ART EVOKES EMOTIONS IN HUMAN BODY

TURKU : People all around the world create and consume art, however, the mechanisms underlying the feelings that art evokes remain poorly characterised. A new study reveals how visual art influences our emotions. The research subjects viewed various types of artworks and described how the art made them feel in their bodies. The researchers observed the subjects’ eye movements as they looked at the art. “Seeing the art elicited a wide range of feelings and emotions in people, Even though many of the pieces depicted sad or scary topics, the emotions that the people experienced were mainly positive. The bodily sensations evoked by art also contributed to the emotions: the stronger the body’s reaction was to the artwork, the stronger were the emotions experienced by the subject,” says Professor Lauri Nummenmaa from the

Turku PET Centre at the University of Turku, Finland. “Our results suggest that our bodies have a significant role in the aesthetic experience. This is why the emotions and bodily sensations evoked by art can be used, for example, in mental health rehabilitation and care,” Professor Nummenmaa recounts. “In the artworks, human figures were the most interesting subject and were looked at the most. People have a tendency to empathise with each other’s emotions and this is probably also the case when we view human figures in art.

The human emotions presented in art pieces can be absorbed by the viewer unnoticed, through so-called mirroring,” says Academician Riitta Hari from Aalto University. Altogether 1,186 people from different countries participated in the study and they assessed the emotions evoked by over 300 artworks. The research was conducted with online surveys and eye movement recordings in the laboratory.