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Three significant points are raised here. Firstly, the inability to see what is being differentiated between. Secondly, bluffing, or to be less euphemistic, lying in such a way as to mislead about ones understanding about art. Thirdly, what is bad art?

It is important to deal with these points in the right order. Firstly it is necessary to establish that some people are not visual in the same way as some people are not musical, or have some word blindness. The later two have designated names, the first of these being tone deaf the other being known as dyslexia, these are recognizable conditions, but I would like to establish an as yet unidentified condition, which for want of a more suitable nomenclature will henceforth be known as visual illiteracy. This condition affects a much greater proportion of the population than either of the other two and takes the form of not being able to discriminate between, vision and perception. A part of the brain remains so undeveloped that these people have very little understanding of vision. How well a wrist or arm was drawn would be wasted on someone suffering from this condition. A good way to identify this condition is to ask them to map certain points on a head, set before them in profile, the results have very little relationship to the head. Is this perhaps just down to a lack of coordination between eye and brain or brain and hand? No this can quickly be discounted, have they perhaps some kind of defective vision, no some can have 20/20 vision. The problem seams to lie in their understanding, i.e. not being able to understand the difference between vision and perception, and therefore unable to disentangle one from the other. As I write, a program on radio 4* "Big illusion, a history of the mirror" with Professor Richard Gregory and Dr Jonathan Miller, illustrates the confusion between vision and perception even by experts in this field. The discussion touched on the painting of gold. Dr Miller said it was an indication of ability and that it was made possible in the 15th Century because of the invention of oil paint and their ability to produce glazes. It is an understandable mistake to think that glazes would produce the illusion of shiny surface quality. But it may help if surface quality is seen as a continuum with matt black at its base and gold at its pinnacle. Professor Richard Gregory in his book "Eye and Brain, the psychology of seeing" also has problems in this area. As he puts it, I paraphrase, 'the three colour light system cannot produce the metallic colours such as silver and gold'. I am afraid the reason for this is that these are quite simply not colours, they are effects. With reference to Dr Millers explanation that the ability to produce the illusion of gold was made possible by the invention of glazes. Glazing is not a prerequisite for this illusion, to explain the painting of gold is to do it. That is, painting, contrary to popular belief should not be seen as a skill but as a philosophy, it is in fact a visual explanation: to paint gold using red, yellow and blue or variations there of, it is necessary to understand what it is in visual terms. As this is seen as the peek of an artists understanding. Dr Miller has my sympathy. Painting is at its best when it does not rely on glazing. Rembrandt's 'Man in a Gold Helmet' or William Nicholson's 'Golden Mug' are both in that alla prima style that does not allow for glazing and are both beautiful examples which resolve both Professor Gregory and Dr Millers problems in this area. It is not my intention to denigrate either of these esteemed gentlemen. Lack of understanding in this area is wide spread.

The problem arises when not understanding art leads to people making up their own idea of art. Again a resent Radio 4 program, *Woman's Hour, had an item on Frida Kahlo. Frida Kahlo and husband Diego Rivera's elevation in the art world are symptomatic of this kind of problem.

Her painting illustrates the struggle of the female, his the struggle of the oppressed freedom fighters, painting large murals onto buildings, both I am sure are important, but which very definitely appeal to a specific section of society and are typically covered on programs such as Woman's Hour. And by people like Professor Griselda Pollock, professor of history of art at Leeds, who says "I think she is an incredibly important artist" with a powerful body of work. To examine the validity of the claim as to whether or not this is art, we only need ask the question, why are the IRA mural painters not considered artists? If the answer is, their mural's are too badly painted, then we have acknowledged it is how the subject is painted that determines its artistic value not the content. How ever this is hardly necessary as nothing can disguise the fact that these works are just very badly done. Even those to whom this work appeals, will have to admit that these works indicate a lack of understanding of; drawing, painting, modeling, colour, tone if I was to list all of the faults, I would be endangering the Rain Forests. Although it maybe a fanciful idea of mine that these people can, when pointed out, see the list of short comings, for no matter how you look at it they are advocating that painting of a very poor standard, be considered as having artistic value, and this alone puts them very firmly in the visually illiterate category. Of course this condition is much easier to disguise than dyslexia. If it were not for this elevating none art to art, the likelihood of this condition ever coming to light is so remote as to not be worth calculating. How would you know how well a wrist or arm was appreciated by a third party, especially if they wished to deceive, they would have little difficulty in learning and making the right noises. And there are of course many who do wish to deceive, in fact this condition would be irrelevant here if it were not for the fact that people lie, cheat and deceive for the reason already sited, i.e. that they feel that an association with art confers so much.

The path of deception to infiltrate the art world is so prevalent that there is a predominance of these people inhabiting the art world. However, far from having no effect, as would be the case else where, with ostensibly impotent aspirants. This tendency to move away from how well that wrist or arm is drawn and to start to connect stories, or look for symbolic elements has the undesirable effect of directing the market in this shallow direction. It may be a natural tendency for the visual illiterate to reconcile the very obvious value placed on painting with their poverty of understanding, but their influence spreads quickly and has a devastating effect, like an infection disintegrating the real art world. The story which the painting depicts is offered up by these people as being the artistic element, so consistent is this trait it could be said that the interest displayed in the subject is inversely proportional to their ability to see.

Here we move almost imperceptibly into the bluffing. Bluffing may be said to play a part in many jobs or areas of life, but in the art world it is endemic. 90% of the people involved, seem to be pretending to one another in some way or other. This interest in the subject matter or symbolic element can be seen as an easy path to follow, for a painter needs a subject to paint. For many centuries religion and painting where intrinsically linked as in the Byzantine and indeed much of the Renaissance. Symbols and conventions were generated from this relationship: the symbolic device of the halo was first used in art to donate special power somewhere around the 5th century. Size came to denote importance i.e. no one could be larger than Christ, also there were allegories and historical events, all with their own symbols and conventions. Soon a gentleman was not considered well educated if he was not conversant with these connections. Until very recently to have studied Classics at an ancient university was the height of good breeding. Parallel with this grew a whole industry in the art of reading such symbols and conventions, and one day other none visuals would use this to give license to their artistic pretensions.

By this criteria even the most visual illiterate could become an expert on art. But from the Renaissance onwards painting and sculpture were becoming the objective its self, the story was just the vehicle. The Western world was alone in pursuing the translation of the 3D world into 2D and thereby separating vision from perception. The beginning of the Renaissance was a transition from the illustration of perception to this new approach. The literal translation of Renaissance does mean rebirth and although there were translations of the 3D world into 2D, translations in purely visual terms from the past, notable examples being found in Pompeii, by and large the rest of the world were happy to produce the comic book illustration type of art. When a child draws mummy as a round head with eyes, nose and mouth and strands of hair, a triangle for a dress with two arms and two legs sticking out, this is a symbolic illustration of the child's perception, the child perceives the mummy and draws a symbol for that perception.

Although vision is part of that perception, visually this symbol has very little resemblance to mummy. Gombrich in his book 'Art and Illusion' asks the question "a problem which has haunted the minds of art historians for many generations..........will the paintings we accept as true to life look as unconvincing to future generations as Egyptian paintings looked to us?" What Gombrich fails to understand here, and it seems fellow art historians, is that the Egyptians were illustrating perception.

This is not a progression, as Gombrich suggests, where painting improves with time, this is pre disentangling vision from perception. I hope the minds of art historians are hence forth released from this haunting (I excluded those who were so much further up the artistic ladder than Gombrich that they were never so haunted) So the reader is left in no doubt of Sir Ernest Gombrich's status in the art world I list his honors and credits below:

Gombrich, Sir Ernest (Hans Josef) (1) Knighted 1972. (2) CBE 1966. (3)FBA 1960. (4) FSA 1961. (5) PhD (Vienna). (6) MA Oxon & Cantab. (7) Director of the Warburg Institute & Professor of the History of the Classic Tradition in the University of London 1959-76. (8) Research Asst. Warburg Inst., 1936-39. (9) Research Fellow, 1946-48. (10) Lectr, 1948-54. (11) Reader, 1954-56. (12) Special Lectr, 1956-59, Warburg Inst., Univ. of London. (13) Durning-Lawrence Prof. of the History of Art, London Univ. University Coll, 1956-59. (14) Slade Prof. of Fine Art in the University of Oxford, 1950-53. (15)Visiting Prof. of Fine Art, Harvard Univ. 1959. (16) Slade Prof. of Fine Art, Cambridge Univ. 1961-63. (17) Lethaby Prof. RCA. 1967-68. (18) Andrew D. White Prof-at-Large, Cornell, 1970-77. (19) A Trustee of the British Museum, 1974-79. (20) Mem., Museums and Galleries (formerly Standing Comm. on Museums & Galleries),1975-82. (21) Hon. Fellow, Jesus Coll., Cambridge, 1963. (22) FRSL. 1969. (23) Foreign Hon. Mem., American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1964. (24) for. Mem., Amer. Philosophical Soc., 1968 (25) Corresponding Member: Accademia della Scienze d Torino, 1962. (26) Royal Acad. of Arts and Sciences, Uppsala, 1970. (27) Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschapen, 1973. (28) Bayerische Akad. der Wissenschaften, 1979. (29) Royal Swedish Acad. of Sciences, 1981. (30) Hon. FRIBA, 1971. (31) Hon. Fellow: Royal Acad. of Arts, 1982. (32) Bezalel Acad. of Arts & Design, 1983. (33) Hon. DLitt: Belfast, 1963, London 1976. (34) Hon. LLD St Andrews, 1965. (35) Hon LittD: Leeds, 1965, Cambridge, 1970, Manchester, 1974. (36) Hon., DLitt: Oxford, 1969; Harvard, 1976. (37) Hon. Dr. Lit. Hum; Chicago, 1975; Pennsylvania, 1977; DU Essex, 1977. (38) Hon. DHL Brandeis. 1981. (39) Hon Dr RCA, 1984. (40) W.H.Smith Literary Award, 1964. (41) Erasmus Prize, 1975. (42) Hegel Prize, 1976. (43) Medal of New York Univ., for Distinguished \Visitors, 1970. (44) Ehrenkreuz fur Wissenschaft und Kunst, 1st cl., Austria, 1975. (45) Medal of College de France, 1977. (46) Orden Pour le Merite fur Wissenschaften und Kunste, 1977. (47) Ehrenzeichen fur Wissenschaft und Knust, Austria. 1984.

The beginning of the Renaissance was where the disentangling of vision from perception began and where the story became less important than the painting, the painting was no longer just an illustration of perception. In spite of this the vast majority of the art service industry are only interested in the analysis of the vehicle i.e. the subject. Although great pretense maybe made, this is a major indicator that art is not their top priority. Of course a great deal of the human brain is devoted to evaluation and someone steeped in art will already be receiving a myriad of other signals. How ever as art is such a difficult and subtle area it can be all but impossible for a member of the public to call the bluff of someone using this technique to enhance their artistic superiority.

An example of this approach to art is exemplified in an article on Vermeer (Daily Mail 16th June 2001) more specifically the analysis by Sir Roy Strong, of Vermeer's 'The Artists Studio'. A person who, like Gombrich , is very adept at climbing the art service industry ladder, being at one time or another: Director of The National Portrait Gallery; Director of The V & A; Assistant Keeper of The Warburg Institute; Council of The R.C.A; Chairman of the Arts Panel Arts Council of Great Britain; and member of The Fine Arts advisory committee of the British Council. I must add here that there are much worse offenders than Sir Roy Strong and knowing how easy it is for the art world to be misdirected tries in his own way to counter its worse excesses.

The article attempts to explain why the painting is such a work of genius in the following way:

1.	"The source of light is hidden behind a heavy woven curtain, which is drawn aside to reveal the artist at work. Notice how Vermeer turns highlights into delicate beads of light. They are employed with particular effectiveness on the curtain, the magnificent chandelier and on the studs in the rather uncomfortable chair in the foreground."
2.	"The model, posing as the Muse of History, carries a trumpet, a symbol of the fame an artist may find. Is Vermeer saying that fame need no longer be sought through painting historical subjects - but can be found through contemporary scenes such as this?"
3.	"On the table a plaster mask represents painting as the art of imitation. It may also be a death mask, signifying the death of painting in provinces still under the rule of Holland's enemy Spain. Notice also how the draperies on the near side of the table allow the light to cascade over them like water over a waterfall."
4.	"The prominent position of the chair invites the viewer to take a seat at this carefully staged scene. However, the viewer is not allowed to intrude on the intimacy between the artist and model, who are both absorbed by the task in hand. Neither acknowledges the existence of the spectator."
5.	"See how effectively the eye can follow the tiles on a diagonal to either the left or the right. Alternatively, we may be persuaded to follow a vertical line directly into the painting. Here we are guided by the 'arrows' created by the first three white marble tiles, the unbroken line of white titles on the left lead, like stepping stones, towards the model."
6.	"The painter is not dressed in the clothes of his day, but wears a 15th-century costume. It seems Vermeer is connecting the art of his own era with art of the time of the great masters van Eyck and van der Weyden, perhaps to claim that the standards they achieved are maintained by Vermeer's generation."
7.	"The frame of the easel points to Holland on the map, underlining the new republic's prosperity after the war which freed it from Spain."
8.	"The artist's hand is resting on a 'mahistick' - a support with a padded end that rests on the canvas without damaging it. It is significant that he is working on the laurel wreath, which 'crowns' the triumphant hand of the artist."
9.	"Near the bottom of the map, level with the model's collar. 'I Ver-Meer'."
10.	"The vertical crease marks the frontier between Protestant Holland and Catholic Flanders - still under the political control and cultural influence of Holland's enemy Spain."
11.	"The roof beams create a strong horizontal pattern continued by the map's roller bars. The underlying structure of horizontals and verticals gives the picture of its mood of stability and calm."

Let me first sympathize with Sir Roy Strong, Vermeer is probably one of the most difficult artists to evaluate. I remember as a very young student, puzzling over a poster of a Vermeer pinned up in my bedroom. This poster troubled me for some time. None of the gloss stylizations found in works by artists like Van Gough or the satisfying wooly approach of the Impressionists or the beautiful wet into wet paint of a Daumier. What was interesting in this painfully quiet painting? The staff at college, who where teaching us, on the one side 'De Stijl / Constructivism' and on the other 'Frans Klienen' abstract expressionism, although feigning enthusiasm, seemed no more interested in him than I, damming him as a wonderful genre painter, a recorder of the events of the day. I suspected that there was more to it than that, perhaps I had glimpsed the tip of an ice berg of genius. Strangely enough his work seemed to improve in direct proportion to my ability to paint. His paintings even seemed to be quite modern, possessing a hint of the 'Euston Road School', a method of mapping used from time in memorial but which was endowed with a title and became a movement in 1939.

Such a convert was I, that many years later I was eager to see the Vermeer exhibition at the National Gallery. But even I had to admit his earlier struggling attempts where very poor, the exhibition revealed a very step learning curve with only his later works being entitled to be termed peeks of genius. But herein lies the litmus test for Sir Roy's analysis, what would make these works the apotheosis of genius: Would a map in the background or the points of tiles "leading ones eye" have made these very poor works suddenly become works of genius. I think not.