The Influence of Presentation Format and Viewer Training in the Visual Arts on the Perception of Pictorial and Aesthetic Qualities of Paintings

Abstract

The comparability of viewers' responses to slide-projected and computer-generated images of nine paintings by renowned artists to those obtained from individuals experiencing the originals in the galleries of the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art was investigated. The influence of training in the visual arts upon evaluative judgments made under the three presentation formats was also assessed. Specifically, art-trained and untrained participants in each format condition rated each artwork on sixteen measures of physical and structural characteristics, novelty of content, and aesthetic qualities. Analyses revealed significant differences in the judged hedonic value of the originals as contrasted with the two types of reproduction, whereas trained and untrained participants' evaluations of the pictorial qualities of the artworks were comparable across presentation formats. Findings are discussed in terms of a facsimile-accommodation hypothesis proposed by the authors.

On personality and piloerection: Individual differences in aesthetic chills and other unusual aesthetic experiences.

“…Fluid intelligence and the creativity of people's college majors had little to do with aesthetic chills scores; gender primarily predicted feeling touched rather than chills. A large literature shows that expertise moderates many aesthetic processes, such as how people perceive, understand, evaluate, and experience art ( Hekkert & van Wieringen, 1996a, Hekkert & van Wieringen, 1996bLocher, Smith, & Smith, 2001;Parsons, 1987;Silvia, 2006;Silvia & Berg, in press). People with more expertise in the arts reported feeling aesthetic chills more often, but it remains for future work to discern why.…”

Comparison of engagement and emotional responses of older and younger adults interacting with 3D cultural heritage artefacts on personal devices

“…The physical artefacts were taken out of the museum setting to ensure that each modality of artefacts would be shown in the same space so participants can evaluate them under consistent conditions. In addition, since past studies have indicated that the museum environment influences emotions (Locher et al 2001;Taylor 2001), showing all the modalities, including the physical modality, outside of the museum can further demonstrate the potential for the artefacts to influence emotional connections.…”

“…Previous studies have claimed that emotional responses to artworks and objects in museums are influenced by a museum's environment and seeing original objects (Gadsby 2011;Locher et al 2001;Taylor 2001). In addition, these emotional responses are considered the most important part of understanding museum objects (Taylor 2009).…”

“…Another study by Locher et al (2001) investigated the responses of seventy-nine participants to nine original oil paintings at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art and their slide-projected and digital image copies. Of the volunteers, subsets of twenty were created for each format condition in both art-trained and untrained backgrounds.…”

“…However, it was also found that the museum environment and display methods may have contributed to these emotions (Gadsby 2011;Locher et al 2001;Taylor 2001). …”