Jung's ‘secret knowledge’: commentary on works by contemporary Irish artist Gavin Hogg

Abstract

Jung's ‘secret knowledge’ is identified as including three interrelated threads: precessional astrology, alchemy and an opus divinum. This is interpreted, broadly, in terms of an astro-alchemical myth. An extrapolation of this myth is then used as a basis from which to interpret a sample of works by contemporary Irish artist Gavin Hogg. The argument developed is that such an astro-alchemical myth finds visionary expression in such artworks, and that it offers a valuable perspective from which to critique a religious problematic such as a Catholic Ireland in crisis. The related notion of integrating a ‘missing fragment’ as an Eastern and also a Celtic holistic spirituality into the Western world picture is also briefly developed.

Keywords:

• C.G. Jung
• Gavin Hogg
• secret knowledge
• alchemy
• astrology
• visionary art
• Celtic
• Irish

Notes on contributor

Mathew Mather is a Lecturer at Limerick School of Art and Design, Limerick Institute of Technology, Ireland. He has a PhD degree in psychoanalytic studies from the University of Essex, and is author of The Alchemical Mercurius: esoteric symbol of Jung's life and works. His interests include Jungian studies, esotericism, art and psyche, and environmentalism.

Notes

1. ‘[I]n terms of books, Man and His Symbols would have been something that I read in college and didn't much understand and then possibly looked at again but I only read it properly after doing the Jungian course’ (Gavin Hogg, personal communication, 26 March 2014).

2. Dancing Demons was completed in 2011, Trinity in 1995, and The Sea in 1994.

3. Jung develops this myth in greater detail, especially in Mysterium Coniunctionis.

4. According to some scholars, this oracle was the predecessor of the I Ching (see Peat, 1988, pp. 133–134).

5. In this context, one can also reflect on The Red Book, where we see the uprooting of deeper archaic mytho-historical ‘layers’ of the psyche that resonate with such a unitary worldview (for example, as Izdubar), and a process of integration of such figures into his ever-evolving life myth.

6. During this period, Gavin's directed Sun (his ‘Hero's Journey’) traversed above the constellation Krater (cup). Such symbolism might be correlated to a ‘baptism into the mysteries’. In astrology, this cup-constellation (as well as the Aquarian water-bearer's vessel) has been likened to the grail vessel. Interestingly, Jung's progressed Sun also traversed this part of the sky during the time of his ‘confrontation with the unconscious’.

7. In Christian iconography, this is the spirit of the Holy Ghost that can manifest in our visible reality, such as in the form of a dove.