Art and Illusionism

For viewers of maps in medieval China, what systems of visual technologies and cultural logic invested these maps with their perceived power and efficacy, and what kinds of relationships did the map imply between its image and the mobility of its beholder? Despite the fact that map artifacts from this period no longer survive for scrutiny as visual images, this article explores the imaginative consequences and extensions of map use as preserved in written accounts from this period. It takes as its point of departure a narrative from the Tang dynasty (618–907 CE) in which a beholder of a wall-bound map merges into its fold, and embarks on a cross-country journey, and it investigates the mechanisms through which such merging and travel were thought possible. When the account of this fictive map is contextualized in relation not only to cartography but also to the contiguous genres of painting, miniature sculpture, and travel poetry, it shows that the visual language of Chinese terrestrial maps drew from a broader pictorial culture shaped simultaneously by medieval Buddhist and Daoist beliefs in the instrumental use of efficacious images. The account of map travel thus provides both a panoramic perceptual experience of space and an itinerary-based conception that offers further occasions for narrative.

This contribution focuses on the fluorescent turn in the work of Frank Stella, a subject only scarcely and superficially addressed in the literature. It places the use of this synthetic palette within Stella’s artistic discourse by tracing the evolution that directly leads up to it. A specific emphasis is put on material aspects and their unique visual effects. In the first part, his choice for self-referential household paints is analyzed, in which his fluorescent turn is seen as the logical successor to the previous metallic paints. After mapping this transition, a study of the visual effects of his DayGlo artworks is made, using knowledge from phenomenological studies and vision science. In addition, some preliminary results of a short-exposure experiment are discussed, in which the instantaneous quality of replicas of some of the Moroccan paintings are tested. The insights of this study are held against the light of the art criticism of the sixties, to address the influence of Stella’s DayGloification on the experience of time and illusion in his artworks.

I argue that if we read E.H. Gombrich's Art and Illusion with the charity that it deserves, we will find a much more subtle theory of depiction than the illusion theory which is usually attributed to Gombrich. Instead of suggesting that pictures are illusory because they cause us to have experiences as of seeing the depicted objects face-to-face, I shall argue that Art and Illusion is better read as making the point that naturalistic pictures are illusory, because they cause us to see qualities and properties which the pictures themselves do not possess. Once we appreciate this point, we will be in a better position to appraise the value and limits of naturalistic art.

The essay Anecdotical Architecture analyses the concepts of 18th-century Exoticism and 19th-century Romanticism, making a case study of Horace Walpole’s book Anecdotes as well as his Neo-Gothic transformation of the villa Strawberry hill into what he considered to be his ‘castle’. This also lead me into the analysis of the contrast between the 18th-century version of trompe l’oeuil and what may be considered as Barok illusionism.

Considered within the context of Jesuit theatre and liturgy, and within the broader culture of spectacle and ritual in the era of Counter-Reform, the works of art and architecture commissioned by the Jesuits in the seventeenth century can be read as 'theatres' of religious performance.  In this paper I will present several examples of religious scenographies of the Jesuit artist Andrea Pozzo (1642-1709), comparing them with his permanent works of illusionistic painting.  I will use them to illustrate the idea of a 'total rhetoric' designed by the Jesuits in this period as the ultimate tool of religious persuasion.  In addition to analysing these works as visual environments of performance––comprising iconography, allegory, emblems and symbols, visual narratives, spatial illusions, and architecture––I will discuss the performances themselves––the liturgical rites and methods of prayer which comprise the 'interior' and 'exterior' theatre in which both visitors and the faithful engage.

Moving through space and time, the falling body poses a unique challenge to sixteenth and seventeenth-century artists and theorists struggling with new truth claims of visual images. Gian Paolo Lomazzo’s illusionistic fresco the Fall of Simon Magus (c.1571) raises the concept of 'moti' — or movement — with its dramatically foreshortened rendering of the plummeting heretic. Elaborated in his Trattato della Pittura (1584) and Idea del Tempio della Pittura (1590), moti is a complex idea that marries internal and external motion through the affective response of viewers. Lomazzo’s own description of his Fall of Simon Magus further suggests that the ability of images to mimic reality does not require the actual extension of time, which is impossible in the visual image. Instead, the animation of images depends on their capacity to extend the experiential time of the beholder. Significantly, Lomazzo’s conception of moti would be critiqued decades later by the Roman art collector and physician Giulio Mancini in the influential but unpublished Considerationi sulla Pittura (1617-21). Although Mancini directly criticizes Lomazzo for his failure to account for the continuity of time in images of movement (“essendo di natura di moto l’esser continuo in tempo”), he ultimately reaffirms the priority that the earlier writer places on the temporality of viewing. Moreover, Mancini similarly positions the falling body at the centre of his text, describing the ability of Francesco Vanni’s Fall of Simon Magus (c. 1603) to provoke the imagination of temporal continuity through which the image endures in the mind of the beholder.

Séduction, magie et illusionnisme forment un bloc originel. L'illusionnisme s'insère parfaitement dans le réseau conceptuel utilisé classiquement pour penser la séduction dans sa forme générale : détournement, tromperie, manipulation, incertitude, jeu, défi, etc. Travaillant sur la puissance du signe autonomisé et coupé de son référent, cet art explore les mécanismes occultes de la psyché humaine. Récusant le « détournement d’attention », il tend à une véritable « maîtrise de l’attention ». Il s'appuie sur une production structurée d'images actives destinées à capter l'attention, la conduire d'image en image puis à induire finalement dans l'esprit du spectateur une reconstruction mémorielle artificielle qui créera l'expérience magique.

An academic assignment -  it takes a general follow on the 20th century OP Art Movement. OP Art is a form of abstract art which mainly relies on creation of optical illusions in order to fool the eye of the viewer and give a tangible dimension to illusionary space. It is also called optical art or retinal art as it questions the visual understanding of the eye.

The movement officially started off in mid 1960s with Victor Vasarely, emerging as the leader of the Op Art Movement. The document discusses the evolution of the movement, its general characteristics, leading artists/painters and its various forms.