Suzanne recently shared her thoughts with us about Robert Hughes and his book The Spectacle of Skill, here is what she wrote.
Robert Hughes moved to the United States in 1970 to become chief art critic for Time, a position he held until 2001. He is to this day held as one of the most respected art critics of our time. I found his book, The Spectacle of Skill absolutely mesmerizing! His ability to articulate with great honesty the history and the reality of art and architecture across centuries was remarkable. His simple explanation of the complexity of perspective for instance is worth sharing;
“….perspective is a form of abstraction. It simplifies the relationship between eye, brain, and object….Perspective gathers the visual facts and stabilizes them; it makes of them a unified field. The eye is clearly distinct from the field, as the brain is separate from the world it contemplates….perspective is a generalization about experience….Look at an object: your eye is never still. It flickers involuntarily restless, from side to side. Nor is your head still in relation to the object; every moment brings a fractional shift in its position, which results in minuscule
difference in aspect….the brain can isolate a given view, frozen in time;….a mosaic of multiple relationships,….Reality, in short, is interaction.”
difference in aspect….the brain can isolate a given view, frozen in time;….a mosaic of multiple relationships,….Reality, in short, is interaction.”
I was reminded of Hughes’, The Spectacle of Skill, recently as there was an article, Regarding Gaudi, in the Wall Street Journal. Hughes of course wrote eloquently of the true impact Gaudi had on modernism.
I highly recommend Robert Hughes’ The Spectacle of Skill and if nothing else, take the time to read the chapter entitled, The Hermit in the Cave of Making!