In a series of online and laboratory experiments involving more than 1,700 people, participants tended to associate abstract paintings with more distant times and places compared with representational paintings, suggesting that abstract art elicits greater psychological distance in viewers than representational art and therefore evokes mental states that are quantifiably more abstract than those evoked by representational art, according to a study.
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Article #20-01772: "An objective evaluation of the beholder's response to abstract and figurative art based on construal level theory," by Celia Durkin, Eileen Hartnett, Daphna Shohamy, and Eric R. Kandel.
MEDIA CONTACT: Daphna Shohamy, Columbia University, New York, NY; tel: 646-591-5956; e-mail: ds2619@columbia.edu ; Eric R. Kandel, Columbia University, New York, NY; tel: 212-853-1013; e-mail: erk5@columbia.edu
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences