Blog Guide Hi there. Welcome, and thanks for your interest.

This blog posts primarily visual information selected from my research and study into cryptomorphic images found within fine art; it is a selected introduction to cryptomorphs giving but a small taste of the subject proper. I hope that it proves useful in any case and goes some way towards confirming your interest in this widely fascinating field of study crucial to an understanding of many of art historys most influential artists and paintings. It uses information and experience from the research to create a new digital practice of drawing and dissemination. Its purpose is to publicise the research in order that new knowledge be learnt and shared concerning the presence, methods and influence of cryptomorphs within the western tradition of painting. I have been researching cryptomorphs for over ten years, creating an archive of closely traced drawings of cryptomorphs taken from artists who interest and challenge me. With cryptomorphs being common to a wide range of artists and periods, my work concentrates on Modernism, and very often the pictures of Czanne and Picasso. Within current art history though, study of the presence and influence of cryptomorphs is generally ignored: Broadly speaking, opinions tend to believe that hidden images are the result of a creative imagination at work within the mind of an observer; or else, they are merely subconsciously created and meaninglessly random images of the artist. Beside these opinions being inaccurate, for art history a deep concern must be seen to centre on the knowledge that it has failed so successfully to recognise the presence of cryptomorphs in the first place regardless of any attempt at interpretation based on an unreliable and misunderstood evidence base. An important narrative exists connecting many artists to this particular form of visual expression. Although having been in existence for thousands of years, cryptomorphs at the present time are awaiting proper recognition of their breadth, influence and history within art.

Artists such as Picasso, Braque, Czanne, Renoir, Pissarro, Turner; Bacon, de Kooning, Freud, Cecily Brown... are but a few from the wide ranging story drawn across all periods of art history, from its high point in modernism, to cryptomorphic examples in prehistoric paintings. Cryptomorphs are a natural product of the natural act of drawing. This does not of course therefore relegate them down towards the level of unconscious drawing. The subconscious argument against the wilful creation and conscious inclusion of

hidden images is one readily employed to denigrate cryptomorphs without at the same time comprehending the real meaning and true range of the subconscious in relation to human activity. Cryptomorphic detractors lean on the idea of the subconscious in order to devalue different forms of image which are beyond their knowledge. They also do this without following the same flimsy argument through to its logical end to provide, for every image that we value, a clear map of the areas of conscious and subconscious work appearing upon the surface of a painting; therefore to definitively show us which parts of a picture to ignore and which as being deserving of attention: This is clearly an argument that goes nowhere as far as cryptomorphs in particular are concerned; but by all means read the current neural research telling us that simply everything we consciously do as humans has already taken place within our subconscious minds, and those minds themselves having interaction with other minds equally ahead of their own conscious knowledge.

From the pen of art history you may wish to read Sidney Geists, Interpreting Czanne, and James Elkins, Why are our pictures puzzles? You may also be interested in some of Christopher Greens work on Gris and Pepe Karmels on Picasso. Geists hidden images, with his poor illustration, vague description and subject matter being mostly elsewhere; works alongside Elkins short Chapter Seven to produce nothing of great cryptomorphic accuracy. It is the case that art historical literature is not in its argument strong either for or against cryptomorphs...Which conveniently allows me to point to the quantitative difference in aims, ambitions and suitability toward explication from two clearly different modes; verbal/textual versus visual. An underlying weakness of art history in regard to understanding hidden images is that cryptomorphs exist at some distance of perception from clearly visible images, which themselves are much more textually accessible in their descriptive nature. The apparent motif of a picture can always be described with a few short words: A skull and a candle on a table. Art history, being designed to produce PhD students who favour textual language with which to analyse pictures, will continue failing to recognise the value of describing pictures with images. It is therefore likely that cryptomorphs shall continue to be hidden from their view remaining the moot point they currently are. If you search the internet you will find a few references and pages of original visual analysis in relation to hidden images. Some are all too clearly away on their own narrow and personal agenda showing no creditable visual skills, no signs of artistic

background and no credible cryptomorphs; others clearly individuals, are working along the right lines achieving results deserving of closer attention.

The role of cryptomorphic images varies within pictures, from the compositionally incidental, fun, playful and rhyming; to the compositionally integral and pictorially ambitious multiple hidden images to be found within Picasso and Braques Analytical Cubism. Cryptomorphs most often take the form of human figures; bodies and faces in relation to other figures or objects, engaged with the paintings content; or else artistically humorous or punning. Within analytical cubism, cryptomorphic images can also be found in sequence utilising a technique similar to individual animation drawings to simulate the appearance of movement. With this new digital method I employ a considerably looser drawing technique, along with the abstract use of dots to indicate the visual reading of pairs of eyes. I keep drawing to a minimum in order that the viewer can perceive cryptomorphs and painting in a natural fashion. My long standing analogue practice uses pencil and paper to produce closely detailed traced drawings. The aim here with these digital means is to be as clear as possible as to the cryptomorphic solutions I offer while also allowing room for the viewer to discover cryptomorphs for themselves. I do not employ digital manipulation on the paintings only the addition of clearly obvious line drawing and shading. Use slide show to move between images for visual comparison paying close attention to the pictures mark-making details. As cryptomorphs are subject in particular to points 2, 3 and 4 of my definition, sometimes a single drawn interpretation is difficult to achieve; the viewer may occasionally think that some of the visual interpretations shown here are too vague. It is with these drawings I would wish the viewer to do a little work towards their own understanding of the cryptomorphs; I may deliberately leave drawings very spare in order that the viewer be encouraged to visually search for the parts, or whole cryptomorphs I do not explicitly indicate. Difficulties of editing and presentation this blog faces include for example, that cubist paintings may yield a dozen or more separate sheets of densely traced pencil drawings - which my analogue archive easily accommodates. Within these many sheets of drawing the separation of individual cryptomorphs is usually unnecessary as presentation is not always demanded, however; with this blog being concerned with presentation, for the sake of both visual clarity and viewers required attention each post can only show highly selected images. You will also note the contiguous nature of many cryptomorphs, whereby a nose can also act visually as the mouth from another image, which can then also double as an ear or eye from one or more other cryptomorphic images thus creating larger and more complex images. Related to which aspects of the cryptomorph are being

highlighted, the visual interdependence of complex cryptomorphs can dictate how they are traced out. This can mean at times that the tracing of a simple, single cryptomorphic image is difficult to achieve in other words, when I have drawn an eye I can then see it also as a mouth from another cryptomorphic image, which itself then requires to be drawn onto the same sheet in order that the relationship between them is clear. Essentially the biggest challenge of editing is leaving as much out as possible from each drawing while at the same time allowing the viewer to both appreciate the cryptomorphs and to see for themselves how it and others are structured within the painting.

This digital presentation is therefore an abbreviated record of original cryptomorphic research using available both screen-friendly painting and cryptomorphs. Challenges that will become apparent to the new viewer of cryptomorphs are where exactly do they begin and end? How do they exist? What is the meaning for both visual understanding and textually based art history? When visual familiarity with a hidden image dominates a picture to the point that it is no longer hidden in any way; can cryptomorphs be understood as hidden at all? What are we to make of the fact that in Picassos self-portrait, Yo Picasso, my eyes fall firstly and easily upon the clearly visible, once cryptomorphic face of Ambroise Vollard, so ending Vollards successful 100 year cryptomorphic career? Cryptomorphs are a visual, intellectual and philosophical challenge which reward your time with artistic appreciation, insight and humour. Thanks for your interest here; I hope that you find. Lee.

TAGS: PhD students, visual language, original visual analysis, analytical cubism, definition of cryptomorph, Sidney Geist, Interpreting Czanne, James Elkins, Why are our pictures puzzles? Pepe Karmel, Christopher Green, weakness of art history, visual perception, cryptomorphs, influential artists, influential paintings, masterpiece paintings, western tradition of painting, modernism, Picasso, Czanne, Braque, Renoir, Pissarro, Turner, Bacon, de Kooning, Freud, Cecily Brown, prehistoric paintings, Ambroise Vollard, Yo Picasso, intellectual, philosophical