Symbolic Images: Studies in the Art of the Renaissance by E. H. Gombrich (review)

178 Books lead a child to mental health through artistic creation. Lindsay discusses the means for helping those afflicted with several handicaps, namely, visual, auditory, autistic, brain damage, mental retardation, mongolism, brain tumor and cerebral The central idea of her teaching with respect to the retarded child is expressed as follows: ‘All materialsshould be prepared by the teacher beforehand . Meticulous organization is essential in preparing creative activities for all handicapped pupils, ., ..’ (p. 48). Emotional and mental disabilities ‘make it necessary that negative feelings of frustration shouldbe kept to a minimumin order that they might have a better chance of success. ...’ ‘Whenchildrenhavenever knownthe challenging and rewarding adventures that are experienced in the courseof natural development,creativeactivities which involve a variety of materials should help them acquire physical skills and realize their basic emotional need for new experiences. ... There are many pupils in our ordinary schools who find creative expression difficult when this particular aspect is not encouraged.’ ‘....Creativeeducationcanbeameansfor helping many to organize their experience and develop a better self-concept,that they may gradually extend their interests beyond themselvesand become more socially adjusted.’ Her method for dealing with the autistic child, it seems to me, is of particular significance. ‘When pupils are unaware of their personal identity despite personal grace and agility, as can happen in autism, it is possible that they could have an incomplete body image. It took three years of constant effort to teach a girl, aged ten years, to draw a figure. The teacher helped her each day to build a body image by touching the child‘s head, eyes, and other appropriate parts, or rubbing each limb, while verbalizingeach relationship’(p. 49). Again, with reference to autism, Lindsay writes: ‘I have already pointed out that autistic children become obsessed at various times by certain things such as lights, straight lines or a particular color. It is important to introduce creative activitieswhich follow their obsessions in order to try and induce some purposeful response from these pupils. An autistic girl would stand fascinatedby a row of tall treeswhichcouldbeseenoutsidethewindow. When a straight line was drawn for her during this phase, she would eagerly dash down her copy beside it in paint and the procedure would be repeated many times. ‘It is often noticeable that by the secondary school stage quite a number of (autistic) pupils persist in making what they term “patternyy.This is a defence barrier, for they hope it will hide their inability to be creative. Such lack of confidence can only be dispelled by introducing an entirely different creative activity or a new approach to painting, where the nature of the material itself will provoke their interest’(p. 66). Each of Lindsay’shandicap categoriesis handled palsy. with the same insight as these quotations for the cure of autism. Certainly this book should be in the library of every teacher interested in helping childrento mental health through art. Beyond that, it seems to me that the chief value of this book lies in its power to stimulate new thoughts concerning the creativeprocess-not onlyfor the retarded child but for all alert teachers dealing with normal children and also for those of us who are productive artists eager to transcend our own autistic devices and prepossessions or, as Freud has called them, ‘obsessions’. Symbolic Images: Studies in the Art of the Renaissance . E. H. Gombrich. Phaidon, London and NewYork, 1972. 247pp.,illus.g5.00. Reviewedby: PeterFingesten* What has this great and enormously erudite scholar to say to artists? He is a writer with respect for the artifact as well as for the artist who created it. By entering so deeply into the surrounding spiritual, historical and intellectual milieu of a painting, he elevatesthe significanceof the creative act to a very high leveland reinstatesa certainpridein the artist’s estate. Gombrich, as well as the late, undisputed master of iconology, Erwin Panofsky, specialize in the unravelling and revealing of the origins of certain motifs dear to the Renaissance. If only we had scholars of their caliber to delve into the intellectual background of modern art! Our problem is not the lack of scholars but of distance to the masterpiecesof our time. Gombrich‘s book demonstrates that the more knowledge...