The Analysis of Beauty

"The Analysis of Beauty" is a book written by William Hogarth (18th century English painter, satirist, and writer) and published in 1753, which describes Hogarth's attempt at formulating theories of visual beauty and grace in a manner accessible to the common man of his day. Prominent among his ideas of beauty was the theory of the Line of Beauty; an S-shaped curved line (serpentine line) that excited the attention of the viewer and evoked liveliness and movement. "The Analysis of Beauty" formed the intellectual centrepiece of what the historian Ernst Gombrich described as Hogarth's "grim campaign against fashionable taste", which Hogarth himself described as his "War with the Connoisseurs". "The Analysis of Beauty" is also the title of a Hogarth tribute installation exhibited by Disinformation (art and music project). "The Analysis of Beauty" installation premiered in the "Noise" exhibition at Kettle's Yard gallery, Cambridge, UK in January 2000 (where it was exhibited alongside work by Francis Crick and James Watson, Umberto Eco, Marc Quinn and John Dee). The installation has since been exhibited at The Royal British Society of Sculptors (London), The Huddersfield Art Gallery, The Ashcroft Arts Centre (Fareham), Quay Arts (Newport, Isle of Wight), The Chamber of Pop Culture (London), South Hill Park (Bracknell), Orleans House Gallery (Twickenham), Q Arts (Derby), The Mac (Birmingham), Wrexham Arts Centre and Saltburn Artists Projects (all UK), and (on video only) in the Sonar Festival at CCCB Barcelona. This installation also gave its name to an Arts Council sponsored National Touring exhibition (and catalogue) of the same name.

Contents

In "The Analysis of Beauty" Hogarth implements six principles, which independently affect beauty. Although he concurs that those principles have an effect, he is not determinate on their specific influence. The first principle of beauty Hogarth describes is fitness, which is not in itself a source of beauty, but can be described as a material cause of it. Though the account of fitness on the total beauty of an object is only moderate, it is a necessary cause. Fitness does not necessarily imply purpose. However, improperly implied forms cannot be the source of beauty. It is in this that the necessity of fitness must be seen: if not accounted for, a form cannot readily be assumed beautiful.

The second major principle of beauty is variety. It is the source of beauty, which Hogarth shows us by the contrary notion of "sameness": "sameness", a lack of variety, offends the senses. "The ear is as much offended with one even continued note, as the eye is with being fix'd to a point, or to the view of a dead wall. [Hogarth, William, "The Analysis of Beauty", Ch. 2] " In contrast, our senses find relief in discovering a certain amount of "sameness" within a varietal experience.

The third notion of regularity is understood as a form of "composed variety": it only pleases us when it is suggestive to fitness. Similar to this notion in effect is simplicity, which enhances the pleasure of variety in that it pleases the eye. The variety which causes a beautiful experience should, so to speak, be tempered by simplicity. On the other hand: simplicity without variety at best does only not displease.

Intricacy is a strange principle in that it does not directly follow from the formal behaviour of a beautiful object. Hogarth means by this the habit which causes us end up in the whirling game of pursuit, when bit by bit discovering the beauty of an object. Intricacy arises from the love of this pursuit. Every difficulty in understanding or grasping the object enhances the pleasure of overcoming it, in order to continue the pursuit. There is a direct connection here to the Line of Beauty Hogarth dictates, along which every image is built up. Though the movement of our eye is discrete in itself, the movement of our "Mind's eye" follows a duplicate course of the line, a principal ray of light moving along with the line of sight. The continuous movement of our "Mind's eye" triggers the notion of intricacy.

Quantity, finally, is associated with the notion of the sublime, which, when Hogarth's book appeared, was not yet entirely distinguished from the apprehension of beauty. Hogarth thus does not speak of sublimity, but of greatness. He recognizes a great quantity to have an aesthetic effect on the beholder without the necessity of a varietal or fitting form. This should not be exaggerated, as that might lead to absurdities.

External links

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMtz9ciE9M0 "The Analysis of Beauty" by Disinformation]
* [http://www.tristramshandyweb.it/sezioni/e-text/hogarth/analysis_html/title-page.htm "The Analysis of Beauty" full text on The Tristram Shandy Web]

References

* "The Rumble" (exhibition catalogue) The Royal British Society of Sculptors 2001
* "Disinformation - The Analysis of Beauty" (exhibition catalogue) Arts Council National Touring Programme 2003
* "Noise" (exhibition catalogue) Kettle's Yard / Wellcome Trust / Cambridge University Press 2000
* "The Beautiful, the Sublime and the Picturesque in Eigtheenth-Century British Aesthetic Theory", Walter John Hipple Jr., The Southern Illinois University Press, 1957