THE OCCULT and ELUSIVE LOGIC OF AESTHETIC

INTELLECT by Paul Henrickson, Ph.D. tm. © 2007

© 1975, 2005

Since the definition of art is as broad as to include the

products of the carder, the dyer, the scribbler as the works
of Michelangelo, Rubens and Rembrandt by what other word-
symbol might we identify the productive results of a carder
from those of Rembrandt?

My present guess would be that at the point when the

appropriate mechanics of the job have been most
satisfactorily completed and indications of other qualities stir
our senses we are, then, involved with the arcane
phenomenon of the aesthetic.

Those who have struggled to comprehend a foreign tongue

and to assemble a rudimentary structure out of mysterious
sounds may recall that joy of sudden comprehension when
the totality of the language breaks through to consciousness.
Such can be the experience when the dawn of realization
lights up the once obscure relationships extant within a work
of art.

These aesthetic relationships may have nothing to do with

the facts which ordinarily concern the historian, although, I
believe, they aught if the historian would like to be
concerned with more than with the transmission of subject
matter and the like from one period in historic time to
another.

It is my contention that had scholars systematized sensual

data, evidences of which are in every work of art that a
person such as Van Meegeren would never have been able
to “con” so many experts. On the other hand Van Meegeren
may have exemplified Aristotle’s definition of art as a
“capacity to make, involving a true course of reasoning”,
however I doubt that UNLESS one accept that a “copy” is the
same as the original. Aside from the fact that such a feet is
impossible. If one of two is original and one is original and
the other a copy , the copy cannot be the original, BUT the
copy might fool someone into thinking it is the original. In
such a case, however, the rules followed in the making of the
original were not the rules followed in the making of the
copy. The copier followed the rules laid down by the one who
made the original. The maker of the original followed,
perhaps not rules at all, but intuitions, and therein lies all the
difference.

If what Van Meegeren accomplished might then be called art

what then might be the difference between a Van Meegeren
Vermeer and a Vermeer Vermeer? Obviously, the
distinctions to be made relate to
Jan Vermeer: The Red Hat
Van Meegeren: Christ among Disciples I find it impossible to believe that
anyone with the slightest knowledge of Vermeer’s work could possibly have
mistaken work such as this as a genuine Vermeer.

moral as well as aesthetic matters. The art market

encourages the development of talented and frustrated
artists willing to hood-wink an insensitive and greedy public
including the frauds who direct some prestigious galleries. If
I had less respect for the legitimate functions of art I would
applaud every instance where one clever enough to
accomplish a really convincing fake and thereby makes an
arse out of the legitimate maker whose pride in
accomplishment is mocked and made vain.

The reality that makes the difference is that in the one the
focus is on technical appearance and in the other in the
inspired spirit it is up to the observer to tell them apart. But
I am too committed to that exciting world, that world of
genuine image making we moved into some two or three
hundred years ago, no, that would be incorrect to say, we
have actually been there all along. It is only that at times
there seems to be more genuine artists functioning than at
other times, but in between times and concurrently, we must
deal with the Pharisees.
The most vital issue in a matter such as this is the one that
revolves around distinguishing the real from the appearance
of the real. The most substantial reason for doing this rather
than accepting the ruthless degradation of the genuine by
imposters, artists, dealers and authenticators is the rescue
of the gentle, subtle and fragile values inherent in the
original work.

Although substantial that value is elusive and difficult to

identify. It has something to do with the unique place an
artist occupies in history and in locale. These factors
together with the unduplicatable individuality of the person
involved indicates the real job of the critic and the historian.
Evidences of these qualities is what should concern us and
the fact that men like Van Meegeren and Emile de Hory are
able to fool a great many people tells us that they are not
merely clever at deception and mindless as to the rights of
others to their heritage but indicates also that those who
believe them do not know as much of their cultural history as
they should.

When a man with genius generates substance from the

unknown and offers this product to the public some few in
that public may wish to translate that material into
something “on the order of” the original, a simpler version,
if you will, that less sophisticated people may better
understand it . Unfortunately this system doesn’t work that
way. A complex subject does not become easier to
understand if its elements are made more simple but the
complex might become easier to understand if the various
elements are considered separately and then in
combination.. The observer, the critic, must move toward the
object in steps that are gradual enough for him to eventually
understand the totality of the mechanism. That is one
reason why one individual may spend his lifetime studying
another individual. Person “A” becomes an expert on person
“B” and the rest of us must decide how to apply the
information learned to a greater body of knowledge.

Copyists such as Van Meegeran and Emile de Hory do not

help the world to understand the artists they plagiarize.
They steal from us and deprive us from gaining an
understanding that would make our lives more complete and
more meaningful.* The real value of the work of art is
inherent in that work. The real value is not the price tag
placed on it. But it is the focus on that price tag which makes
the business of the copyist so lucrative. If it is important for
us to understand how the creative mind works having to deal
with the mass of fakes before we can get to the real stuff
only wastes our time and our energies.

In the case of Van Meegeren it is, from my point of view,

almost unbelievable how so many people could possibly
have been misled into accepting as genuine Vermeer what
that man offered. I can only suggest that those who were so
misled had no right being in the positions they were in,
making the judgments they did and, thereby, misleading
whole generations of people. However, since a portion of the
time Van Meegeren was making fake Vermeers and others
and sold them to high ranking Germans during the Nazi era
some forgive him.

How then does the scholarly expert distinguish the genuine

from the bogus? In addition to the physical properties of the
work itself, such as the paper, the canvas, the chemicals and
pigments, there are also internal evidences with which the
scholarly detective must be concerned. Such an expert really
needs to know how a work of art is created. In spite of the
fact that many of these experts spend day after day and
year after year in the presence of the genuine they may still
be unable to tell a fake from the real thing.

These evidences may include such characteristics as the

artist’s personal graphic behavior, something of the same
sort of evidence a graphologist uses in identifying
handwriting, or an analytical psychologist who searches out
the meaning of repeated symbols, or behaviors in their
contexts.

With a visual artist there are certain behaviors that become

more obvious with study but remain subliminally available to
the unsophisticated or casual observer. These graphic
behaviors may record the unconscious preoccupations of the
artist, and as such, are more like the intonations in speech
than they are like words, words which are, generally
speaking, culturally agreed upon sounds bearing
predetermined meanings…sounds that denote as opposed to
sounds that suggest.

We are actually dealing with a complex analysis here. There

are several levels of communication in a work of art. The
subject matter of the work if there is a subject matter may
be the most obvious. It certainly is the main characteristic
discussed in most courses in art appreciation and history.

If we take, for example, Leonardo da Vinci’s “Mona Lisa”, we

are aware that we have before us a portrait of a woman, a
particular woman. Through some contemporary written
reports we know something about this woman. We also know
something about the artist through similar sources and other
graphic evidences.

There are many observable details inherent in the work that

indicate to us that Leonardo achieved a very high order of
direct observation of a physical reality…physiognomy. As
admirable as that is, we have additional evidence that
certain psychological characteristics of the artist, for
example, his concern for a certain level of personal secrecy,
may have influenced the subtle and gentle shadings he
achieved in the face of the model. The secrecy I have in
mind may be seen in the fact that he had kept a diary that
could only have been read if held opposite a mirror. This
indirect approach to recording may also be seen in the report
that he had hired musicians to play while he created the
portrait under discussion. The job of the musicians was to
keep the model from becoming bored, tense, restless or
nervous as a result of having to sit for long period of time
until the portrait was finished. The delicate modeling we see
in the face may also be a result of the artist’s approach to
rendering the subtle changes in construction. This may also
be seen in his approach to designing the mechanics of a
military tank or in studying the action of water.
Leonardo de Vinci: Mona Lisa

Leonardo da Vinci: Armored Car

I am sure that e all know of portraits that seem to confront

the observer directly and had he wanted to I am equally
certain that leonardo could have achieved that sort of
briskness. By and large, however, his subjects avoid a direct
confrontation with the observer. This obliqueness of glance
is matched by the “sfumato” technique mentioned above…a
manner of grading values from light to dark, which lends a
subtle and gentle appearance to the subject. It is, indeed,
quite possible to imagine that this particular leonardesque
aesthetic affected his personal relationships and accounted
also for the admirable reputation of being a “gentle” man.

The brief discussion above seems to relate the

characteristics of the work to the characteristics of the artist
and that, I believe, is an essential understanding necessary if
an adequate criticism is to be constructed. The results,
however, of that procedure will often produce an art criticism
unacceptable in most of the approved art venues, but
welcomed in those which stress psychiatry. Yet, my
involvement in that approach has convinced me that without
it we will not discover what the real nature of the creative
act is, or why the effort exists.

It may appear, at first, that Leonardo’s interest in

mechanical fine-tuning and in designing instruments of war
contradicts this claim of gentleness. However, if one views
the problems of technical articulations in a variety of
structures, regardless of the uses to which those structures
are put, the comparison between the finely articulated
components of the “Mona Lisa” and Leonardo’s design for a
land tank or parachute may not be difficult to accept.

Leonardo da Vinci: sketch for a parachute

“The fine arts and the speculative sciences”, Aristotle

informs us “complete human life. They are not necessary,
except, perhaps for the ‘good’ life. They are the dedication of
human leisure and its best fruit. The leisure without which
neither could come into being nor prosper is found for man
and fostered by the work of the useful arts”.
This analysis might be extended to suggest that the products
of leisure might be returned to the tool shed of the useful
arts. Society has done that fairly well, I suppose, with some
of the products of scientific enquiry, however, it does seem
to have been so successful in returning to the grass roots the
discoveries, awareness and sensibilities of humanities
studies or the creative arts.

The result of this failure is that the world of the artist, the
commercial gallery, the state art museum, the private
collector, the all-influential art critic are now riddled with
irrelevancies, intellectual dishonesty and graft. The graft
often takes the form not unusually, of the artist making
himself available for erotic dalliance in exchange for a good
comment…and the gender or the sexual orientation of the
critic makes no difference. Pity the collector who has works
in his collection works that attribute their fame to an
explosion of someone else’s semen. How does the collector
reconcile the various pertinent facts regarding a particular
work in his collection when there is something he doesn’t
know about its origins.

The various published comments regarding an artist’s life

style, political views, opinions by experts, and his alcoholism,
all of this
baggage of notoriety is, surprisingly, pertinent to the value
of his work. …in very telling ways. In theory, an observant
critic should be able to objectively describe the work of an
artist and arrive at a profile that should match one arrived at
by an observant sociologist with all the living facts at his
disposal.

Visual images, some of them esoteric have served to

augment a sense of cohesiveness. Family shields, coats of
arms, flags, crosses, stars, and moon have been used to
remind the observer of some things he shares with others as
a member of a group. Although such emblems may be
valuable especially to the leaders of such groups, they can
also be attractive and fun, the level of communication is
elementary.

It is my suspicion that an entire civilization may be brought

to a highly sophisticated level of visual awareness by the
techniques available to us now.

What value would such a structure of visual culture have?

Although negatively expressed, one positive influence might
be the decrease in the incidents of works of art being viewed
primarily as objects of monetary investment with their
attendant tax shelters. The incidence of increments of the
economic value of art objects being created by the rarity of
the object, or the creative insights the artist may have built
into it, would increase, and those created by the
manipulation of uninformed opinion buttressed by social
demands (not need or insight) and a fear, on the part of the
consumer, of being thought ignorant would decrease. These
would be most treasureable effects.

Additional positive values of a more sophisticated visual

perception would be the development of a language of
words approximately equivalent to the structure of a visual
logic. The associated development of these disciplines might
provide us with a community of acceptable symbols from
among which more speculative visual researches might be
undertaken.

One of the dangers of systems which have been generally

accepted, various university disciplines, for example, is that
divergent endeavors are not encouraged. One of the
dangers of the over-riding presence of a governing
philosophy is that what is produced may lack the helpful
contacts with other disciplines.

Considering the nature of human nature the answer to the

vexing problem of determining value symbolized in currency
as opposed to the inherent value of the work perceived by
the viewer and which encourages the development of
aesthetic insights is difficult to solve.

Certainly another aspect of the problem of a generally

elevated aesthetic awareness is the coalition of he narrative,
symbolic and romantic preferences for visual stimulation
with those political and commercial interests more than
willing to provide the unchallenging but provocative fare.

Although this kind of need can be manipulated by

techniques of socialization, advertising, group psychology
and the like, these pressures and assaults on belief systems
perform an injustice on the individual. Such procedures do
not teach the individual how to see, they merely condition
him to behave.

I see the function of the teacher, the educator is a better

term, and the operations of the critic as crucial in mitigating
the crystallization effect of socio-psychological pressures
towards a conformity of vision and perception. In addition,
dialogue is essential to the development of perceptual
flexibility. This dialogue may take place between artists,
artist and non-artist, critic and artist, teacher and critic,
consumer and artist or any other combination of individuals.

Aquinas indicated that “even in speculative matters there is

something by way of work; e.g., the making of a syllogism,
or a fitting speech, or the work of counting or measuring.
Hence whatever habits are ordained to suchlike works of the
speculative reason, are, by kind of comparison, called arts
indeed, but liberal arts in order to distinguish them from
those arts which are ordained to those arts done by the
body, which are, in a fashion, servile, inasmuch as the body
is in servile subjection to the soul, and man, as regards his
soul, is free. On the other hand those sciences which are not
ordained to any such work, are called sciences simply, and
not arts.”
“Works done by the body” is an expression which, itself, is
worth, perhaps, some speculation. What does the body do?
How does it perform? Why does it perform? One speaks of
“the art of love”. Is it possible that the mention of the art of
love making is untended to convey something beyond and
more refined and respectful than rape? Certainly one might
hope so. The body also moves, that is, it locomotes from
one point in space to another either in whole or in part.
Motion, then, which is something more or less than practical
such as dance, mime, or gesture supportive of innuendo in
speech may be an art.
In order to understand the extensions of meaning suggested
by Aquinas, what is it that one might consider about the art
of painting, or sculpture, or music? Is it sufficient or even
possible for Aquinas or Aristotle to recognize that in the act
of making itself there may be touchstones of spirit that
inform the characteristics of the practical result? Even in
such work as pottery, cabinetry and iron mongering there
are, or can be, moments where there is a combination of
both science (knowledge) and art (informed intuition). How
would the definitions of these two philosophers function with
such products as a ceramic piece by Miro or a copy of a
Vermeer by van Meegeren?

Juan Miro, “Nuit”

Obviously both products would be dismissed if these

definitions operated inflexibly, although it might be difficult
to justify the action. Would a closer look at the products
indicate that the example of the “minor art” of ceramics
stood higher in some scale of values than the work of the
imposter van Meegeren? It would seem so to me, and, in
practice, it often seems so whether or not the “fine art”
example is a fake in the sense that the van Meegeren works
are fakes.

If we do not care to split philosophical hairs we might

assume that Aristotle and Aquinas recognized the interaction
among the arts of knowledge and intuition despite the fact
that physical labor was involved. However, they might not
be willing to admit that painting and music and sculpture
might also be “liberating” as are those aspects of literature
to which Aquinas had reference when he mentioned the
making of a syllogism, or fitting speech. I shall try to make
my point by making a syllogism; 1) a work of art is a product
or a function pf a product which engages the observer’s
senses; 2) an aesthetic experience engages at least one, but
often several of the observer’s senses.3) a work of art is,
therefore, an aesthetic experience.

This intellectual structure, however, doesn’t touch the

question of quality and, consequently, it fails utterly to
engage the crucial matter of the works appeal to the
observer, this matter has a vast range from abhorrence to
fanatic attachment. In fact, there have been times when the
same object has elicited both extremes of reaction in the
same observer.

Such a situation should certainly tell us that what passes for

an aesthetic experience is not one that resides in the object
but one whose origin and whose quality (quantity or
strength) is to be found in the observer. Wherein and from
where, then, does the artistry arise if it is not inherent in the
object? What is the source of the aesthetic experience if
there can be none without the particular object and the
particular observer being present. Does the tree falling in
the forest make a sound if there is no one there to hear it?
It would seem that one workable answer to this question
might be that the qualities of a work of art, regardless of
their estimated value, are identified only when there is an
act of perception on the part of a viewer. A related
consideration should be that while the qualities of the work
remain in the work they cannot be released, e.g., recognized
until the mind set of the observer allows for it. It is not unlike
having the right key to open the right door.

There are some people, if you can believe it, who consider
Santa Fe, New Mexico one of the most beautiful communities
in the United States. There are others, mainly Texans, who
have told me they consider it a “slum”, “lacking culture” and
“depressing”.** This illustration is useful in so far as it
provides us with some platform from which to try to explain
how the psychological mechanisms which govern our choices
remain somewhat shy when it comes to their being
discovered through psychological testing, but I rather
suspect that they are related, on that level, to what supports
our self-esteem. Santa Fe, New Mexico is not Dallas, Texas
and it may take a Bostonian from Massachusetts to know
why they are not the same.

If what Plato suggested about artists and their role in society

were true, one’s aesthetic choices, whether in production as
an artist, or in appreciation, as an observer, are subjective,
unreasonable and unreliable, I would then agree that artists
would be poor political risks. I believe, however, that I may
be aware of something Plato was not, although I suspect that
Socrates was. That is, that because the symbolic systems
employed by artists are not the result of a consensus, nor
tied to a specific denotation (except , as might be seen, in
part, in works from the early medieval period when artists
used the same work books to arrive at their graphic
solutions). The works of many contemporary creative artists
offer a challenge to the interpretative abilities of a
contemporary observer. There are many more venues of
interpretation and varieties of sources of information
available to the contemporary critic than in past epochs.
The contemporary critic, whether professional or not, is well
advised to draw on as many of these as he can in his effort
to evaluate the object before him.

It cannot be the fault of the painters, sculptors and

musicians if Plato was more comfortable with the written or
the spoken word than with the creative uses of the written
and the spoken word. In so far as we know today the
avenues of creative expression for the painter and the
sculptor in ancient Greece were severely limited by their
conventions which, to a great extent, define what we, today,
call the Greek style. A style, which, if presented today as
contemporary would be rejected as inadequate. It is my
understanding that it was one of Plato’s complaints about
music that it encouraged, what he thought to be,
uncontrolled behavior. In the interim the plastic arts have
gained not only a respect for their innovative practices, but
an expectation from their audience that what they be
innovative. The result is that, therefore, there is a
requirement for more interaction between the creator and
the audience.

Today, there are many who expect that new aesthetic

insights must be present in works of art for the works to be
considered of value. Consequently, it would seem, that an
audience capable of discerning these insights must also
exist, therefore the artist and his observers are placed in a
sort of adversarial position where the artist must present
material the observer can comprehend and the observer
must have the mental equipment to discern it. The
continuum of understanding from the originator to the
receiver is at hazard. This, presumably, is where the
function of the art critic intervenes and where, if
contemporary art critical reveals anything, the critics have
failed and their surplanters have substituted an art form of
their invention which obscures more than it clarifies and
have made of their responsibilities a mystery religion which
fails to serve understanding but rather commercial and
political interests.

There is some indication that either as a result of superior

and native aesthetic intellect, or possibly more effective
educational experiences there was discovered in an
experimental psychological program conducted at The
University of Northern Iowa between 1968-1971 a segment
of the student population representing 4% of the total
population which was in significant agreement in their
aesthetic judgments of primitive and naïve works with
experienced faculty members.

That alone would not be too surprising a result if it were not

also found that those same 4% consistently in their high
school and undergraduate records achieved a grade point
average of one grade below that of the average college
student and in addition was found to differ significantly from
the average student in the matter of scores on independent
lying measures indicating that the achieved academic
superiority of the majority of the students was the result of
their ability to “con” their evaluators, their teachers. The
results also suggested that those who did not have high lie
scores were also better able make acceptable aesthetic
judgments thus indicating that these judgments may be
independent of the prevailing group tolerance. My
interpretation of this phenomenon was simply that in their
structure of values the 4% were more confident in their own
perceptions of reality; were of more importance to them than
were the perceptions accepted by their peers or taught them
by their school or social system. In other words, they would
not deny the evidence of their senses in favor of the social
structure presented them by family, school and society.

An artist behaves in the same way, if indeed he is an artist

and not merely a practitioner of techniques. The artist must
respond to the materials he employs in a direct and honest
way or he is not functioning fully as an artist.
The reason why philosophers of aesthetics may not be in
significantly high agreement with the practitioners of the
arts may be related to the nature of the intellectual symbols
they use in an attempt to describe what may be heard, seen
or felt. Santayana seemed to understand this when he
suggested that poetry explained more about reality than did
science which tended to impoverish it. So be it.

I realize that in addressing this audience on these matters I

may be treading on some egos. It is not my intention to
raise the respectability of the plastic arts in the minds of
those who believe the language arts to be superior. Nor is it
my intention to be a sophist, that is, intentionally obscure in
order to challenge the listener to overcome intentionally
placed intellectual hurdles. It is my intention to suggest the
probability that given the types of behaviors characteristic of
creative people in any field their products possess inherently
communicable meaning and, are therefore, liberating.

If the logic of the plastic arts is not readily apparent I believe

it may have failed to be because they have traditionally
been judged on their narrative characteristics and on their
good technical manners rather than on the broader and
grander characteristics of their sensual sensibilities.
Unfortunately, in the minds of many people these have
remained largely esoteric or, in the case, of certain
geographic areas, due to religious influences, have been
denied as a legitimate source of knowledge. Although even
in those areas their rejection of the sensual as a legitimate
vehicle of expression did produce some aesthetically
handsome pieces.

Shaker table
Regrettable as the division between the avenues of
communication may be which makes the visually minded
individual a member of a minority group and the verbally
oriented individual , unless he is extraordinarily well-
developed in language disciplines, a member of a vast
majority. This remarkably unbalanced relationship between
the verbally-minded and the visually-minded had both
frustrated both groups and been an occasion for amusement
most especially if the verbally minded is highly accomplished
and the visually minded is accomplished in mime and
gesture. As one means of addressing the imbalance in our
educational system regarding the education of our senses I
have devised a collection of forty puzzles bearing non-
objective compositions and an untraditional format which are
currently available through THE CREATIVITY PACKET an
internet source at: www.tcp.com.mt

Two examples of the puzzles mentioned above.

The meeting on the same lecture series program of Alan

Shields, Philosopher and Larry Rivers, painter must have
been arranged by a mischievous impresario who was a
closet comedian. Rivers used sounds, gestures and,
occasionally, words, but rarely sentences and never one
thread of logic, at least not the traditional kind. Shields
expounded, pronounced, explained and illustrated. But it was
Rivers who communicated a sense of community by means
of this clowning and was, therefore, able to upstage Shields
by “playing to the gallery”. To Shields, I am certain, River’s
language was inept, but apt. To Rivers, I am certain, Shields’
presentation was cumbersome and therefore irrelevant.
Larry Rivers, French Money

We need to rethink the qualities inherent in our senses.

Paul Henrickson, PhD.

The original talk was, as I recall, written to be presented to an audience at St.
John’s College, Santa Fe, New Mexico, but has been recast for this
presentation.

* The director of one of Santa Fe, New Mexico’s rather

upscale art galleries specializing in the already acceptable
art products volunteered to use his equipment to photograph
a 19th century painting, attributed to Bierstadt, I owned, to
send the photo to a gallery in New York to see whether it
might be authenticated. I wanted the photograph of the
work so I agreed and waited something like two months
before I returned to ask what news he had received from the
New York Gallery. He had, apparently forgotten about the
entire matter and so told me he had lost the letter from the
gallery and had forgotten what it had said. Within a few
months more when this same gallery sponsored an
exhibition of the work of the artist who some had thought
had been the artist of the work I owned I noticed one of the
more than a dozen works on exhibit was exactly a copy of
the work I owned only half the size. Dot for dot it was the
same subject matter. It was clearly identified as the work of
the artist some had suspected had done the work and had a
price tag of $18,000. The exhibition brochure also pictured
the work and identified it by the artist’s name. I was told that
the painting really belonged to a Gold Gallery in Los Angeles
and when I contacted the Gold Gallery I was told that the
cards identifying this work had been withdrawn from their
file. I consider this an example of image theft and yet, it
appears, I am helpless to defend myself from the results of
this act. What is worse the people who may have bought the
work have been defrauded as well and our civilization
impoverished by the deception, yet, the perpetrators
continue to prosper. More information on this is available in
the CD: “IN BROAD DAYLIGHT” .

**A most outstanding example of this was the well-corseted,

dominating , middle-class mother of two grown children, one
male, one female, both of whom had tried to commit suicide
within a two-month period whose volunteered defense of her
son’s attempting it in my house was that the drugs he had
used had been provided him by the then President of the
Neuro-Psychological Association of America whose legal
secretary she, the mother, happened to be, or so she
claimed. I had no response to the logic of this explanation.