Cleve Gray
SEDUCTION AND BETRAYAL IN
CONTEMPORARY ART
The ancient Greeks didn't have any Muses to represent
the visual arts. They had Muses for poetry, dance , comedy,
tragedy, music, history, astronomy, but none for the visual arts.
This was because painters, sculptors, architects were regarded as
mere craftsmen, artisans with no spiritual intimations. The
artist's work, his skill, was praised, but the artist as maker was
considered to be too coarse a being to be an honored citizen, not to
speak of being worth the protection of a goddess. It is said that
Socrates's father was a sculptor and tried to train his son in that
profession; but the future philosopher scorned labor that could
convey, at best, only a representation of the physical world. And
we all recall Plato's rather contemptuous references to drawing
and painting.
It
is clear that the source of this ancient disdain was
not only philosophical but also social. In very late classical times
a few visual artists were accepted into the upper levels of society
and were spoken of as inspired by the Muses, but, on the whole,
painters and sculptors were seen as vulgar artisans and trades–
men. It' s tantalizing to speculate that the Greeks, who almost
3,000 years ago conceived just about all of the archetypes of our
communal psyche, may have sensed how particularly vulnera–
ble the visual arts are to corruption.
Many centuries would pass before the artist whose occupa–
tion was considered to be disreputable would be glorified. It's not
my purpose to give an account of the changing social position of
the artist over the past centuries. For that I can refer you to
Wittkower's fascinating book,
Born Under Saturn.
I will not con–
sider further artists of the distant past here except to tell you that
by the middle of the fifteenth century, Cennino Cennini asked
artists to pray before beginning to paint: "Begin, " he said, "by
adorning yourselves with these vestments, love, reverence, obe–
dience, and perseverence." And the great architect, Alberti , was
