Aestheticism, or the Aesthetic Movement, was a European phenomenon during the latter 19th century that had its chief headquarters in France. In opposition to the dominance of scientific thinking, and in defiance of the widespread indifference or hostility of the middle-clasas society of their time to any art that was not useful or did not teach moreal values, French writers developed the view that a work of art is the supreme value among human products precisely because it is self-sufficient and has no moral aim outside its own being.

The typical phrase of aestheticism was l'Art pour l'art - art for art's sake.