Arnheim, Gestalt and Art

Arnheim, Gestalt and Art is the first book-length discussion of the powerful thinking of the psychologist of art, Rudolf Arnheim. Written as a complete overview of Arnheim's thinking, it covers fundamental issues of the importance of psychological discussion of the arts, the status of gestalt psychology, the various sense modalities and media, and developmental issues. By proceeding in a direction from general to specific and then proceeding through dynamic processes as they unfold in time (creativity, development, etc.), the book discovers an unappreciated unity to Arnheim's thinking. Not content to simply summarize Arnheim's theory, however, Arnheim, Art, and Gestalt goes on to enrich (and occasionally question) Arnheim's findings with the contemporary results of gestalt-theoretical research from around the world, but especially in Italy and Germany. The result is a workable overview of the psychology of art with bridges built to contemporary research, making Arnheim's approach living and sustainable.

The author is a professional art historian but began his career at the University of Michigan where he met Rudolf Arnheim. Subsequently he studied experimental psychology with Alain Gilchrist and then devoted himself to art history. Never losing his interest in psychology, he has cultiavated relationships with European psychologists whose works provide much of the impetus of this book. He has gone on to write several professional papers on the thinking of Arnheim, gestalt psychology, not to mention works on Rennaissance and Baroque painting and perspective theory, including editing a book on the art patronage of the Della Rovere Family, The Della Rovere: The Creation and Maintenance of a Noble Identity.

Why Arnheim? Why Gestalt?.- Arnheim and Different Approaches to the Psychology of Art.- Expression, Symbolism and Visual Thinking.- The Senses, Perceptual Objects and Their Dynamics.- The Notorious Gestalt Brain Model.- The Dynamics of Pictorial, Sculptural and Architectural Form.- The Dynamics of Pantomimic Form.- The Dynamics of Musical Form.- The Dynamics of Poetic Form.- Art in Comparative Perspective: Children, Adults, Cultures.- The Dynamics of Microgenetic Artistic Development.- Individual Artistic Development.- The Dynamics of Differential and Psychopathological Artistic Form.- The Dynamics of Cultural-Perceptual Artistic Form.- Objective Percepts, Objective Values.- Conclusion.