Kitsch and Perception: Towards a New ‘Aesthetic from Below’

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.

A Functional Model of Kitsch and Art: Linking Aesthetic Appreciation to the Dynamics of Social Motivation

“…With this statement Martindale clearly refers to the “antitraditional tradition” (Cǎlinescu, 1987, p. 66) of Modernism. We make a case that a modernist view has placed its mark on the most influential theories of empirical aesthetics (Ortlieb and Carbon, 2018). For instance, in Aesthetics and Psychobiology Berlyne (1971) stated that collative stimulus properties such as novelty, surprise, and ambiguity form the “essential ingredients of art and of whatever else is aesthetically appealing” (p. viii).…”

“…This limitation in terms of emotional valence allows for us to discriminate between an unclouded positive response to kitsch and the multifaceted experience of “being moved” (Menninghaus et al, 2015), that typically involves mixed emotions (Weth et al, 2015) along with indicators for negative affect on a physiological level (Wassiliwizky et al, 2017). Hence, we suggest to modify Kulka’s first precondition as follows: Above all, “kitsch requires a subject matter with a positive emotional charge” (Ortlieb and Carbon, 2018, p. 6). The subject First Kiss (Figure 1A), for example, seems particularly promising with regard to affective impact since it borrows on several highly emotional themes including first love, friendship, childhood innocence, and, of course, nostalgia.…”

“…Altogether, we hypothesize that the aesthetic appeal of kitsch consists of (A) emotionally rich content with a positive valence in combination with the inherently rewarding experience of (B) perceptual (effortless identifiability), and (C) conceptual fluency (standard associations). Jointly, these three components offer a reasonable explanation for its great popularity: Kitsch is liked simply because it provides instant and effortless emotional gratification (see Benjamin, 1982/2002; Cǎlinescu, 1987; Kulka, 1996; Menninghaus, 2009; Ortlieb and Carbon, 2018). When we talk about kitsch and art it seems that we are dealing with two different kinds of aesthetic appreciation that can be reliably separated in terms of processing dynamics (Graf and Landwehr, 2015) and the role of positive content-related associations (Ortlieb and Carbon, 2018): a fluent one, consisting of a spontaneous, inherently pleasurable affective response and general accessibility (kitsch); and a disfluent one, that may yield new insights but requires previous knowledge and cognitive elaboration (art; Belke et al, 2015).…”

“…6The present article is mainly concerned with the psychological effects of kitsch. For a more detailed analysis of kitsch-related stimulus properties see Ortlieb and Carbon (2018).…”

“…According to Albrecht and Carbon, the fluency-positivity link only applies to stimuli with a positive valence; in the case of aversive stimuli, fluency increases negativity. Regarding kitsch, this particular limitation of the HFM is not an issue, since kitsch classification presupposes content with a positive valence (Ortlieb and Carbon, 2018).…”