The Claude Glass

by Maillet, Arnaud

• ISBN13: 9781890951481
• ISBN10: 189095148X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-04-30
• Publisher: Zone Books

Summary

In this first full-length study of a largely forgotten optical device from the eighteenth century, Arnaud Maillet reconfigures our historical understanding of visual experience and meaning in relation to notions of opacity, transparency, and imagination. Many are familiar with the Claude glass as a small black convex mirror used by artists and spectators of landscape to reflect a view and make tonal values and areas of light and shade visible. In a groundbreaking account, Maillet goes well beyond this particular function of the glass and situates it within a richer archaeology of Western thought, exploring the uncertainties and anxieties about mirrors, reflections, and their potential distortions. He takes us from the magical and occult background of the "black mirror," through a full evaluation of its importance in the age of the picturesque, to its persistence in a range of technological and representational practices, including photography, film, and contemporary art. The Claude Glassis a lasting contribution to the history of Western visual culture.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. 9
Prolegomena
Definitions: Characteristics and Aspects	p. 15
Problems of Naming	p. 27
Problems of Historical Sources: The Disappearing Mirror	p. 37
A Suspicious Mirror
Demoniac Mirrors	p. 47
Catoptromancy	p. 57
Magnetism, Hypnotism	p. 61
Disquiet	p. 67
Fascination	p. 77
A Reductive Mirror
Regarding the Eye and the Visual Field	p. 85
A Reductive Mirror: Regarding Tonality	p. 103
A Seductive and Deceptive Mirror
An Idealizing Mirror	p. 137
Limits on the Use of the Claude Mirror	p. 147
Toward Deception and Beyond	p. 167
A Devaluing Mirror
Devaluation	p. 187
Abstraction(s)	p. 203
An Irremediable Loss	p. 211
Notes	p. 223
Index	p. 289
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