The role of expertise and culture in visual art appreciation

Abstract

Is art appreciation universal? Previous evidence suggests a general preference for representational art over abstract art, and a tendency to like art originating from one’s own culture more than another culture (an ingroup bias), modulated by art expertise. However, claims about universality are difficult given that most research has focused on Western populations. Across two pre-registered and statistically powered experiments, we explore the role of culture and art expertise in the aesthetic evaluation of Indian and Western paintings and dance depicting both abstract and representational content, by inviting expert and art-naïve Indian and Western participants to rate stimuli on beauty and liking. Results suggest an ingroup bias (for dance) and a preference for representational art (for paintings) exists, both modulated by art expertise. As predicted, the ingroup bias was present only in art-naïve participants, and the preference for representational art was lower in art experts, but this modulation was present only in Western participants. The current findings have two main implications: (1) they inform and constrain understanding of universality of aesthetic appreciation, cautioning against generalising models of empirical aesthetics to non-western populations and across art forms, (2) they highlight the importance of art experience as a medium to counter prejudices.

Cultural-match effect on the appreciation of traditional and contemporary visual arts: Evidence from Poland and Hong Kong.

“…Also, high art expertise might override the cultural-match effect on art appreciation. In comparison with art novices, art experts might not rely on cultural parameters in the same manner or to the same extent when perceiving or appreciating artworks (Darda & Cross, 2022). Further studies should compare people of differing art expertise (and art interest) to cross-validate the present findings.…”

“…A cultural-match effect on art appreciation has been largely supported among past studies with different methodologies (Bao et al, 2016;Darda & Cross, 2022;Trawi nski et al, 2021;Yang et al, 2019). For example, Bao et al (2016) presented Western and Chinese participants with Western and Chinese traditional paintings.…”

“…Although cultural-match effect was not found between Western and Indian paintings, it was found between Western (ballet) and Indian (Bharatanatyam) dance videos—the Western group preferred ballet whereas the Indian group preferred Bharatanatyam. One explanation for Darda and Cross’s (2022) mixed findings is that, unlike the dance stimuli that purely belonged to a traditional category, the painting stimuli consisted partly of contemporary artworks that were not as culturally distinctive. In other words, a cultural-match effect might not generalize to contemporary artworks.…”

“…While the Western group gave higher aesthetic ratings to the Western artworks than to the Chinese artworks, the Chinese group gave higher aesthetic ratings to the Chinese artworks than to the Western artworks. Recently, Darda and Cross (2022) conducted a similar study with Western and Indian participants. Although cultural-match effect was not found between Western and Indian paintings, it was found between Western (ballet) and Indian (Bharatanatyam) dance videos—the Western group preferred ballet whereas the Indian group preferred Bharatanatyam.…”

“…Overall, while artworks outside the museum are evidently processed as art by their viewers, appreciation of those artworks seems to differ from that of artworks inside the museum. The existing studies of cross-cultural art appreciation have typically presented the participants with reproductions of artworks that are normally encountered inside the museum but not outside the museum (Bao et al, 2016; Darda & Cross, 2022; Trawiński et al, 2021; Yang et al, 2019). In addition to the cultural (West vs. East) and historical (traditional vs. contemporary) factors, the present research will incorporate the distinction between painting and mural as a factor of art medium.…”