Weight

Fra Bartolomeo, Adoration of the Christ Child, 1499, Galeria Borghese, Rome

        “Intrinsicinterest” has been found by Puffer [1] to be a factor of compositionalweight.  An area of a painting may holdthe attention of the observer either because of the subject matter – for example,the spot around the Christ child in an Adoration – or by formal complexity,intricacy, or other peculiarity. (Compare the multicolored bouquet of flowers in Manet’s Olympia.)   Thevery tininess of an object may cause a fascination capable of compensating thelight weight that would otherwise go with small size.  Also, recent experiments have suggested thatperception may be influenced by the observer’s wishes and fears.  It would be interesting out whether pictorialbalance is changed by the introduction of a highly desirable object or afrightening one.

 

Edouard Manet, Olympia, 1863, Musee d'Orsay, Paris

        Isolationmakes for weight.  The sun or moon in anempty sky will be heavier than an object of similar appearance surrounded byother things.  On the stage, isolation isknown as a means of emphasis.  Staractors often insist on not being approached too closely by others during animportant scene.

Arthur Dove, The Moon and the Sea, 1923, Curtis Galleries, Inc.

John Gielgud as Hamlet, 1944

[1]  Puffer, EthelD.  Studies in symmetry.  Psychological monographs, 1903, vol. 4, pp.467-539.

From Rudolf Arnheim, Art and Visual Perception, A Psychologyof the Creative Eye.  Berkeley and LosAngeles. University of California Press, 1969.

The Fallen Idol, 1948 (starring Ralph Richardson; director Carol Reed)

The Third Man, 1949 (starring Joseph Cotten; director Carol Reed)