Ambiguities in Art
Everyone who has ever studied art knows that one of the common characteristics of great masterpieces is that they do not make sense. For instance, just as Velazquez in Las Meninas paints a picture from an impossible viewpoint so the mirror in Manet’s Bar at the Folies-Bergere (above) provides an inaccurate reflection. The bottles are on the wrong side of the table. These visual inconsistencies and ambiguities seem to encourage a variety of responses from the viewer and, since they are rarely explained logically, are often thought to be “poetic license”, intentionally illogical. Is it likely that a great artist would include details that make no sense? And why would they do that?
Posted 10 Aug 2010: TheoryVisual Perception
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