Dynamics and expression in visual perception and art: emotions as relational structures

From a phenomenological perspective, the entire observable world is a bearer of feelings, as in the case of a cheerful morning or a sullen sky. The issue of expressive qualities offers the possibility of considering emotions and feelings not only as events internal to the subjective sphere, as is implicit in traditional psychology, but also as ‘perceptual structures’ that can take place across the relationship between the observer and the observed. This chapter aims to provide an organic overview of the main empirical findings in visual perception research in the area of expressive qualities. The focus is on the concept of 'relationship', which is presented as an organising tool capable of encompassing a variety of phenomena in a unified perspective. Indeed, the expressive relationships can be observed in a wide range of manifestations, in both static and dynamic scenarios. They are, for example, the relationship of an object to its environmental reference system (e.g., in the cases of obliquity and gravitational force, or self-propelled motion), the internal articulation of an object (e.g., as in different lines, shapes and trajectories), the relationship between two or more objects (e.g., the principle of ‘faceness’ and dynamic displays such as biological, causal, or intentional patterns), and the whole pattern of relations between various objects (e.g., the ‘atmospheres’). Furthermore, the same relationship between the observer and the observed can vary both on the side of the observed, who can exhibit different degrees of ‘demanding character’, and on the side of the observer, who can adopt different modes of perception, such as a ‘physiognomic’ or a ‘geometric-technical’ mode. In conclusion, the recognition of the role of relations as meaningful perceptual constraints has the important advantage that many expressive events can be operationalised and investigated using the classical methods of experimental psychophysics and experimental phenomenology - by systematically isolating and manipulating the variables involved. The growing body of work in visual aesthetics and in the topic of animacy and social perception reported here suggests that the study of expressiveness deserves a relevant place in experimental psychology alongside other more traditional areas of visual perception research.