Pub Date : 2019-03-06DOI: 10.1163/22134913-00001091
Stefan Ortlieb, C. Carbon
Although kitsch is one of the most important concepts of twentieth-century art theory, it has gone widely unnoticed by empirical aesthetics. In this article we make a case that the study of kitsch is of considerable heuristic value for both empirical aesthetics and art perception. As a descriptive term, kitsch appears like a perfect example of hedonic fluency. In fact, the frequently invoked opposition of kitsch and art reflects two types of aesthetic experience that can be reliably distinguished in terms of processing dynamics: a disfluent one that promises new insights but requires cognitive elaboration (art), and a fluent one that consists of an immediate, unreflective emotional response but leaves us with what we already know (kitsch). Yet as a derogatory word, kitsch draws our attention to a general disregard for effortless emotional gratification in modern Western aesthetics that can be traced back to eighteenth-century Rationalism. Despite all efforts of Pop Art to embrace kitsch and to question normative values in art, current models of aesthetic liking—including fluency-based ones—still adhere to an elitist notion of Modern art that privileges style over content and thereby excludes what is essential not only for popular taste and Postmodern art but also for premodern artistic production: emotionally rich content. Revisiting Fechner’s (Vorschule der Aesthetik, 1876) criticism of highbrow aesthetics we propose a new aesthetic from below (Aesthetik von Unten) that goes beyond processing characteristics by taking content- and context-related associations into account.
{"title":"Kitsch and Perception: Towards a New ‘Aesthetic from Below’","authors":"Stefan Ortlieb, C. Carbon","doi":"10.1163/22134913-00001091","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22134913-00001091","url":null,"abstract":"Although kitsch is one of the most important concepts of twentieth-century art theory, it has gone widely unnoticed by empirical aesthetics. In this article we make a case that the study of kitsch is of considerable heuristic value for both empirical aesthetics and art perception. As a descriptive term, kitsch appears like a perfect example of hedonic fluency. In fact, the frequently invoked opposition of kitsch and art reflects two types of aesthetic experience that can be reliably distinguished in terms of processing dynamics: a disfluent one that promises new insights but requires cognitive elaboration (art), and a fluent one that consists of an immediate, unreflective emotional response but leaves us with what we already know (kitsch). Yet as a derogatory word, kitsch draws our attention to a general disregard for effortless emotional gratification in modern Western aesthetics that can be traced back to eighteenth-century Rationalism. Despite all efforts of Pop Art to embrace kitsch and to question normative values in art, current models of aesthetic liking—including fluency-based ones—still adhere to an elitist notion of Modern art that privileges style over content and thereby excludes what is essential not only for popular taste and Postmodern art but also for premodern artistic production: emotionally rich content. Revisiting Fechner’s (Vorschule der Aesthetik, 1876) criticism of highbrow aesthetics we propose a new aesthetic from below (Aesthetik von Unten) that goes beyond processing characteristics by taking content- and context-related associations into account.","PeriodicalId":42895,"journal":{"name":"CERAMICS-ART AND PERCEPTION","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-03-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"88527042","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-03-06DOI: 10.1163/22134913-20191095
K. Bálint, B. Rooney
Close-up shots have been shown to modulate affective, cognitive and theory-of-mind responding to visual narratives. However, the role of close-up’s narrative-sequence position, that is the relative timing of close-up shots in a visual narrative, is largely unknown. Participants watched one of ten versions of the same animated film, after we inserted a close-up shot (neutral or a sad face) at one of five different time points. Story recall responses of 168 participants were analyzed by the Linguistic Inquiry of Word Count, a computerized content analysis software, and coded manually for theory of mind. The narrative-sequence position of the close-up influenced the level of cognitive processing, affective processing, and theory of mind evident in participant responses where a U-shaped relationship was observed for the close-up position. These findings further our understanding of how close-ups affect narrative processing and are of relevance for studies on formal features in visual narratives.
{"title":"Narrative Sequence Position of Close-Ups Influences Cognitive and Affective Processing and Facilitates Theory of Mind","authors":"K. Bálint, B. Rooney","doi":"10.1163/22134913-20191095","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22134913-20191095","url":null,"abstract":"Close-up shots have been shown to modulate affective, cognitive and theory-of-mind responding to visual narratives. However, the role of close-up’s narrative-sequence position, that is the relative timing of close-up shots in a visual narrative, is largely unknown. Participants watched one of ten versions of the same animated film, after we inserted a close-up shot (neutral or a sad face) at one of five different time points. Story recall responses of 168 participants were analyzed by the Linguistic Inquiry of Word Count, a computerized content analysis software, and coded manually for theory of mind. The narrative-sequence position of the close-up influenced the level of cognitive processing, affective processing, and theory of mind evident in participant responses where a U-shaped relationship was observed for the close-up position. These findings further our understanding of how close-ups affect narrative processing and are of relevance for studies on formal features in visual narratives.","PeriodicalId":42895,"journal":{"name":"CERAMICS-ART AND PERCEPTION","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-03-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"85011319","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-03-06DOI: 10.1163/22134913-20191101
B. Rolke, Madeleine Y. Stepper, Verena C. Seibold, Elisabeth Hein
We investigated the relationship between attention and the aesthetic appearance of visual stimuli. In a first study, we evaluated the aesthetic value of pictures depicting chairs by means of a questionnaire. These pictures were categorized as aesthetic, neutral, or non-aesthetic and used in a second study, in which we employed a dot-probe task and a recognition memory task. In the dot-probe task, two pictures of chairs were presented to the left and to the right of fixation, followed by a dot at one of the chair pictures’ positions. Participants decided at which side the dot had been presented. To investigate the relation between the aesthetic value of the chairs and the orientation of attention, we paired either aesthetic or non-aesthetic pictures with neutral pictures. The results showed that participants reacted faster when the dot appeared at the position of the aesthetic chair than when it appeared at the position of the neutral one. Such a ‘congruency’ effect was absent for non-aesthetic chairs. This interactive pattern of results shows that aesthetic stimuli capture attention. In the recognition memory task, in which participants were asked to decide whether a chair had been presented before or not, aesthetic chairs were more accurately and faster recognized than neutral or non-aesthetic ones. Taken together, these results show that aesthetic stimuli entail prioritized cognitive processing. In a final study, we investigated which particular features of the aesthetic stimuli might be important for this effect by correlating the aesthetic evaluation of the pictures with their Gestalt impression.
{"title":"Aesthetic Stimuli Attract Visual Spatial Attention","authors":"B. Rolke, Madeleine Y. Stepper, Verena C. Seibold, Elisabeth Hein","doi":"10.1163/22134913-20191101","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22134913-20191101","url":null,"abstract":"We investigated the relationship between attention and the aesthetic appearance of visual stimuli. In a first study, we evaluated the aesthetic value of pictures depicting chairs by means of a questionnaire. These pictures were categorized as aesthetic, neutral, or non-aesthetic and used in a second study, in which we employed a dot-probe task and a recognition memory task. In the dot-probe task, two pictures of chairs were presented to the left and to the right of fixation, followed by a dot at one of the chair pictures’ positions. Participants decided at which side the dot had been presented. To investigate the relation between the aesthetic value of the chairs and the orientation of attention, we paired either aesthetic or non-aesthetic pictures with neutral pictures. The results showed that participants reacted faster when the dot appeared at the position of the aesthetic chair than when it appeared at the position of the neutral one. Such a ‘congruency’ effect was absent for non-aesthetic chairs. This interactive pattern of results shows that aesthetic stimuli capture attention. In the recognition memory task, in which participants were asked to decide whether a chair had been presented before or not, aesthetic chairs were more accurately and faster recognized than neutral or non-aesthetic ones. Taken together, these results show that aesthetic stimuli entail prioritized cognitive processing. In a final study, we investigated which particular features of the aesthetic stimuli might be important for this effect by correlating the aesthetic evaluation of the pictures with their Gestalt impression.","PeriodicalId":42895,"journal":{"name":"CERAMICS-ART AND PERCEPTION","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-03-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"89900199","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-11-28DOI: 10.1163/22134913-00604001
{"title":"Abstracts from the 6th Visual Science of Art Conference (VSAC)","authors":"","doi":"10.1163/22134913-00604001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22134913-00604001","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42895,"journal":{"name":"CERAMICS-ART AND PERCEPTION","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-11-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86880027","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-10-17DOI: 10.1163/22134913-20181092
G. Mather
The history of Western visual art is traditionally divided into a succession of stylistic movements on the basis of the art-historical provenance and visual qualities of artworks. Little is known about how the visual statistics of Western artworks have changed over time, though this data could inform debate about the transitions between art movements. This longitudinal statistical study shows that two measures of the statistics of Western paintings remained relatively stable for 500 years, and similar to the values found in photographic images depicting the same subjects. Dramatic changes began in the late nineteenth century between the years 1878 and 1891, when the statistics of artworks became steadily more variable, and more frequently departed from values that are typical of representational images. This period can be considered as a major turning point that marks the beginning of the Modern Art movement. Statistically, abstract Modern art is more diverse than the representational art of any period. There is only limited evidence that aesthetic responses to paintings bear any relation to their visual statistics.
{"title":"Visual Image Statistics in the History of Western Art","authors":"G. Mather","doi":"10.1163/22134913-20181092","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22134913-20181092","url":null,"abstract":"The history of Western visual art is traditionally divided into a succession of stylistic movements on the basis of the art-historical provenance and visual qualities of artworks. Little is known about how the visual statistics of Western artworks have changed over time, though this data could inform debate about the transitions between art movements. This longitudinal statistical study shows that two measures of the statistics of Western paintings remained relatively stable for 500 years, and similar to the values found in photographic images depicting the same subjects. Dramatic changes began in the late nineteenth century between the years 1878 and 1891, when the statistics of artworks became steadily more variable, and more frequently departed from values that are typical of representational images. This period can be considered as a major turning point that marks the beginning of the Modern Art movement. Statistically, abstract Modern art is more diverse than the representational art of any period. There is only limited evidence that aesthetic responses to paintings bear any relation to their visual statistics.","PeriodicalId":42895,"journal":{"name":"CERAMICS-ART AND PERCEPTION","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-10-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78245822","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-10-17DOI: 10.1163/22134913-20181093
S. D. Winter, Pieter Moors, H. V. Gelder, J. Wagemans
Although Frank Stella intended to create flat, illusion-less Irregular Polygons paintings, it is not uncommon to experience the illusion of colour depth, based on the interaction between their fluorescent and conventional colours. Some critics praised these artworks’ flatness, while others described odd depth experiences that they categorised as a new kind of illusion. In order to provide a correct reading of these works and to reassess their art historical significance, a scientific case study regarding this colour-depth effect imposes itself. This article discusses an experiment in which we determined whether twenty artists, twenty art historians and twenty laypeople experienced fluorescent colours as protruding, receding or flat in combination with conventional colours. We additionally looked at whether they still perceived colour depth when all fluorescent colours were replaced with their conventional variants. All participants observed fifteen designs, which they had to rate according to the perceived depth of each coloured region with a number between −3 (strongly receding) and +3 (strongly protruding). The results revealed that most participants experience fluorescent regions as strongly protruding, unlike all conventional colours, which were rated as much less protruding. When a fluorescent colour was swapped with a conventional variant, all participants experienced significantly less depth. The differences between the subject groups were statistically negligible when looking at the mean depth ratings for both colour types. However, we discovered that artists experienced more contrast effects, as they gave different ratings to different panels (of identical colour and shape) in the same design, depending on their position.
{"title":"Illusory Depth Based on Interactions Between Fluorescent and Conventional Colours: A Case Study on Frank Stella’s Irregular Polygons Paintings","authors":"S. D. Winter, Pieter Moors, H. V. Gelder, J. Wagemans","doi":"10.1163/22134913-20181093","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22134913-20181093","url":null,"abstract":"Although Frank Stella intended to create flat, illusion-less Irregular Polygons paintings, it is not uncommon to experience the illusion of colour depth, based on the interaction between their fluorescent and conventional colours. Some critics praised these artworks’ flatness, while others described odd depth experiences that they categorised as a new kind of illusion. In order to provide a correct reading of these works and to reassess their art historical significance, a scientific case study regarding this colour-depth effect imposes itself. This article discusses an experiment in which we determined whether twenty artists, twenty art historians and twenty laypeople experienced fluorescent colours as protruding, receding or flat in combination with conventional colours. We additionally looked at whether they still perceived colour depth when all fluorescent colours were replaced with their conventional variants. All participants observed fifteen designs, which they had to rate according to the perceived depth of each coloured region with a number between −3 (strongly receding) and +3 (strongly protruding). The results revealed that most participants experience fluorescent regions as strongly protruding, unlike all conventional colours, which were rated as much less protruding. When a fluorescent colour was swapped with a conventional variant, all participants experienced significantly less depth. The differences between the subject groups were statistically negligible when looking at the mean depth ratings for both colour types. However, we discovered that artists experienced more contrast effects, as they gave different ratings to different panels (of identical colour and shape) in the same design, depending on their position.","PeriodicalId":42895,"journal":{"name":"CERAMICS-ART AND PERCEPTION","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-10-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79912858","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-10-17DOI: 10.1163/22134913-20181094
S. Mastandrea, J. Kennedy
In two experiments, we tested pictures of horse gaits—alt (standing), walk, trot, gallop, and a fake gallop, a pose shown in a well-known Gericault painting. The pose was portrayed frequently in the nineteenth century, its features hotly debated. Fake gallop has legs extended fore and rear, close to parallel to the ground. Experiment 1 sampled real artworks depicting horses and Experiment 2 used silhouettes of horses. In both, reports of amount of movement increased from alt to fake gallop. In Experiment 1 similar results were obtained from novices and equestrians (‘experts’ familiar with horses). The extreme leg extension in fake gallop may suggest high speed, as Arnheim suggested. However, true gallop includes legs curled close together under the body—a ‘running pony’ pose—so both extremes of extension may suggest high speed. In Experiment 2, novices judged fake gallop unrealistic despite giving high movement scores. We suggest its depiction may be metaphoric, meaning a deliberately false item has relevant features of a referent. For the artworks, the amount of movement reported correlated positively but quite modestly with aesthetic appreciation, but for the silhouettes, the correlation was reversed. We suggest expression can be positive for many horse poses.
{"title":"Gericault’s Fake-Gallop Horse Judged Speedy but Unrealistic","authors":"S. Mastandrea, J. Kennedy","doi":"10.1163/22134913-20181094","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/22134913-20181094","url":null,"abstract":"In two experiments, we tested pictures of horse gaits—alt (standing), walk, trot, gallop, and a fake gallop, a pose shown in a well-known Gericault painting. The pose was portrayed frequently in the nineteenth century, its features hotly debated. Fake gallop has legs extended fore and rear, close to parallel to the ground. Experiment 1 sampled real artworks depicting horses and Experiment 2 used silhouettes of horses. In both, reports of amount of movement increased from alt to fake gallop. In Experiment 1 similar results were obtained from novices and equestrians (‘experts’ familiar with horses). The extreme leg extension in fake gallop may suggest high speed, as Arnheim suggested. However, true gallop includes legs curled close together under the body—a ‘running pony’ pose—so both extremes of extension may suggest high speed. In Experiment 2, novices judged fake gallop unrealistic despite giving high movement scores. We suggest its depiction may be metaphoric, meaning a deliberately false item has relevant features of a referent. For the artworks, the amount of movement reported correlated positively but quite modestly with aesthetic appreciation, but for the silhouettes, the correlation was reversed. We suggest expression can be positive for many horse poses.","PeriodicalId":42895,"journal":{"name":"CERAMICS-ART AND PERCEPTION","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-10-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78297288","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-01-01DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-56874-4_5
N. Swanepoel
{"title":"Spirit Guards: A Squad of Ceramic Dogs in South Africa","authors":"N. Swanepoel","doi":"10.1007/978-3-319-56874-4_5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-56874-4_5","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42895,"journal":{"name":"CERAMICS-ART AND PERCEPTION","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83627246","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 1900-01-01DOI: 10.1016/b978-0-12-460480-3.50011-0
Martin Kerby
{"title":"Remembrance of things past","authors":"Martin Kerby","doi":"10.1016/b978-0-12-460480-3.50011-0","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-12-460480-3.50011-0","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42895,"journal":{"name":"CERAMICS-ART AND PERCEPTION","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"77984875","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"艺术学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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