Most of us, if not all of us, feel that “clean and organized” pictures look best. This NYU News article, “Beauty is Simpler, and Less Special, Than We Realize” by James Devitt, encapsulates the idea in simple terms that a lot of what we assume beauty is can be predicted with simple visual features such as order and symmetry. The article highlights that the feeling of beauty could be an especially intense form of pleasure versus a separate mental category and that people can judge aesthetically very quickly. Hence beauty is not a slowly thought out process.
For our class reading, “Social Groups and Polarization of Aesthetic Values from Symmetry and Complexity” by Mather et al, talks about and shows why real world taste does not always meet in the middle. When the authors mapped out people’s preferences across symmetry and complexity, they found that many observers still share broad defaults. Preference ends up being high symmetry and moderate complexity. However, there is a twist to what people dislike and are split into two “islands”. One island leaned towards low complexity and the other high symmetry both across many complexity levels. The clearest separation was seen in dislikes which revealed a type of aesthetic polarization (Mather et al, 2023).
We had the pleasure of having Dr. Norberto Grzywacz speak during a seminar and during his lecture, he emphasized that the visual system gives us shared, fast cues like symmetry and simplicity. However, communities and experience impact where we draw the line between yes and no. His study supports that by saying that people with more exposure to art were less likely to fall into either island at all, as more varied viewing seems to keep their tastes more flexible. Secondly, from those who did end up on an island, gender was a key predictor as to which island they would land on. As seen in the paper, men were often on the symmetry island and women more in the simplicity island.
Overall, looking at both articles we see that the NYU article explains why simple rules such as order, symmetry, and simplicity feel good in general. The paper by Mathar er al. explains the why, even though there were shared rules, tastes still pull apart in everyday life. As groups converse, share their opinions and reward certain looks, the small likes turn into strong preferences. Which is why minimalist as opposed to maximalist feeds, album art styles, or décor trend can feel identity based with tastes places into camps.
Devitt, J. (2018, August 20). Beauty is simpler, and less special, than we realize. NYU News. https://www.nyu.edu/about/news-publications/news/2018/august/beauty-is-simpler--and-less-special--than-we-realize.html
Mather, K. B., Aleem, H., Rhee, Y., & Grzywacz, N. M. (2023). Social groups and polarization of aesthetic values from symmetry and complexity. Scientific reports, 13(1), 21507. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-47835-w
No comments:
Post a Comment