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In this study, we use paintings that canonically and/or visually belong to the Abstract Expressionist movement to study how the brain processes different forms of color and luminance. Subjects viewed 240 unique images in the experiment in a block design. All of the paintings used in the experiment were painted by the artists in color. Half of the 240 images were three styles of painting in their original (saturated) forms, and the other half were desaturated versions of the same paintings. In our analysis, we compared saturated Abstract Expressionist paintings to their desaturated counterparts - both as a group and within the Gesture and Color Field styles. We also compared the desaturated Gesture paintings to their saturated counterparts because many of the Gesture painters created work with little to no color. Through these contrasts, we show that different regions in the brain process color and luminance. Notably, we show that (1) the brain processes color in the Gesture and Color Field paintings differently (2) color is capable of producing significant activation in the amygdala and (3) the color and luminance in the Gesture paintings produce strikingly different patterns of significant activation.

Ruwe manier describes loose painting, characterized by visible brushwork that is casually or even crudely exposed. Although Rembrandt did not invent ruwe manier, his late style is practically synonymous with highly developed surface texture. The goal of this study is to help develop historical context for understanding Rembrandt’s characteristic approach to thick paint, as well as to attempt to locate what is so distinctive about Rembrandt’s expressive brushwork. The ruwe manier is particularly prominent in Rembrandt’s 1658 Self-Portrait housed in the Frick Collection in New York City. The Frick Self-Portrait thus operates as a case study and as a point of departure from which to discuss notions of the rough manner in this period. Through detailed formal analysis and primary texts, I propose how the emotional impact of impasto, as understood in Rembrandt’s time, might have served as motivation for Rembrandt’s painting approach in his later years. In the last section, I apply these discussions about Rembrandt’s ruwe manier to a current neuroscience research about visual and tactile perception. This final, exploratory chapter is more of an inquiry of neuroaesthetic methodology than of Rembrandt’s painting. I ultimately suggest that the assertion of self is manifest not only in the Rembrandt’s presentation of himself as a subject, but also as it is imbued on a conscious and fundamental level—in the very tactility of the paint itself. / text

Visual art is important for humans. Most people have an interest in visiting art museums, and they spend both time and money on artworks. Appreciating visual art can have an effect on several psychological states, such as pleasure, emotions of wonder, awe, and the sublime. However, the question of what constitutes an aesthetic experience and what mechanisms that are involved in experiencing visual art, are still not fully understood. The discipline neuroaesthetics, which is a subfield of cognitive neuroscience, investigates the biology behind aesthetic experience and aesthetic appreciation. The aim of this thesis is to give an overview of the neural processes involved in experiencing visual art, and to explore how it could be related to components of emotional well-being. As such, neuroimaging studies addressing aesthetic experience and emotional processing are reviewed and discussed. This thesis found a relationship between the neural processes that operate behind a broad range of positive valanced emotions and aesthetic experience. The findings show that experiencing visual art that are aesthetically appreciated by the viewer, induces feelings of hedonic niceness or pleasant well-being and is associated with increased activity in the reward circuit. How aesthetic appreciation affects our emotional and cognitive states respectively and enhances our physiological and psychological well-being remains to be investigated. Understanding the underlying neurobiological processes involved when experiencing visual art is important due to its implications on positive health and well-being.

Title: Aesthetic judgement from philosophical, psychological, and neuroscientific perspectives Author: Tereza Hadravová Department: Aesthetics Department Supervisor: prof. PhDr. Vlastimil Zuska, CSc. Abstract: How does science relate to aesthetics? This question usually reads as a question concerning scientific contribution to aesthetics. Philosophers are most- ly skeptical about the application of scientific results in their domain, wheras psychologists and, in recent years, neuroscientists are optimistic. In the thesis, I argue that both of these positions, in their extreme versions, impede the mutual enrichment of science and aesthetics. The starting-point of the thesis is George Dickie's radical claim that no scientific information has ever been relevant for aesthetics. The claim, I argue, is firmly embedded in the aftermath of logical positivism: it is related to the e↵ort to "rescue" aesthetics from progressive eli- mination. As a consequence, most of analytic aesthetics discourse has ignored psychologically informed conception of aesthetic judgement, including some fine distinctions that such a conception enables, e.g. the di↵erence between judgements about pleasure and aesthetic judgements. The distinctions are further elaborated and, in the last part of the thesis, the results of this elaboration are...

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With the growth of fashion consumption through websites and e-tailers, the question of when and why consumers engage in shopping without the intent to purchase has gained new relevance. A novel framework for understanding this phenomenon comes from studies examining the neural basis of aesthetic appreciation. Previous studies in neuroaesthetics have identified brain regions associated with value and reward, including the nucleus accumbens (NAcc) and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC), as involved during attractiveness judgments even when no physical product is consumed. Along with research demonstrating that attractive stimuli can serve as economic incentives to motivate behavior, these results suggest that the experience of aesthetic appreciation can have value in and of itself, similar to the hedonic value previously proposed to explain shopping without the intent to purchase. The proposed study examines whether fashion browsing can be considered a type of aesthetic experience. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) will be used to measure neural activation as female subjects (N=50) view fashion images. If fashion browsing is a type of aesthetic experience, we would expect it serve as an economic incentive and motivate work. Additionally, the NAcc and VMPFC during browsing should show increasing activation with increasing attractiveness of fashion content. Individual differences in self-reported fashion browsing behavior will correlate with the degree of neural differentiation to fashion content such that individuals who spend more time per week browsing will have higher BOLD signal NAcc and VMPFC activation during the experimental task. Fashion browsing as an aesthetic experience could serve as a crucial mechanism to develop a greater understanding of an important aspect of the consumer shopping experience.

Sur le fil invisible reliant la temporalité tridimensionnelle de l'ancestral, du présent et du devenir, se profilent les pas du compositeur. Parcours individuel, traversée sociale, épopée humaine, l'acte créatif émane des profondeurs du ressenti de l'être et des profondeurs de la collectivité sociale. Notre recherche se veut un voyage en vue d'une reconstitution du parcours du dire musical en tant qu'expression de l'être impliquant culturalité et subjectivité compositionnelles et aboutissant à l'œuvre musicale en tant qu'entité-signe. En consacrant notre réflexion aux musiques modales arabo-musulmanes de tradition orale, nous développerons dans ce cadre une théorie des strates englobant le processus compositionnel dans sa totalité en le considérant comme un processus préparé par une phase pré-œuvre, élaboré en une phase poïétique et aboutissant à l'émergence d'une entité-signe porteuse de sens. La phase pré-œuvre met à contribution les strates profondes, à savoir la strate psychoperceptive empreinte des composantes immatérielles du ressenti modal, la strate neuroesthétique impliquant les prédispositions génétiques et l'impact du milieu culturel pour une imprégnation modale et la strate d'appropriation du mode d'expression propre au langage modal. La phase poïétique s'articule ensuite autour de l'évolution des strates d'influence constituées d'une strate des facteurs motivationnels, d'une strate permettant l'acheminement vers une amorce de l'œuvre et d'une strate de transduction aboutissant à l'œuvre. Après l'étude de la phase pré-œuvre et de la phase poïétique, nous entreprendrons une analyse sémiotique de l'œuvre en tant qu'entité-signe porteuse d'une mosaïque de sens. / On the invisible thread connecting the three-dimensional temporality of the ancestral, the present and the becoming, the figure of the composer looms large. At once an individual trajectory, a social crossing, a human epic, the creative act emanates from the depths of the being and from those of the social community. This research aims to be like a journey where we seek to reconstitute the path of musical telling as an expression of the being, involving both the cultural and subjective dimensions of composition, and leading to the musical work as a sign-entity. In this framework, by devoting our reflection to Arab-Muslim modal music of the oral tradition, a theory of strata will be developed to include the totality of the compositional process considered as a process prepared by a pre-work phase, elaborated into a poietic phase and leading to the emergence of a meaningful sign-entity. The pre-work phase engages deep strata, namely the psychoperceptive stratum imprinted with the immaterial components of modal feeling, the neuroaesthetic stratum implying genetic predispositions and the importance of cultural environment for modal impregnation, and the stratum of the appropriation of the expressive mode specific to modal language. The poietic phase is then organised around the development of the affluence strata constituted by a stratum of motivational factors, a stratum enabling the progression towards the onset of a work and a transduction stratum leading to the work. After the study of the pre-work phase and the poietic phase, we undertake a semiotic analysis of the work as a sign-entity carrying a mosaic of meanings.

Text in English / The present paper analyses the neuroanatomical and neuropsychological backgrounds of art reception and art creation in modern visual art and creative processes. It critically presents two models of aesthetic experience to provide a comprehensive theoretical basis for the discussion. The research purpose is to show that with increasing experience and expertise the referential frame of the aesthetic judgment is changing and that neural processes involved in object recognition provide a starting point for visual aesthetics. Thus, the investigation focuses on constructing and testing neuropsychological theories that fall in the domain called 'neuroaesthetics'. These theories, in turn, serve as a starting point to formulate neural laws of art and aesthetics and aesthetic experience. Some artistic styles, such as expressionism, reflect specific neural processes. Various studies indicate correlations between hemispheric specialisation and art or creativity and show the right hemisphere plays a particular role in it. However, studies exploring the neural correlates of aesthetic preference have yielded mixed results. Furthermore, neuroimaging studies have proved that different categories of modern artworks are processed in different areas of the brain. These diverging results will be discussed in a critical assessment of the two models of aesthetic experience. Besides, the question of identifying exclusive neural correlates of aesthetic preference will be raised. Comparing amateurs and experts has revealed the more reduced the cortical activation, the more efficiently it works. Biological and neuropsychological factors of creativity point out the meaning of the activation level, cognitive inhibition and prefrontal cortex. Divergent thinking differs from convergent thinking in terms of the neural level. Neurodegenerative processes and brain injuries sometimes influence the artistic output surprisingly or even launch it. Lesion studies contributing to understanding art experience will be explained. / Psychology / M.A. (Psychology)

The present paper analyses the neuroanatomical and neuropsychological backgrounds of art reception and art creation in modern visual art and creative processes. It critically presents two models of aesthetic experience to provide a comprehensive theoretical basis for the discussion. The research purpose is to show that with increasing experience and expertise the referential frame of the aesthetic judgment is changing and that neural processes involved in object recognition provide a starting point for visual aesthetics. Thus, the investigation focuses on constructing and testing neuropsychological theories that fall in the domain called 'neuroaesthetics'. These theories, in turn, serve as a starting point to formulate neural laws of art and aesthetics and aesthetic experience. Some artistic styles, such as expressionism, reflect specific neural processes. Various studies indicate correlations between hemispheric specialisation and art or creativity and show the right hemisphere plays a particular role in it. However, studies exploring the neural correlates of aesthetic preference have yielded mixed results. Furthermore, neuroimaging studies have proved that different categories of modern artworks are processed in different areas of the brain. These diverging results will be discussed in a critical assessment of the two models of aesthetic experience. Besides, the question of identifying exclusive neural correlates of aesthetic preference will be raised. Comparing amateurs and experts has revealed the more reduced the cortical activation, the more efficiently it works. Biological and neuropsychological factors of creativity point out the meaning of the activation level, cognitive inhibition and prefrontal cortex. Divergent thinking differs from convergent thinking in terms of the neural level. Neurodegenerative processes and brain injuries sometimes influence the artistic output surprisingly or even launch it. Lesion studies contributing to understanding art experience will be explained. / Psychology / M.A. (Psychology)