Celtic Pattern

Adam Tetlow

Description

How do you draw Celtic knotwork? What are the secrets of keys? Are there tricks for drawing Celtic spirals? What do these mysterious patterns actually mean? Who drew them? Where did they come from? In this exquisite pocket book, author and artist Adam Tetlow shows us the practical tricks of the trade and the hidden principles behind the ancient magical science of Celtic artwork. With examples from both early and later periods, illustrations by the author and rare engravings. WOODEN BOOKS are small but packed with information. "Fascinating" FINANCIAL TIMES. "Beautiful" LONDON REVIEW OF BOOKS. "Rich and Artful" THE LANCET. "Genuinely mind-expanding" FORTEAN TIMES. "Excellent" NEW SCIENTIST. "Stunning" NEW YORK TIMES. Small books, big ideas.

Sujets

• History of art

Informations

• Publié par: Wooden Books
• Date de parution: 01 avril 2018
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781912706105
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 16 Mo

Extrait

Bronze shield mount found in the River Thames at Wandsworth, London. Lithograph by Orlando Jewitt in Horae Ferales , 1863
First published 2006 Revised and updated edition 2010 eBook edition © Wooden Books Ltd 2018
Published by Wooden Books Ltd. Glastonbury, Somerset.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Tetlow, A.
Celtic Pattern
A CIP catalogue record for this book may be obtained from the British Library.
eBook ISBN: 978-1-912706-10-5 Physical ISBN : 978-1-904263-70-8
All rights reserved.
For permission to reproduce any part of this miniature masterpiece please contact the publishers.
Designed and typeset in Glastonbury, UK .
Converted and optimised for digital display by CPI Anthony Rowe, Chippenham, UK.
CELTIC
PATTERN
VISUAL RHYTHMS OF THE ANCIENT MIND
Adam Tetlow
Three candles illumine the darkness:
truth; nature; knowledge.
from the Irish Triads
This book is indebted to Celtic Art by George Bain and the books of Aidan Meehan. Thanks to my teachers: Keith Critchlow, Paul Marchant, Patrick Harpur, Jules Cashford, Merrily Harpur and John Neal. Thanks to John Martineau for editorial kung fu; to my ever supportive family Mum, Dad, Elisabeth, Trent, Paddy and tribe; to Haifa for heroic patience, love and CAD skills; and to Idris, Saena and Oak for inspiring and teaching me every day. My website is www.adamtetlow.net .
Select Bibliography: Time Stands Still by K. Critchlow, Language of the Goddess by M. Gimbutas, Mind in the Cave by D. Lewis-Williams, Celtic and Anglo-Saxon Painting by C. Nordenfalk, The Earliest Irish and English Bookarts by R. Stevick, Archaeology in Celtic Art by D. Harding, Sacred Geometry by J. Michell, The White Goddess by R. Graves, Celtic Art by R. & V. Megaw, The Voice of the Eagle by C. Bamford, Open World by K. White.
Above: Map showing the primary sites and populations mentioned in this book.
L
INDISFARNE
C
ARNAC
I
ONA
Halstadt
Waldalgesheim
Catal Huyuk
S
TAVE
C
HURCHES
K
ELLS
Vinca
LA TENE
STYLE
EXPANDS 500-200 BC
CELTIC
CHURCH
400-800 AD
OLD
EUROPE
c. 7,000-5,000 BC
CONTENTS
Introduction
1
Primordial Symbols
2
Measuring Heaven & Earth
4
Celtic Constructions
6
Living Lines
8
Totemic Visions
10
Early Insular
12
Faces of the Other
14
Different Tonsures
16
Assorted Spiral Centres
18
Recursive Roundels
20
A Paleolithic Meander
22
Unlocking Key Panels
24
Sawtooths and Arrowheads
26
Folding Solutions
28
Turning Keys
30
A Braided Line
32
Roots of Knots
34
Variations on a Theme
36
Knots of Roots
38
Woven Labyrinths
40
Animated Creatures
42
Entangled Nature
44
Region of the Summer Stars
46
A Multitude of Shapes
48
Appendix I - Grids
50
Appendix II - Spirals
52
Appendix III - Keys
54
Appendix IV - Knots
56
Appendix V - Illuminations
58

INTRODUCTION
The line has always been at our service—tool and companion on our journey into being, it has measured, mapped, woven and wriggled its way through our lives, its quicksilver flexibility fueling our discoveries.
We harness lines to make our world, to bind language into time, to connect and protect, surround and select. They are our means for bringing our imagination into existence, our will manifested.
Ancient societies were fascinated by the magic and poetry of the line, for within the patterns it described they saw the face of eternity, those qualities we name numbers. To study number is to study permanence—numbers are forever, they do not change, they are change. Traditional geometry studies the quality of number in space using cord, compass and straight edge. It is rooted in the idea of a cosmos embroidered with number by causal intelligence.
As true philosophers, Celts, Druid and Christian, lived in a world of vision, seeing nature as both living presence and vast book, written in a language of symbolic analogy (sometimes known as “the language of the birds” or “the green language”). This vision of meaning in nature is nowhere better expressed than in the flowing ornament and rigorous geometry of Celtic art.
So join us as we follow the adventures of line through the Celtic world, as it winds its way from prehistory to the first books. Tracing its path we will see into the minds of the Celtic artists, unfolding their intent and imaginings, reconstructing their technical mastery and its strictures, and learning through practice to join the action of hand, eye and heart, and see a glimpse of an immanent reality.
1
P RIMORDIAL S YMBOLS
a deep history of pattern
The essential motifs of indigenous art emerge from the mists of prehistory fully formed. Symbols found in the earliest examples of human mark-making ( opposite, in black ) dance through the artifacts of the pre-Celtic world. Marija Gimbutas tracked these early marks across central Europe and found them universally linked to the Bird Goddess (moon, mother, matrix, soul, imagination), our oldest image of deity, passed down to us some say from the Neanderthals. As we shall see later, forms such as nets, grids, rhombs, knots, ‘S’- and ‘C’-shapes and mushrooms, and others like chevrons, zigzags, meanders, cup and rings, spirals, crosses, arrows, axes, butterflies, squares and circles, resurface in every phase of Celtic art.
These geometric glyphs are stylised models of processes, ways to map the world and its cycles ( e.g. below centre, lunar counts on stones from Newgrange ). They arise first from within, as symbols, dreams and visions, as well as through physiological entoptic phenomena ( opposite, in white ), where patterns seen by carefully pressing the eyes, or in prolonged darkness and certain altered states of consciousness, are sent by the visual cortex to the retina, reversing the normal flow of signals and allowing us to actually see the structure of our own brains.
2