Commonbook Entry 1

Cézanne said of Monet: "Monet n'est qu'un œil—mais quel œil!" The folly in this statement is that there ever existed an "innocent eye"—that we are passive recipients of sensations which are turned into perceptions by our mind. This claim is false.

"Elle (la peinture) vie se justifie que si on la considère comme une création de signes et non d'object feints." ("It (painting) is justified only if one regards it as a creation of signs and not of pretended objects.")

—Daniel-Henry Kalviweiler

This is at the very heart of what I am investigating: that images  can and do function as signs pointing to their represented object(s), and that the illusion exists in the perceived representation of reality—not a confusion between the image and the object.