Secret Knowledge [Hardcover]

 

 

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Most reviewers of this fascinating book seem to have missed its central thrust. Hockney is not simply stating a position in an academic art-historical debate on the techniques of the Old Masters. His thesis that many Western artists since the early 15th century used optics is meant to support a fundamental challenge to Western visual culture as it has developed since the Renaissance and especially since the invention of modern photography. His view is that the dominance of "lens vision", especially in the 20th century, has broad social, cultural and even political implications. We should remember that Hockney is not writing as a theoretician or historian but as a practising artist. It is in the course of his own work, engaged as it is (as all serious art is) in dialogue with the past, that Hockney has come to raise questions about the use of optics. True enough, he is far from being the first to ask these questions and his research follows work done by many scholars before him. But Hockney, as a major contemporary artist, is in a unique position to explore the relation between technique and creativity and to show how the decisions taken in the studio can affect the style of a period and, ultimately, the way in which we understand reality.

Hockney is trying to demystify the art of the past. Too often we think of the Old Masters as "safe". We needn't feel challenged or disturbed by those pretty pictures we see in the museums. That's "Great Art", harmlessly locked away in the past. What Hockney shows is that the exploration of technology by these painters is part (but not the only part) of a continuous development leading directly into our present image-bound culture with its imposition of a supposedly "scientific" and therefore "objective" point of view. The single "right" point of view, imposed by the camera lens, and so easily manipulated for commercial, journalistic and political purposes, is the real object of Hockney's polemic. The effect of mathematical perspective is to eject the viewer from nature. And so technology is not simply a neutral tool allowing the artist to create "exciting effects". It bears on the deepest questions about our place in nature. "Taking away the hand takes away our bodies." Hockney is by no means opposed to the use of technology which in any case has always been central to art. He uses it himself in a variety of ways as demonstrated with his recent work using the iPad. But he wants to restore the multiple viewpoints characteristic of, for example, Oriental art and so put the viewer back into the picture.

Hockney, in his disarmingly sly way, means more than one thing by "secret knowledge". In showing the interrelation of art and technology he is not trying to disparage the creativity of the Old Masters. "I don't really understand why people would think optics diminishes the achievements of these artists. They were not like Cézanne or Van Gogh, alone and heroic, they had large workshops making the only images then known." But he does want us to understand that the Western visual tradition is the result of choices and decisions made by individuals and institutions with purposes that are not always acknowledged.

"...I do think this has immense interest for us today, when lens vision has triumphed all around us, and somehow made the world seem dull. Doesn't television make everywhere look the same. Better to have the human hand at work, at least it's connected to an eye and therefore a body. We are a part of nature, in it, not a mathematical point."

An excellent book and well written. The research is thorough but not as great a revelation as most people may think. Mirrors, optics and reflectors as well as staged studies for major pictures were aids in the creation of art and are worthless without real knowledge of technique and practice. Art historians are wary that this book may diminish the true talent accredited to our art heroes. They are not impressed because of the lack of balanced information (which is an entirely different book) on how hard the old masters/vocational artists trained and studied to sustain their art careers. Isn't it funny how when this book first came out in the book stores it was a forty dollar book classified as only an Art Technique book and that after the CBS 60 Minutes profile on Hockney it became a ninety dollar book classified as Art Theory/Critisism.

It is intriguing that the negative reviews all cite that artists can produce photo-realistic images and abjure the devaluation of training. These are opinions Hockney is IN AGREEMENT with,not refuting. He merely shows that there are focus errors and mapping intracacies that strongly suggest an optical approach. I am by no means 100% sold, but if this was presented as a scientific theory (as it was with Falco and would take minimal editing to resubmit this document as such) it would little doubt be judged valid. I think that the critics who are so quick to object have not read the correspondence section, which is quite elucidating and convincing. As Hockney says, the artist makes the marks. Why is this technology any less valid than the use by Durer of his mapping techniques?

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4.0 out of 5 stars Hockney's Masterpiece
This book is a must have for any artist, art student or art lover. If it were not so big and heavy, I would keep it beside my bed for nightly reference. Read more

Published 18 months ago by Sheila M. Kerr

1.0 out of 5 stars Not even "1" star actually...
David Hockney's proposal is not borne out by facts. If Hockney's supposed "secret" were a fact, contemporary artists would easily match the masters of the... Read more

Published on Jun 26 2004 by Bruce Bain

2.0 out of 5 stars Critique of "Secret Knowledge..." by www.loissimon.com
There isn't really much to read in the first half of the book. It's what we called a picture book as a child. I come from a long line of artists. Read more

Published on Jun 21 2004 by Lois Simon

5.0 out of 5 stars Secret Knowledge by Hockney
The author depicts the mechanics of visual effects and textual evidence/design. The fine detail of van Dyck is illustrated and explained. Read more

Published on May 15 2004 by Dr. Joseph S. Maresca

4.0 out of 5 stars The Lens modality
I am a visual artists, I work at Universal Entertainment developing video games, and I studied illustration and Baroque painting at Art Center College of Design (I was a... Read more

Published on Jan 12 2004

1.0 out of 5 stars a photographer/art lovers perspective
In recent trips to Europe, I've had the good fortune to see many of the actual paintings reproduced in Secret Knowledge. Read more

Published on Oct 18 2003 by W. Wick

1.0 out of 5 stars Hockney
You really have to wonder to yourself the purpose of this book. What influenced Hockney to suspect that artists used lenses and mirrors? Read more

Published on Oct 18 2003 by Keith P

5.0 out of 5 stars fascinating and compelling, well argued
in "Secret Knowledge", Hockney has turned his critical eye to history and discovered a previously unseen (yet important) phenomenon. Read more

Published on July 14 2003 by K-TRON

1.0 out of 5 stars But can he explain the sculptures?
I have not read this book, but having read many of these reviews and viewed the pages available online, I am left with one very perplexing question... Read more

Published on Mar 4 2003

1.0 out of 5 stars Garbage
I once read a quote from Hockney's in which he talked about leaving feet off his figures because they are so difficult to draw. Read more

Published on Jan 26 2003 by Richard Luschek

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