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

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.