Sleight of Hand in Art
The Eye, The Hand and The Materials (no.2) - The hand speaks through its work.
I am going to follow up on the previous article A leaf on a Tree. In this article I am going to talk about the hand: “…the hand (the mechanics of construction and composition)” as an element of creating works that cause a feeling of resonance in the viewer.
A Leaf on a Tree
A couple of weeks ago I posted the article Typographic Abstraction and in the comments Ester Feske wrote the following.
The hands are often referred to in the arts almost as if they are a second brain, that the hands almost seem to be self-conscious in how an artist works with their materials.
While I was contemplating this, the term sleight of hand came to mind that I thought could make a good title for this article. I looked up sleight of hand in the dictionary to see if there were any ideas or suggestions I could get from it to help me write something. Prestidigitation and legerdemain, both French in origin, are two related words that I personally have never used and found them very interesting to consider.
We typically think of sleight of hand in relation to deception like a magician uses in a magic trick to fool the viewer into believing the seemingly impossible. In a certain way a lot of great art does the same thing. Art can often help the imagination to see things the viewer never dreamt of, to see the world in a new surprising way.
This thought brought to mind the quote from Pablo Picasso…
“We all know that Art is not truth. Art is a lie that makes us realize truth at least the truth that is given us to understand. The artist must know the manner whereby to convince others of the truthfulness of his lies.”
―Pablo Picasso
and also…
“Art is the lie that enables us to realize the truth.”
― Pablo Picasso
The point of sleight of hand in art is not deception exactly but in revealing truths through craft and well practiced skillfulness. In this sense the sleight of hand has to do with skill and dexterity and adroitness: having or showing a skillful use of expedients, cleverness, or resourcefulness in handling situations to achieve one's purpose.
This suggests that, through immersive practice and experimentation and attention to detail that the ‘well practiced hand’ just knows what to do with the materials before it without thinking or indecisiveness. The hand becomes a conduit for creative intuition and seems to bypass the haggling and criticality of the intellect. It works below the threshold of critical, logical thinking and in the realm of wordless intuitive knowingness. There is no choosing involved, the hand just knows exactly what to do.
Most of this element of creativity defies explanation, it is happening outside of the realm of speech. Whenever we use language to describe something we are interpreting our experience into the words we know. There is not a direct one-to-one equivalence between experience and our description of it.
The hand speaks through its work.
I don't give enough credit to my hand(s) when creating a piece and give all the kudos to my brain, instincts, God, and my heart. Yet I know that when I'm not totally prepared for some intricate work like doing resin or plaster and while it's happening I start to literally mess up, somehow in my near panic state of being my hands seem to scramble and know exactly what to do to avoid a complete mishap. At times it feels as if I've grown another hand to help avoid a disaster. The hand does indeed know what to do and that's why perhaps it's automatic and I don't give it much credit. And even through some arthritic discomfort, the hands still know how to operate. Your article has given me much food for thought in appreciation for my hands. Thank you!!!
Cecil, I got started writing in 2018 introduced by a friend. There are lots of groups to write for/with. My favorite is NEAZNativeDemocrats.org because I think we owe something to native Americans and I feel that I’m helping get info to them. I also write with postcardstovoters.org started by Tony (the democrat) McMullen in Georgia. I write for several other groups. And now have an In-person group here. Plus writing in several zoom groups. It’s very satisfying. I’m glad I have the means to buy postage stamps by the roll!! And it’s good to be with like minded people. You can see what I do on Instagram @mimgolub Thanks for being interested.