Besides «The Message Rediscovered» Cattiaux wrote poems and a little book on painting, «Physics and Metaphysics of Painting» which is the subject of this article. Relegated to the background of «The Message Rediscovered», this work bears the subtitle «Essay». Although the two works are of a very different nature, some references allow for a better understanding of the verses of «The Message Rediscovered». A letter dated 1946 addressed to his painter friend Gaston Chaissac, who had recently settled in Boulogne with his wife, alludes to this ongoing work:
«I am finishing a book on painting that may interest you, as I am trying to analyse the mechanism of inspiration and especially the means to remain in a state of grace, which is the great secret of true artists.» (Cf. «The collected Letters of Louis Cattiaux», Beya Publications, 2013, § 170)
In this letter, Cattiaux includes a copy of the first edition of «The Message Rediscovered» published at his own expense that same year. It only contained the first twelve chapters, out of the forty in the final version completed in 1953, the year the author left this world. To Chaissac, he presented it as follows:
«I am sending you «The Message Rediscovered» and I hope to please you. I kindly ask you to make the necessary effort to read it for a long time in order to penetrate the surface of things. The left column corresponds more or less to the sensible world, and the right column is its equivalence from the spiritual point of view. God will help you read it because you have a simple heart, which is the greatest treasure here below…»
Could he have conceived «Physics and Metaphysics of Painting» as a bridge between artists—especially painters like himself—and «The Message Rediscovered»? All means are good to convey this message he had rediscovered. Reflection on artistic creation could be one such means, as he himself had been confronted with another reality during artistic creation.
In 1946, when Cattiaux self-publishes the first twelve books of «The Message Rediscovered», he believed it to be finished. However, new verses continued to impose themselves on him for a long time. In the years 1950-1951, while deeply engaged in writing «Physics and Metaphysics of Painting» the composition of chapter 22 of «The Rediscovered Message» still absorbed him.
The original documents suggest that for «Physics and Metaphysics of Painting» Cattiaux organizes a series of notes of different nature related to painting and artistic creation. The first eight chapters, concerning the profession of painter, may seem too specialized to laypeople. The question is important to him; with much passion, he seeks the craft: the techniques and mediums of earlier painters. A mutual friend of Chaissac and Cattiaux, Albert Gleizes, a great cubist painter admired by Cattiaux, shared his research on pictorial techniques. Cattiaux concludes these technical chapters by quoting him: «During the 19th century, great painters were criticized for technical and professional issues».
Did Cattiaux feel drawn to these ancient secrets of the craft, jealously guarded within guilds? The technical processes were not the only concern; these associations could have been the origin of certain secret societies. Throughout his work, Cattiaux links craft and spirituality, close to alchemy, an artificial process where the work of nature is perfected. This idea is recurrent in Cattiaux’s thought, starting with the general dedication of the book: «To the glory of the one who taught us to order nature through Art».
Astrological, chiromantic (chapter: «Test»), magical (chapter: «Origin»), or visionary (chapter: «Vision») comments, always applied to the artist, illustrate Cattiaux’s idea and that of certain surrealist authors: the work of art cannot be separated from occult reality.
At the beginning and end of each chapter, various quotes pique our curiosity; Cattiaux chooses contemporary painters or art critics known to him: Diehl, Rousselot, Gonzague Frick, Gleizes; or classical authors: Goethe, Blake, or Wilde; or even occultists like Péladan, who opens the book. Others are borrowed from spiritual masters: Rumi, Confucius, the evangelist Saint Matthew, or from The Principles and precepts of the return to evidence by Lanza del Vasto, a friend already mentioned by Cattiaux and author of the preface to the first edition of «The Message Rediscovered». However, many come from an unknown book, lost or misplaced as Cattiaux describes it, or are simply without reference; they are actually aphorisms from «The Message Rediscovered», already written or drafted during the time when «Physics and Metaphysics of Painting» was being completed. These quotes, the quintessence of the book, guarantee the esoteric meaning:
«Priming»: Let the inspiration of the artist be as high as the stars, and his life be as humble as dust.
«Backgrounds»: He who draws little distinction between the things of the world soon perceives the unity that gives life to them.
«Light»: There is something better than seizing the obviousness of life, and that is to participate in its primitive purity.
«Technique»: Do not blame the tool if you are a bad workman, and do not call it a crime if you surrender your life to death.
«Art And Science»: There is only one Art, that which manifests the free spirit, which is the light of the Universe. There is only one Science, that which insufflates into this light the divine soul that leads it to perfect shape.
«Culture»: Be only yourself, rely only on yourself, question only yourself, penetrate only yourself, lose yourself only in yourself, find yourself only in yourself, repose only in yourself.
«Gift»: In order to approach the truth, one has to be naked like it. Everything that pretends to direct or to force the expression of art sterilizes it and kills it: political, religious or scientific sectarianism more than any other constraint.
«Generations»: Great generosity of soul is required to be the first to recognize that an unknown work is beautiful.
«Easiness»: He who explores his ignorance is the only one who knows the wisdom and madness of ART.
«Mediocre People»: Moderation is a distinctive feature of the sage. Tyranny is characteristic of the madman. Insensitivity is the lot of the mediocre one.
«Appraisal»: He who bathes in the clarity of the interior fire is like an idiot before all creation, yet he alone is truly enlightened.
«Test»: One learns to love by seeking to penetrate in the state of others.
«Ascesis»: Creation, man, art, are not perfectible, in the sense that they have only gone astray, and that their most perfect accomplishment is only the return to their initial perfection.
«Sensibility»: Why discourse when everything is so magnificently diversified by the shade and by the light?
«Fertility»: What characterizes life is movement, change, fertility, diversity, freedom and gratuity.
«Vision»: Accurate vision is to see things as they were and as they shall be, that is, as they are in reality in the primary unity.
«Abandonment»: The artist knows only heaven and earth; the science, the morals and the politics of men bore him and kill him.
«Enthusiasm»: He who does not carry his joy in himself shall not see it reflected in the world.
«Suggestion»: The artist, the believer, is he who raises himself up to the terrifying beauty of the creation.
«Liberty»: It is from within that we must first break our prison, and deliverance shall come at the same time from outside.
«Museum»: When we give up understanding is when we begin to feel and eventually understand. When we give up explaining anything is when we begin to make ourselves truly heard and understood.
These concise excerpts from the book, reflecting the spiritual experience beyond artistic creation, allow one to penetrate the divine reality, free from any religious prejudice.
In Book 22 of «The Message Rediscovered», Cattiaux revisits the cited sentences, in the order he assigns them in his final draft, condensed into the mystery of revelation:
- When we give up understanding is when we begin to truly understand.– When we give up explaining anything is when we begin to make ourselves truly heard and understood.
22’.He who bathes in the clarity of the interior fire is like an idiot in the world, yet he alone is truly enlightened. «In order to approach the truth, one has to be naked like it.»
- Be only yourself, question only yourself, penetrate only yourself, lose yourself only in yourself, find yourself only in yourself, repose only in yourself and you shall approach the Lord of within, who accomplishes all things in you without you.
23’. Creation, man, art, are not perfectible, in the sense that they have only gone astray, and that their most perfect accomplishment is only the return to their initial perfection. «There is something better than seizing the obviousness of life, and that is to participate in its primitive purity.»
23’’. Tolerate yourself, Help yourself, Seek yourself, Discover yourself, Know yourself, Accomplish yourself, with the aid of the Lord of heaven.
- The seed of the stars is hidden in the earth.
24’. The slime of the earth is the first creature.
- Accurate view is to see things as they were and as they shall be, that is, as they are in reality in the primary unity.
25’. The greatest work in the greatest ease, here is art. The greatest love in the greatest purity, here is holiness. The greatest freedom in the greatest repose, here is wisdom.
- Great generosity of soul is required to be the first to recognize that an unknown work is beautiful.
26’. He who explores his ignorance, his powerlessness and his death, is the only one who knows the madness and wisdom of art.
- Let the spirit of the artist be as high as the stars, and his life be as humble as dust!
27’. He who distinguishes little between the things of the world soon perceives the unity that gives life to them.
- All that is opposed to life manifests it all the more clearly, and all that receives it participates in it magnificently.
28’. What characterizes life is movement, change, diversity, freedom, purity, joy, fertility, gratuity and praise.
- We cannot please everyone, for we are full of defects and weaknesses and still covered in foreign filth, but the Book is already a judgement that secretly separates the pure, enlightened hearts from the blind and satisfied dying ones of this world.
29’. If only he would give back to many the desire and the taste for studying the holy and wise Scriptures of all nations! If only he would be for many the standard of victory and of freedom in Him who is! If only he would illuminate the hearts of those that await the light of life!
- Everything that intends to direct or to force art sterilizes it and kills it.
30’. Moderation is a distinctive feature of the sage, tyranny is characteristic of the madman, insensitivity is the lot of brutes.
- The artist, the believer, the saint, the sage is he who raises himself up to the illuminating beauty of the creation released from its gangue of death.
31’. There is only one true art, that which manifests the free spirit, which is the light of the Universe. There is only one true science, that which fixes this divine light in the repose of God.
- Why discourse when every-thing is so magnificently diversified by the light of God?
32’. He who does not carry his joy in himself shall not see it reflected in the world and shall not see it flower in God.
- The true artist knows only heaven and earth; the science, the morals and the politics of men bore him and kill him.
33’. Only dead stars do not spin with joy under the breath of the Unique One.
In «The Message Rediscovered» every word, every phrase has a meaning and an intention of greater significance than what is perceived at first reading. Let us read again, for example, verses 23 and 23′ of the cited excerpt and confront them with its corresponding text in «Physics and Metaphysics of Painting» in the chapters «Culture» and «Light», where we have surprising evidence.
The chosen title, «Physics and Metaphysics of Painting» clarifies the meaning that Cattiaux attributes to painting and art: a spiritual journey. A Latin mind might translate this title as «the natural and the supernatural of painting», as the Greek word physis corresponds to the Latin natura. Even though the use of the word metaphysics in our modern Europe distances us from its etymological meaning, for Cattiaux, this term is not opposed to physics, that is, to nature, but rather perfectly complementary. «Art consists in making the supernatural appear hidden within the natural» (MR IX, 53). The first interpretation of «supernatural» or «metaphysical» situates the concept outside, distant from nature, while Cattiaux closely links them. The blessed Raymond Lull, for example, tell us the same:
Indeed it is so, Sir, for just as a man who walks places one foot to be able to lift and advance the other, so too, he who wants to perceive what is natural must place his understanding in what is supernatural, and he who wants to perceive what is supernatural must necessarily place his understanding in what is natural… for one thing is the occasion for the other when the first is perceived by the second.
Physics responds to metaphysics, and metaphysics responds to physics. This union is also reflected in the poem Ordo ab chao, by Emmanuel d’Hooghvorst in 1998 as an introduction to the first Spanish edition of «Physics and Metaphysics of Painting». D’Hooghvorst emphasizes the journey that metaphysics has taken to avoid remaining separate and external to man: «To give body and measure to immensity, that is the mystery of Pure Art».
This immensity was called Pan by the Ancients. The name of this Greek god etymologically means «All». Half-human, half-goat, this «All» must take form. In artistic creation, for example, it is «Pan bound in the human root», says d’Hooghvorst; immensity fixed at a point, the meeting of the human and the divine. From that moment on, man «is no longer alone».
Very close to Cattiaux’s thought, d’Hooghvorst notes that the poet sometimes ignores that God inspires him, but this matters little because it is always God who inspires him. Poetic inspiration is knowledge, order arising from the chaos of words then arranged in the sense of art («Le Fil de Pénélope» I, pp. 97 and following). Cattiaux and d’Hooghvorst certainly allude to the Great Art, called Traditional Alchemy throughout the ages.
If, in «Physics and Metaphysics of Painting» Cattiaux expresses himself with the language of art, the philosophia perennis, wisdom transmitted through the ages that remains always the same, is not absent here. One need only linger for a moment on the chapter «Generations», where Cattiaux highlights a recurring conflict in the history of art: must the young artist confront the established ideas of his time? Talented and courageous, he gains recognition and his work finds a place in the museum; otherwise, he sinks into oblivion.
With the idea of generation, Cattiaux introduces the notion of spiritual renewal. Which generation is he talking about? Not just a temporal generation, but a double generation, both carnal and spiritual: Cain and Abel, Esau and Jacob, or, in Greek tradition, Castor and Pollux. The epigraph of this chapter quotes «The Message Rediscovered»: «Great generosity of soul is required…», the generous men belong to another generation. These two words, of the same etymological root, oppose the generation of the generous to that of the mediocre and the self-satisfied, usually represented by the image of the old man. Of a different nature, the generous man is the new man. It is not a matter here of explaining the avant-garde production mechanisms of the 20th century. Cattiaux goes further: for him, the true artist drinks from the source of sacred art; «endowed with a genuine personality», he «remains faithful to himself».
He listens and hears the voice speaking to him in the secret of his intimacy, a true guide. His generous heart is awakened, he is the living one who «can be easily recognized by that faculty he has for loving disinterestedly as though he was only twenty». This artist «is understood only by the men of his generation», the old man rejects him just as darkness chases away light. The quote from the Gospel according to Saint Matthew that concludes the chapter is an allusion to the Last Judgment, where each one occupies his rightful place, according to the secret of his heart.
The artists of the new generation, those who nourish and quench their «fellow being», will then rise to inherit the promised Kingdom. And when the old generation is astonished to find itself damned, the Son of man replies: «Truly I say to you, whatever you neglected to do for one of these little ones, you did it to me». According to Christian hermeneutics, «these little ones» refer to the new generation, the initiated ones in divine art, rejected and abandoned by this world, but glorious in the other.
For Cattiaux, the «new generation», or messianic generation, is the necessary passage to unify traditions, without being limited to any historical moment, for belonging to the divine present, illo tempore, this generation is reborn in every century.
