about such things as perspective, composition, and the of which reveal beholder’s standpoint, all themselves as inner-worldly constructions, not as divinely ordained for nature. Goya seems to have been deeply engaged with such questions in spite of the fact that, roughly from Alberti onwards, the reigning principles of image-making the naturalness of a secular point of assumed view. As Norman Bryson pointed out in Image and Gaze, Albertian perspective served to normativize the set of techniques by which painting could support the fiction of a “natural To understand that the of the standpoint is itself standpoint.”3 “naturalness” beholder’s constructed implied something quite different from the acceptance of Albertian principles. In Goya (though certainly not in Goya alone) the representation of image carries “natural looking” with it an awareness of the fact that the image was itself a product of invention, and that it has a social and material base. It is hardly surprising to see Goya move rapidly away from the picturesque naturalness that informs the tapestry cartoons, since that aesthetic was designed to conceal these very facts. Moreover, the process of secularization is one that seems never to be complete. Various forces that may be associated with the seem to persist, in many forms, even within an “spirit” apparently autonomous, fully secular space. The spirit-world has a demonic that Nachleben invariably throws the secular world off-kilter, reminding it of its own precarious status as a contradictory collection of provisional and sometimes obscure, even irrational practices and beliefs. As Goya was also quick to recognize, this was something that the members of secular society seemed surprisingly unable to see. The persistence of within an “official” religion increasingly secular world tells only part of the story; equally important is the way in which the
about such things as perspective, composition, and the beholder’s standpoint, all of which reveal themselves as inner-worldly constructions, not as divinely ordained for nature. Goya seems to have been deeply engaged with such questions in spite of the fact that, roughly from Alberti onwards, the reigning principles of image-making assumed the naturalness of a secular point of view. As Norman Bryson pointed out in Image and Gaze, Albertian perspective served to normativize the set of techniques by which painting could support the fiction of a “natural standpoint.”3 To understand that the “naturalness” of the beholder’s standpoint is itself constructed implied something quite different from the acceptance of Albertian principles. In Goya (though certainly not in Goya alone) the representation of “natural looking” image carries with it an awareness of the fact that the image was itself a product of invention, and that it has a social and material base. It is hardly surprising to see Goya move rapidly away from the picturesque naturalness that informs the tapestry cartoons, since that aesthetic was designed to conceal these very facts. Moreover, the process of secularization is one that seems never to be complete. Various forces that may be associated with the “spirit” seem to persist, in many forms, even within an apparently autonomous, fully secular space. The spirit-world has a demonic Nachleben that invariably throws the secular world off-kilter, reminding it of its own precarious status as a contradictory collection of provisional and sometimes obscure, even irrational practices and beliefs. As Goya was also quick to recognize, this was something that the members of secular society seemed surprisingly unable to see. The persistence of “official” religion within an increasingly secular world tells only part of the story; equally important is the way in which the
GoyaSecularizationAB.docx