Pictorial Space throughout Art History: Cézanne and ... - ARAS
Pictorial Space throughout Art History: Cézanne and ... - ARAS
Pictorial Space throughout Art History: Cézanne and ... - ARAS
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<strong>ARAS</strong> Connections Issue 2, 2012<br />
Introduction<br />
Since the stone age humankind has created masterworks which possess a<br />
mysterious quality of solidity <strong>and</strong> gr<strong>and</strong>eur or monumentality. Such works now<br />
sell for tens of millions of dollars. A paleolithic Venus <strong>and</strong> a still life by <strong>Cézanne</strong><br />
both share this monumentality. Michelangelo likened monumentality to<br />
sculptural relief:<br />
depth:<br />
Painting should be considered excellent in proportion as it approaches<br />
the effect of relief |1|.<br />
Braque called monumentality space:<br />
You see, the whole Renaissance tradition is antipathetic to me. The hard<br />
<strong>and</strong> fast rules of perspective which it imposes on art were a ghastly<br />
mistake which it has taken four centuries to redress: <strong>Cézanne</strong> <strong>and</strong>, after<br />
him, Picasso <strong>and</strong> myself can take a lot of the credit for this. Scientific<br />
perspective is nothing but eye-fooling illusionism; it is simply a trick - a<br />
bad trick - which makes it impossible for an artist to convey a full<br />
experience of space, since it forces the objects in a picture to disappear<br />
away from the beholder instead of bringing them within his reach, as a<br />
painting should. That's why I have such a liking for primitive art: for very<br />
early Greek art, Etruscan art, Negro art. None of this has been deformed<br />
by Renaissance science ... Cubism was essentially a reaction against the<br />
impressionists ... we were out to attack space which they had neglected<br />
|2|.<br />
Hans Hoffman, himself one of the masters, called monumentality pictorial<br />
Inner greatness, pictorially, is determined <strong>and</strong> limited by the degree to<br />
which the pictorial effect of depth, in contrast to the illusion of depth,<br />
serves the artist's purpose |3|.<br />
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Unauthorized use will result in criminal <strong>and</strong> civil penalties.