Art and Psychology:

Perception and
Symbolism
OB JEC TI VES
a. Relate the study of art to the field of psychology.
b. Interpret Gestalt Psychology and Psychoanalysis as theories of
art and beauty.
c. Identify artworks, styles and artists that abide with the
psychological theories.
d. Formulate a psychological approach to Art
Appreciation.
e. Evaluate the merit or demerit of works of art based on
psychological principles.
f. Apply Psychoanalysis in understanding the personality of the
artists and the symbolic meanings of their artworks.
g. Make an artwork which applies the psychological theory of
perception.
h. Be sensitive to the individual personalities of the artists.
 VIDEO S
1.“Dancing Walk Like an Egyptian by the Bangles,” in
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27 WSpWai QBBC.

2.“Hotel California Reversed,” in https://www.you

tube.com/watch?v=Qmh W5QiMymw.

LECTURES
1. Gestalt Principles Applied to Visual Arts
2. Perception of Space: Perspective
3. Symbolic Meaning: Psychoanalyzing the Art
and the Artist
4. Subliminal Suggestions and Escapism in
Music
 LECTURE 1
Gestalt Principles
Applied to Visual Art
 GESTAL Psychology of Perception
T OF SIMPLICITY OR LAW OF PRAGNANZ
LAW
“Every stimulus is perceived in its simplest
form.” “The whole is greater than the sum
of its parts.”
Reduction of visual form into greater simplicity

Seeing the simplest form (black circular line)

as an assembly of parts of a complex whole (an
 FIGURE A N D GROUND
FIGURE Positive Space
GROUND Negative Space
The focus at any given moment is the figure.
Everything that is not figure is ground.

Leonardo
The Mona Lisa
The woman is the
figure, the landscape
at her back is the
ground
 Malevich
Red Square

The red square is the

figure, the white is the
ground

The title of the painting

is
about the figure.
 Malevich, Black
Rectangle,
Blue
Triangle

The blue triangle is

the upper figure, the
black rectangle is the
lower figure and the
white is the ground
Malevich
White on White

CAMOUFLAGE
The white figure blends
with the white ground

The title of the painting is

both about the figure
and the ground.
 Klein

Monochrome
Blue, 1959

The figure is identical

with the
ground.

MINIMALIST

COLORFIELD
PAINTING
ZEN PAINTING
Landscape

MINIMALISM
Less figure
more ground
Painting by
Alfonso Ossorio

HORROR VACUI PAINTING

More figure, less ground
 SIMILARITY

Things which share visual characteristics such as shape,

size, color, texture, or value will be seen as belonging
together in the viewer’s mind.

Current
Riley

The curve lines are

seen as forming a
whole
 PROXIMIT
Y
Objects or shapes that are close to one
another appear to form a group

Cezanne
Still Life Group of
with apples and
Apples group of
green fruits.
 CLOSURE
Visual connection or continuity between sets of elements
which do not actually touch each other in a composition.

Picasso
The Squirrel The mind
connects the
line to form
the squirrel
 OBJECTIFICATION OR
CATEGORICAL ASPECTION

The visual form is

categorized as a thing
when seen as an imitation
or a representation.

“We see a representational painting as an abstract

configurations of forms, but we also see through
the forms to the reality which they represent.”
(Osborn, Art Appreciation, 1990)
What do
you see?
Japanese

Drawing
 HOW TO DRAW A CAT?
Gombrich, Art and Appearance: A Study on the
Psychology of Pictorial Representation
 HOW TO DRAW A CAT?
Exupery, The Little Prince
What is this?

It’s a hat!
 What is this?

It’s a boa constrictor digesting an

elephant!
Rabbit
or
duck?
 Old
woman
or
young
lady?
 What do
you
see?

Picasso,
Portrait of David
Henry Kahweiller

ANALYTIC
CUBISM
 LECTURE 2
The Perception of
Space: Perspective
 PROJECTION
The process of transporting the visual
image of an object into the picture plane
CAM E R A O B S CU R A
 K I N D S OF
PROJECTION

Flat
Perspectiv
e
FLAT PROJECTION
 FLAT
PROJECTIO
N
Pollock, Black and White, 1952 FLA
PROJECTION T
 Flat
Projection
in Egyptian
Painting
Scroll Painting, Egyptian Book of the Dead, 2,500 BC
PERSPECTIVE PROJECTION

Seurat,
Sunday
Afternoon in
the Island
of La
Grande
Jatte
PRINCIPLE OF

PERSPECTIVE
The nearer
the object the
bigger it looks,
and the farther
the smaller
John Warren
Stairway to
Heaven
1984
PE R SP ECTIVE
VIEWS
 PERSPECTIVE V IE WS
Horizon High

Bird’s Eye View

Eye-Level View

Worm’s Eye View

Horizon
Low
 Chinese
Landscape
Tang
Dynasty
6
18 AD
 Yuan Jian
Island of the
Immortals
(Penglai Shan)
1708
 Ma Yuan
Singing and
Dancing: Peasants
Returning
f
rom Work
 Wyeth
Christina’s
World
Amorsolo
Sunset
Constable
Hay Wain
 Bierstad
t Sierra
Nevada
Mountains,
California
1898
 Van Gogh
Chair with
a Pipe
Giorgio Di Chirico
The Quiet Town
1916
 “MOTHER CHURCH” ALMA MATER
Holy Roman Catholic Church (Beloved Mother)
 ENVIRONMENTAL ART OR EARTHWORK
Berks, Great Buffalo Herd Monument, 1994, Wyoming USA
1.8 Square Miles Natural Grassland Park
 GEOGLYPHS Drawings on the Earth Surface
Nazca Lines, Peru, 450-650 AD, span up to 270 meters
Total of 162 designs covering 500 square kilometer
 LINEAR
PE R SP ECTIVE
DRAWING
 STRUCTURE OF
LINEAR PERSPECTIVE
One-Point Perspective

Horizon
Vanishing .Poi
nt
 Two-Point Perspective
. .
 Three-point Perspective
.

. .
Canaletto
Arrival of French
Ambassador
1735
 Jose Honorato Lozano, View of the Entrance from
San Sebastian Street to Our Lady of Carmen Church,
1862
 Massacio
The Trinity
1425

First painting
which applied
linear perspective
Dali, The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory
Degas
The Dance
Class
MULTI-POINT PERSPECTIVE
 Bihzad
Laila and Majnun
at School, 1494

PERSIAN

PAINTIN
G
No application
of perspective
Aqa Mirak
1524
JAPANESE
PAINTING
AND PRINT

Nanban Screen
16th Century
ATMOSPHERIC PERSPECTIVE
 Picasso, Les
Demoiselles
d’ Avignon
1907

FLA
T
PROJECTIO
N
Picasso
The Three

Musicians
Matisse, Le Robe Persanne
PERSPECTIVE DRAWING IN ARCHITECTURAL
RE ND ERING
PERSPECTIVE DRAWING
IN INTERIOR DE S I G N
 ORGANIC
ARCHITECTURE

Wright
Fallingwater
1939
 ACTIVITY
How to draw a
perspective?
. .
 LECTURE 10.3
Symbolic Meaning:
Psychoanalizing the
Artist
and the Art
UE. DR. ALLAN C. ORATE
 SIGMUND FREUD 1856-
1939
Father of Psychoanalysis
Theory of the Subconscious Mind

Theory of
the
Collective
Consciousness

CARL
 PSYCHOANALYTIC
THEORY OF BEAUTY
Psychological
State of
SUBCONSCIOUS
Mind Perception BEAUT
Y
UGLY
Conceptio
n
 PERCEPTION
OF UGLINESS

TRAUMA
 TRAUMA
IN PERSONAL
EXPERIENCE
 BABY’S
WONDERFUL
EXPERIENCE
OF MUSIC
Kalo
The Dream

TRAUMATIC

EXPERIENCE
Dali, The Dream
Dali, Daddy Long Legs of the Evening
SALVADOR DALI (1904-1989)
Dali, Composition with Boiled Beans
Dali, Face
of a Great
Masturbato
r
 Chagall
I and
My
Village

CHILDHOOD

MEMORY
 Chagall
Self-
Portrait
with Seven
Fi
ngers

SUBCONSC
IOUS
DESIRE
 LEONARDO
DA VINCI

Leonardo
Self-Portrait
1512

Attributed to Leonardo, Self-Portrait

(Lucan Portrait of Leonardo), 1506
BIRTH: April 14, 1452
DEATH: May 2, 1519

FATHER: Pierro Froucino di

Antonio da Vinci, a legal notary

MOTHER: Caterina, a peasant

Leonardo da Vinci was a

repressed homosexual.
WHO WAS THE MODEL?
• Wife of Francesco del Giocondo
• Madonna Lisa de Gherardini
• Duchess Isabella de Aragon
• Leonardo da Vinci himself

Leonardo
The Mona Lisa
(La Gioconda)
1503-07
According to Lilian Schwartz, a computer scientist, the digital analysis
of the facial features of Leonardo and Mona Lisa align perfectly.
The Monalisa
is a self-portrait
of Leonardo da
Vinci himself
trying to realize
subconsciously
his desired
personality as
a woman.
Book written in 1910 by Freud
about his psychoanalysis of the
sexual life of Leonardo da
Vinci based on his paintings,
also entitled A Psychosexual
Study of Infantile
Reminiscence

“Leonardo da Vinci was

a repressed homosexual.”
Had no children
Never been married
No female companion
 LEONARDO DESPISED THE SEX ACT BY
MAN AND WOMAN FOR REPRODUCTION

"The act of procreation and everything

that has any relation to it is so disgusting
that human beings would soon die out if
it were not a traditional custom and if
there were no pretty faces and sensuous
dispositions.“
 Leonardo
John the Baptist
1503

Model was Gian Giacomo

Caprotti da Oreno or Salai, a
male servant and assistant
of Leonardo for more
than twenty years
 Attributed to Leonardo
Bacchus (St. John in
the Wilderness)
1516

Model was Salai, shown

as a handsome young man
In 1476, when Leonardo
was 22 years old, he was
accused of sodomy. He
was charged of having
homosexual interaction
with Jacopo Saltarelli, a
model and a notorious
male prostitute.
MOST PAINTING ATRIBUTED TO LEONARDO ARE OF WOMEN
24 women-paintings out of a total of 41 paintings
SUBJECTED TO
PSYCHOANALYSI
S BY FREUD

Leonardo
Virgin and the
Child with
St. Anne
1510
VULTUR
E
 EGYPTIAN MYTHOLOGY
MOTHER GODDESS MUT
Queen of the Goddesses
and the Lady of Heaven

Heiroglyphics
“MOTHER”

Mut wears a vulture

headdress whose extension
looks like the male phallus.
 “It seems that I should
occupy myself with the
vulture.
I remember, when I was still in the
cradle, a vulture came down to
me. It opened my mouth with its
tail and struck me with the
tail against my lips.”

LEONARDO
 The tail of a vulture forcing
itself inside the mouth of the
baby Leonardo, represented in
the painting as the baby Jesus, is
equivalent to our idea of fellatio.

Therefore, Leonardo’s
fantasy about vulture, and its
occurence in his painting is an
indication of his “repressed
homosexuality” manifested
during infancy.

FREUD
The perception
of oneself is
conditioned by
the subconscious
wish or desire to
be beautiful
 LECTURE 10.4
Subliminal Suggestion
and Escapism in Art
and Music

UE. DR. ALLAN C. ORATE

 CONDITIONING A N D
SUBLIMINAL SUGGESTION

In Commercial Advertisements
and in Slow Rock Music
How to subliminally
advertise
popcorn?
 WARNING:
Cigarette smoking is dangerous to your health
John Warren
Stairway to
Heaven
SUBLIMINAL SUGGESTION IN SLOW ROCK MUSIC
 S t a i r w a y to
Heaven

LE D
Z E P P E LIN
“Yes there are two paths you can go by but in the
long run, and there’s still time to change the road
you’re on….
H eaven
S t a i r w a y to

Z E P P E LIN
LE D

“Glory…. Woes…. Here’s to my sweet Satan, the one

who made a path. For it makes me sad whose power
is Satan….
 H o tel
California

EAGLE
S
“On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair
Warm smell of collitas, rising up through the air
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light.”
C a lifo rn ia
H otel

S
EAGLE

"Satan, he organized his own religion...well, he knows

he should...so nice it was delicious...it cooks it in a vat
he fixed for his son whom he gives away."
SUBLIMINAL SUGGESTION IN SLOW ROCK MUSIC
 Escapist
Theory of Music
ARTHUR
SCHOPENHAUE
R (1788-1860)
SCHOPENHAUER
Music is a way
of escape from
the suffering
of human life.
 REA ILLUSOR
L Y LIFE
Suffering
LIFE Comfort
Pain Pleasur
MU e
“Without music
life would be
a mistake.”
“Life is good, death is better, but the best
is not to have been born at all.”
(SCHOPENHAUER)

Reszo Seress (Music)

Laszlo Javor (Lyrics)
Gloomy Sunday
1933
 ACTIVITY A N D
ASSESMENT

UE. DR. ALLAN C. ORATE

 ACTIVITY
AND
ASSESMENT
▪ Individual Activity. Draw a box according
to the rules of linear perspective. Refer to
the Power Point presentation for the
instructions.
▪ Write a essay about music and human life
reflecting on the musical
composition “Gloomy Sunday”

UE. DR. ALLAN C. ORATE

 ACTIVITY
How to draw a
perspective?
. .
 R U B R I C S F O R ACTIVITY 10
Excellent Good Fair Needs
CRITERIA Improvemen
(16-20 points) (11-15 points) (6-10 t (1-5)
points)

The application of
The application The concept the concept is The concept
Application of of the concept is correctly correct but only is
perspective is correct in applied to the in the small part wrongly
the whole large part of the of the applied to the
composition composition. composition whole of the
composition

The composition Some instruction The composition No instruction

Following the follows all the are not followed in does not follow are followed
instruction instructions. the composition many of the in the
instructions. composition.

The whole There are some Many parts of The whole

Aesthetic composition is parts of the the composition composition is
value of the very pleasing to composition that are not not pleasing to
composition look at. are not pleasing pleasing to see. look at.
to see.