The Cultural Eye

Individuals seem to behold works of art in different ways. Art historians have been discussing this for over hundred years and focused on group-specific similarities, especially those based on geographic, historical or social commonalities. Michael Baxandall (1972, 1980) sharpened these ideas with his concept of a "period eye". He explains the differences in late-Gothic German and Italian early-Renaissance images with the education and every- day habits of 15th century patrons in Florence and Nuremberg. Since then and to this day there are many attempts to postulate a historical variety of culturally determined visual modalities. They are based on the analysis of artifacts and written sources. Since it is impossible to capture the act of seeing post hoc all of them necessarily remain hypothetical. This projects is based on previous studies in the world-wide first eye-tracking laboratory in an Art History Department (principal investigator: Raphael Rosenberg, art history) and deepens its collaboration with the Department for Psychological Basic Research of the University of Vienna (cooperation partner: Helmut Leder). The central element is a cross-cultural eye-tracking-study comparing Japanese and Austrian participants of similar age, gender, education and expertise. The initial hypothesis is that these countries have visual cultures that differ very much and that these differences have an impact on the perception of art. We will study how both groups behave while perceiving paintings. Austrian participants will be tested in Vienna, Japanese participants in Japan. The first part of the study will take place in eye-tracking-laboratories, the second in a genuine museum context. A newly developed eye-tracking system will allow for the very first time a laboratory-museum comparison of eye- movements during art perception. We will use a software ("Eye-Trace") that we have especially developed for the treatment of eye-tracking data from an art-historical perspective in order to focus not only on usual oculometric parameters (i.e. duration of fixations, length of saccades and heat maps) but also on the direction and structure of frequently-repeated saccades that have proven to be intrinsically correlated to the composition of art works. A trial experiment using only a small sample of Austrian and Japanese experimental subjects clearly showed culturally-determined differences. If confirmed in this project, they will be the first-ever results demonstrating empirical evidence for culturally-determined differences in art cognition. By analyzing culturally-determined differences with contemporary spectators we hope to identify the levels and factors of possible historical variances of art perception. The expected results will deeply impact the historical horizons and the acceptance of empirical methods in art history. The project will significantly contribute to develop interdisciplinary cooperation between art history and psychology and should end with an interdisciplinary conference.

We often hear that "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." When discussed in relation to art, this single phrase expands to include preference, understanding, appreciation, and any other form of engagement. But who is this beholder and how do their culture and gender shape how that beholding takes place? This study investigated how viewing behaviour, the actual movement of the eye over the artworks, differs between cultural and gender groups as well as laboratory and museum environments. The Cultural Eye In the first study, Austrian and Japanese participants viewed a wide variety of artworks and everyday photographs. We discovered differences in where the two groups focus their attention (for example foreground or background of the picture) and how their eyes move across the images. Japanese participants made shorter movements with their eyes that were more frequently vertical while Austrian participants more often moved their eyes horizontally. Austrians also focused more on the figures in the paintings while Japanese divided their attention between the figures and background more evenly. This suggests that culturally-specific behaviours, such as reading vertically or horizontally, impacts art viewing on a physical level. We also noticed culturally conditioned attitudes: Whereas Austrians apparently approach pictures like "looking at the world through a window"-the Renaissance definition of perspective, Japanese seem to view paintings in a similar way they read calligraphy. The Gendered Eye In the second study, Austrian participants were divided into groups based on gender and sexual preference. They were presented with neutral paintings (landscapes and still lives) and those containing sexualized and non-sexualized nudes. We found that, for most paintings, there are no significant differences between the way these groups perceive the artworks. This suggests that gender and sexual preferences do not play a role in viewing behaviour on a physical level, i.e. everyone's eyes move in a similar way and focus on similar areas of interest. These results take us a step closer towards understanding what internal and external factors influence viewing behaviour. The Museum Eye The third study explored cultural and gender viewing differences in a museum setting. We tested a prototype device that could record the eye movements of visitors without disturbing the natural museum experience. This prototype is still in development and did not provide the data quality that would allow an in-depth analysis of viewing behaviour. We were able to compare the duration of time spent on looking directly at the artwork and found no significant differences. The primary value of this study was to contribute to the development of new methods for conducting eye tracking studies in the museum, an important step towards enabling the study of art viewers in their most natural environment.