Abstract
Here we present the viewpoint that art essentially engages the social brain, by demonstrating how art processing maps onto the social brain connectome—the most comprehensive diagram of the neural dynamics that regulate human social cognition to date. We start with a brief history of the rise of neuroaesthetics as the scientific study of art perception and appreciation, in relation to developments in contemporary art practice and theory during the same period. Building further on a growing awareness of the importance of social context in art production and appreciation, we then set out how art engages the social brain and outline candidate components of the “artistic brain connectome.” We explain how our functional model for art as a social brain phenomenon may operate when engaging with artworks. We call for closer collaborations between the burgeoning field of neuroaesthetics and arts professionals, cultural institutions and diverse audiences in order to fully delineate and contextualize this model. Complementary to the unquestionable value of art for art’s sake, we argue that its neural grounding in the social brain raises important practical implications for mental health, and the care of people living with dementia and other neurological conditions.
Highlights
PLACING ART IN THE WORLD AND IN THE BRAINWhile beauty has been the subject of philosophical enquiry since ancient times (e.g., Aristotle’s Metaphysics and Plotinus’ Enneads), aesthetics as the study of “what is sensed and imagined” was founded by the German philosopher Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten in 1735 (Baumgarten, Meditationes § CXVI, pp. 86–7)
Complementary to the unquestionable value of art for art’s sake, we argue that its neural grounding in the social brain raises important practical implications for mental health, and the care of people living with dementia and other neurological conditions
Since our aim was to provide a proof of principle, we focused mostly on seminal neuroimaging studies on visual art and visuospatial creativity that have been published in the field of neuroaesthetics
Summary
PLACING ART IN THE WORLD AND IN THE BRAINWhile beauty has been the subject of philosophical enquiry since ancient times (e.g., Aristotle’s Metaphysics and Plotinus’ Enneads), aesthetics as the study of “what is sensed and imagined” was founded by the German philosopher Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten in 1735 (Baumgarten, Meditationes § CXVI, pp. 86–7). Its emergence coincided with the Enlightenment, during which rational thought was considered the only reliable method to uncover universal truths. Through seminal publications such as The Critique of Judgment by Kant (1790), the subject of aesthetics gradually became “the nature and appreciation of beauty.”. According to Kant, beautiful art evoked universal pleasure, disconnected from personal interest. This contention was adopted as the guiding principle in the creation, as well as the cultural analysis, of the “fine arts” in Western societies throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Over the course of the twentieth century, progressive artists led a movement away from this dogma of aesthetics.
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