti is the capital of the Päijänne Tavastia region. It is situated on a bay at the southern end of lake Vesijärvi about north-east of the capital Helsinki...

, Finland.

In addition to aesthetics, Haapala also specialises in hermeneutics, especially the philosophy of Hans-Georg Gadamer

Hans-Georg Gadamer

Hans-Georg Gadamer was a German philosopher of the continental tradition, best known for his 1960 magnum opus, Truth and Method .-Life:...

 and Martin Heidegger

Martin Heidegger

Martin Heidegger was a German philosopher known for his existential and phenomenological explorations of the "question of Being."...

.

A selection of Haapala's writings in English

• Emotion, the role of experience and fiction. International Yearbook of Aesthetics. 1 (1996), pp. 27–37.
• Artistic creativity: Skills and style. Selected papers of the 15th International Congress of Aesthetics. Edited by Kiyokazu Nishimura, Ken-ichi Iwaki, Tanehisa Otabe, Ken-ichi Sasaki, and Eski Tsugami, pp. 87–96.
• Aesthetics in the Human Environment. Edited by Arto Haapala and Pauline von Bonsdorff. Taiteiden tutkimuksen laitos, Helsinki, 1999.
• Aesthetic experience and the ethical dimension: Essays on moral problems in aesthetics. Edited by Arto Haapala and Oiva Kuisma. Taiteiden tutkimuksen laitos, Helsinki, 1999.
• Truth, game and art: Heidegger and Gadamer on the ontology of the work of art. Festskrift till Johan Wrede 18.10.1995. Taiteiden tutkimuksen laitos, Helsinki, 1995.