Images made by chance (or chance images, for
short)
are meaningful visual figurations perceived in mate-
rials—most often rocks, clouds, or
blots—that have not
been, or cannot be, consciously shaped by
men. An
awareness of such images is probably as old as mankind
itself;
evidence of it has been found in the art of the
Old Stone Age. The thoughts
stimulated by this aware-
ness, however, are
not recorded before classical antiq-
uity. As
a chapter in the history of ideas, these thoughts
have become the subject
of investigation only very
recently, so that the following account cannot
be more
than provisional in many respects.
Strictly speaking, an image made by chance is an
absurdity. Explicit, fully
articulated images, our expe-
rience tells
us, must be the result of purposeful activity,
which is the very opposite
of chance in the sense of
mere randomness. The dilemma can be resolved
either
by (1) attributing a hidden purpose to chance, which
thus
becomes an agency of the divine will personified
under such names as Fate,
Fortune, or Nature; or by
(2) acknowledging that chance images are in fact
rudi-
mentary and ambiguous, and are
made explicit only
in the beholder's imagination. The former view, char-
acteristic of prescientific cultures,
is akin to all the
beliefs based on the “ominous”
meaning of flights of
birds, heavenly constellations, the entrails of
sacrificial
animals, and countless other similar phenomena. It was
prevalent until the Renaissance and has not entirely
lost its appeal even
today. The latter view, although
adumbrated in classical antiquity, found
adequate ex-
pression for the first time in
fifteenth-century Italy; it
has been adopted and verified by modern
scientific
psychologists who made it the basis of projective tests
such as the ink blot series named after Hermann
Rorschach. Both views,
however incompatible, are
strongly linked with past and present ideas
concerning
the nature of artistic activity, in theory as well as in
practice.
