The color of fruits in photographs and still life paintings.

Still life paintings comprise a wealth of data on visual perception. Prior work has shown that the color statistics of objects show a marked bias for warm colors. Here, we ask about the relative chromatic contrast of these object-associated colors compared with background colors in still life paintings. We reasoned that, owing to the memory color effect, where the color of familiar objects is perceived more saturated, warm colors will be relatively more saturated than cool colors in still life paintings as compared with photographs. We analyzed color in 108 slides of still life paintings of fruit from the teaching slide collection of the Fogg University Art Museum and 41 color-calibrated photographs of fruit from the McGill data set. The results show that the relatively higher chromatic contrast of warm colors was greater for paintings compared with photographs, consistent with the hypothesis.

Relationship between reflectance and degree of polarization in the VNIR-SWIR: A case study on art paintings with polarimetric reflectance imaging spectroscopy.

We study the relationship between reflectance and the degree of linear polarization of radiation that bounces off the surface of an unvarnished oil painting. We design a VNIR-SWIR (400 nm to 2500 nm) polarimetric reflectance imaging spectroscopy setup that deploys unpolarized light and allows us to estimate the Stokes vector at the pixel level. We observe a strong negative correlation between the S0 component of the Stokes vector (which can be used to represent the reflectance) and the degree of linear polarization in the visible interval (average -0.81), while the correlation is weaker and varying in the infrared range (average -0.50 in the NIR range between 780 and 1500 nm, and average -0.87 in the SWIR range between 1500 and 2500 nm). By tackling the problem with multi-resolution image analysis, we observe a dependence of the correlation on the local complexity of the surface. Indeed, we observe a general trend that strengthens the negative correlation for the effect of artificial flattening provoked by low image resolutions.

Users' continuance intention towards an AI painting application: An extended expectation confirmation model.

With the rapid advancement of technology, Artificial Intelligence (AI) painting has emerged as a leading intelligence service. This study aims to empirically investigate users' continuance intention toward AI painting applications by utilizing and expanding the Expectation Confirmation Model (ECM), Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT), and the Flow Theory. A comprehensive research model is proposed. A total of 443 questionnaires were distributed to users with AI painting experiences for data collection. The hypotheses were tested through structural equation modeling. The primary conclusions drawn from this research include: 1) Confirmation plays a crucial role, significantly and positively predicting satisfaction and social impact. 2) Personal innovativeness has a significant effect on confirmation. 3) Satisfaction, flow experience, and social influence directly and positively predict intention, with social influence showing the most significant impact, while perceived usefulness, perceived enjoyment, and performance expectancy show no significant impact on intention. 4) Habit plays a negative moderating role in the association between social influence and continued intention to use. These findings offer valuable insights and inspiration for users seeking to understand the appropriate utilization of AI painting and provide actionable directions for the development of AI painting.

The art of resilience: a psychobiography of Frida Kahlo.

This psychobiography of Frida Kahlo explores the psychology of the famous Mexican artist. Drawing upon Kahlo's paintings and diary entries, a rich psychological analysis of the feminist icon is juxtaposed with the zeitgeist of 20th century Mexico. Framed through the theoretical model of feminist psychology, Kahlo's role in promoting gender equality and dismantling patriarchal society is discussed. Physical pain resulting from illness and impalement by a metal pole in a trolley accident was matched, if not exceeded, by the psychological pain the artist felt due to resulting issues with fertility and the long-sought but never-realized role of motherhood, infidelity within her marriage, and the eventual loss of her ability to paint. Nevertheless, Kahlo's perseverance and strength led to worldwide recognition of her bold and vibrant paintings, vulnerably depicting her rich inner world. The present study utilises perspectives from art therapy and attachment theory to elucidate the factors contributing to Frida Kahlo's resilience in the face of lifelong trauma and chronic pain. Ultimately, Kahlo's life and work offer valuable insight into the psychological experiences of women in patriarchal societies, emphasising the importance of feminist perspectives in psychological research and highlighting the healing and resilience-promoting role of art.

Why did Rubens add a parrot to Titian's The Fall of Man? A pictorial manipulation of joint attention.

Almost 400 years ago, Rubens copied Titian's The Fall of Man, albeit with important changes. Rubens altered Titian's original composition in numerous ways, including by changing the gaze directions of the depicted characters and adding a striking red parrot to the painting. Here, we quantify the impact of Rubens's choices on the viewer's gaze behavior. We displayed digital copies of Rubens's and Titian's artworks-as well as a version of Rubens's painting with the parrot digitally removed-on a computer screen while recording the eye movements produced by observers during free visual exploration of each image. To assess the effects of Rubens's changes to Titian's composition, we directly compared multiple gaze parameters across the different images. We found that participants gazed at Eve's face more frequently in Rubens's painting than in Titian's. In addition, gaze positions were more tightly focused for the former than for the latter, consistent with different allocations of viewer interest. We also investigated how gaze fixation on Eve's face affected the perceptual visibility of the parrot in Rubens's composition and how the parrot's presence versus its absence impacted gaze dynamics. Taken together, our results demonstrate that Rubens's critical deviations from Titian's painting have powerful effects on viewers' oculomotor behavior.

Vagueness and volume: Testing the perception of depth in images with linear, sharp, or blurred contours.

In European painting, a transition took place where artists started to consciously introduce blurred or soft contours in their works. There may have been several reasons for this. One suggestion in art historical literature is that this may have been done to create a stronger sense of volume in the depicted figures or objects. Here we describe four experiments in which we tried to test whether soft or blurred contours do indeed enhance a sense volume or depth. In the first three experiments, we found that, for both paintings and abstract shapes, three dimensionality was actually decreased instead of increased for blurred (and line) contours, in comparison with sharp contours. In the last experiment, we controlled for the position of the blur (on the lit or dark side) and found that blur on the lit side evoked a stronger impression of three dimensionality. Overall, the experiments robustly show that an art historical conjecture that a blurred contour increases three dimensionality is not granted. Because the blurred contours can be found in many established art works such as from Leonardo and Vermeer, there must be other rationales behind this use than the creation of a stronger sense of volume or depth.

Art perception is affected by negative knowledge about famous and unknown artists.

The biographies of some celebrated artists are marked by accounts that paint a far from beautiful portrait. Does this negative-social knowledge influence the aesthetic experience of an artwork? Does an artist's fame protect their paintings from such an influence? We present two preregistered experiments examining the effect of social-emotional biographical knowledge about famous and unknown artists on the reception and perception of their paintings, using aesthetic ratings and neurocognitive measures. In Experiment 1, paintings attributed to artists characterised by negative biographical information were liked less, evoked greater feelings of arousal and were judged lower in terms of quality, than paintings by artists associated with neutral information. No modulation of artist renown was found. Experiment 2 fully replicated these behavioural results and revealed that paintings by artists associated with negative social-emotional knowledge also elicited enhanced early brain activity related to visual perception (P1) and early emotional arousal (early posterior negativity; EPN). Together, the findings suggest that negative knowledge about famous artists can shape not only explicit aesthetic evaluations, but may also penetrate the perception of the artwork itself.

New Biocides Based on N4-Alkylcytidines: Effects on Microorganisms and Application for the Protection of Cultural Heritage Objects of Painting.

The rapid increase in the antibiotic resistance of microorganisms, capable of causing diseases in humans as destroying cultural heritage sites, is a great challenge for modern science. In this regard, it is necessary to develop fundamentally novel and highly active compounds. In this study, a series of N4-alkylcytidines, including 5- and 6-methylcytidine derivatives, with extended alkyl substituents, were obtained in order to develop a new generation of antibacterial and antifungal biocides based on nucleoside derivatives. It has been shown that N4-alkyl 5- or 6-methylcytidines effectively inhibit the growth of molds, isolated from the paintings in the halls of the Ancient Russian Paintings of the State Tretyakov Gallery, Russia, Moscow. The novel compounds showed activity similar to antiseptics commonly used to protect works of art, such as benzalkonium chloride, to which a number of microorganisms have acquired resistance. It was also shown that the activity of N4-alkylcytidines is comparable to that of some antibiotics used in medicine to fight Gram-positive bacteria, including resistant strains of Staphylococcus aureus and Mycobacterium smegmatis. N4-dodecyl-5- and 6-methylcytidines turned out to be the best. This compound seems promising for expanding the palette of antiseptics used in painting, since quite often the destruction of painting materials is caused by joint fungi and bacteria infection.

[Csontvary, a Hungarian Painter, Art, Psychiatry. The Analysis according to Rennert].

Tivadar Csontváry Kosztka, the great Hungarian artist was called a sort of a "crazy painter" by his contemporaries. Retrospectively, he was diagnosed as suffering not from psychosis but a schizotypal personality disorder based on seven out of nine diagnostic criteria. However, we still need a more precise definition of these criteria. It was also said that his paintings are like those made by the mentally ill. But following the principles and methods of the psychopathological art, especially that of Rennert, we find definitely more dissimilitudes than resemblances. In order to obtain a more accurate profile of this extraordinary creator, we still need further research focusing on the facts.

Art and Pediatric Orthopaedics: Repin and Inclusiveness.

A famous painting of the 19th century, by Ilia Repin, of a religious procession depicts the pageantry of the event but also draws the attention of the viewer to the exclusion of a disabled child from the festivities.

Synthetic images aid the recognition of human-made art forgeries.

Previous research has shown that Artificial Intelligence is capable of distinguishing between authentic paintings by a given artist and human-made forgeries with remarkable accuracy, provided sufficient training. However, with the limited amount of existing known forgeries, augmentation methods for forgery detection are highly desirable. In this work, we examine the potential of incorporating synthetic artworks into training datasets to enhance the performance of forgery detection. Our investigation focuses on paintings by Vincent van Gogh, for which we release the first dataset specialized for forgery detection. To reinforce our results, we conduct the same analyses on the artists Amedeo Modigliani and Raphael. We train a classifier to distinguish original artworks from forgeries. For this, we use human-made forgeries and imitations in the style of well-known artists and augment our training sets with images in a similar style generated by Stable Diffusion and StyleGAN. We find that the additional synthetic forgeries consistently improve the detection of human-made forgeries. In addition, we find that, in line with previous research, the inclusion of synthetic forgeries in the training also enables the detection of AI-generated forgeries, especially if created using a similar generator.

John Ranby FRS, William Hogarth and the Barber Surgeons.

The progress of dentistry towards a profession allied to medicine and surgery was incremental, and a most important step in that process was the separation of the surgeons from the barbers in 1745. Hogarth's illustration of a dentally active barber has been discussed previously in the British Dental Journal. In this paper, his probable contribution to the campaign for separation led successfully by his friend, surgeon John Ranby FRS (1703-1773), through the dramatic and much analysed painting The death of the countess (1743), is analysed. In this paper, it is suggested that William Hogarth was not only aware of the tensions between the physicians, surgeons and barbers that had come to a head, but that he modified the first thoughts, seen in a sketch (now at the Ashmolean, Oxford), to incorporate in this painting, and the print made from it a conspicuous sub-scene, almost central in a composition where the dying countess would be expected to be the only subject, as a satirical comment on that internal conflict.

The Picture of Scientific Surgery: John Hunter and the Reynolds Portrait.

This historical retrospective examines the famous portrait of John Hunter by Sir Joshua Reynolds, focusing on the man and the objects that were chosen to represent his legacy in anatomy and surgery.