This article addresses the comparative analysis of aestheticsand art criticism, as well as describes their special aspects and objectives,considers different viewpoints on the interrelation of these areas – the ideasof Beardsley and R.Barthes in particular. The article further develops Barthes’ideas concerning radical changes that have taken place in contemporary artcriticism. In particular it deals with the assumption that art criticism has norelation to truth. Thus, the viewpoint of Beardsley, who insists that aesthetics isa metatheory in regards to art criticism, is subjected to argumentative scrutiny.The article analyzes the idea that art criticism must be carried out on the basisof aesthetic values only, without taking into account other social circumstancesof creation and functioning of any work of art. A work of art may have value(cognitive, moral etc.) outside aesthetic categories and it can be assessed fromdifferent points of view. According to Beardsley, objective aesthetic argumentsmay be reduced to three universal canons: unity, complexity and intensity, – athesis, which is also subjected to argumentative scrutiny. It is also stated thatcriticism cannot exist outside of ideology, which is proved by the entire historyof its development. The article also describes the evolution art criticism anddemonstrates that art critics can switch from the standpoint of artists’ defenseto that of the defense of public interests. The article puts forward the idea thataesthetics as well as art criticism are drifting towards literary works rather thanphilosophy. At the same time aesthetic, unlike art criticism, does not cease to bea science, although imprecise and inexact.