An introduction to the experimental psychology of beauty / by C.W. Valentine.

  • Valentine, C. W. (Charles Wilfred), 1879-1964.
Date:
1919
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An introduction to the experimental psychology of beauty / by C.W. Valentine. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    too often tends to result in a discussion as to the application of the term beautiful. In applying the Method of Experiment to the study of our appreciation of the beautiful, it is well to commence with simple elements. For example, we may first take a number of single colours, or of uncoloured lines or figures, and see how people are affected by them. A picture involves so many com- plex features, such as colour, form, meaning, associa- tion, memory of the original (if a copy), knowledge of the artist’s reputation, or of his other work, and so on. Now all these points are of great interest, but it is difficult to say to what extent each factor is of influence in determining our judgment of the whole. By taking simple colours or forms, however, we reduce the number of these complexities, though we do not by any means get rid of them all. More especially we are able to vary simple objects, such as coloured papers or lines, in many different ways, and to see how these variations afiect the observer. Thus we may hope, in time; to learn all that can be learned about the beauty of that kind of object as it appeals tc men in its isolated form. Afterwards we may have a, better chance of dealing with more complex objects into which the colours or forms enter as constituent elements. Of course we shall find great changes in the effects of colours or lines when they are built up into complex arrangements such as pictures. But we may reasonably expect some of their most striking and characteristic effects to remain even then. And we also sometimes find similar mental attitudes when a person looks at a picture, or listens to a sonata, as occur when he looks at a single colour or hears a single chord. Thus in studying the enjoyment of simple objects and their effects we are really studying, given the right attitude on the part of the observer, a very much simplified esthetic experience.