The blur between art and science continues to fascinate me. These days, I'm especially intrigued with new research surrounding vision, visual perception, brain functioning (neurobiology), and how understanding these sciences can help us create art with an impact.
Think about the most
memorable paintings or photographs you've ever seen. Which ones have stuck with you over time or have made the most impact? If you have the time, take a moment and write as many of them down as you can. Note the subject matter too.
Here's what I come up with when I do this exercise:
- John Singer Sargent's "Oyster Gatherers of Cancale" and "Madame X" (figurative)
- Bob Kuhn's "Night on the Town" and "A Little to the Left"(wildlife)
- Leonardo da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" and "The Last Supper" (figurative)
- Michaelangelo's "David" and "Pieta" (figurative)
- Seurat's "Sunday in the Park" (figurative)
- Carl Rungius' "Three Old Gentlemen", "Wyoming Sage", and "Quantrell Moose" (wildlife)
- Rungius' "Lake O'Hara" (landscape)
- JW Waterhouse's "The Lady of Shallott" (figurative)
- Mary Cassatt's "Girl Arranging Her Hair" (figurative)
- Howard Pye's "Buccaneer of the Caribbean" and "The Flying Dutchman" (figurative)
I could keep going but I think you're starting to see a pattern.
It seems that for many of us, the most
memorable images we hold in our minds are those which contain people or figures. While I've observed this at art museums and shows, MIT researchers now show us this is indeed the case.
While the human brain can file away many, many images, they're not all equally memorable:
For the new study, the researchers built a collection of about 10,000 images of all kinds — interior-design photos, nature scenes, streetscapes and others. Human subjects in the study (who participated through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk program, which farms tasks out to people sitting at their own computers) were shown a series of images, some of which were repeated. Their task was to indicate, by pressing a key on their keyboard, when an image appeared that they had already seen.
Each image’s memorability rating was determined by how many participants correctly remembered seeing it.
In general, images with people in them are the most memorable, followed by images of human-scale space — such as the produce aisle of a grocery store — and close-ups of objects. Least memorable are natural landscapes, although those can be memorable if they feature an unexpected element, such as shrubbery trimmed into an unusual shape.
It's unclear from the story in the link below as to whether photos with animals were tested for memorability.
What difference does this make to us as artists?
Perhaps now we can begin to understand why 5 out of the last 6 top prize paintings in the Oil Painers of America National Juried Exhibition (at the Associate level) went to paintings depicting the human figure.
Does this mean we should all switch to depicting the human figure in our work?
Hardly, but it does give us a little insight into what attracts a viewer's attention. Seems viewers have an easier time remembering artwork that we can intimately identify with.
Whether you choose to incorporate this finding in to your own work is a personal matter. Bob Kuhn painted wildlife his entire fine art career and supported himself quite nicely, thank you very much.
I'd argue for you to avoid chasing sales - paint what's in your Soul, not simply what you think may sell.
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2011/memorable-images-0524.html
