Not Quite from Scratch: Taking Aesthetics from Fine Art to
Digital Interaction
Eloise Oyzon
Rochester Institute of Technology, New York.
While most users of technology are not students of art, all are immersed in a cultural
landscape that has a shared and rich visual heritage. Myriad conventions that shape the
way we perceive two-dimensional graphics are part of our visual vernacular.
Are we cognizant of our own visual etymology? For most the answer is “no”. Does it
matter? To the users of interfaces, like attending any kind of experiential presentation –
whether it be music, or theater, or a computer interface, it is best if the they are not
cognizant of the underlying structures that are there designed to illicit particular
responses.
To creators that rely upon graphical interfaces as a means of eliciting response in a user,
it does matter. Artists have been creating dimensional spaces: suggested, real seeming,
textural, textual and emotional, for thousands of years. It behooves us to understand long
established techniques used in the arts to convince the user/reader/audience of the
tangibility of what they are sensing.
I must admit that when I first read “Fitts’ Law” many years ago, I took umbrage. A
technique that I had been utilizing for years as an artist had been researched quantified
and named. How could something I do be named after some other fellow?
I do now understand that quantifying perception responses aids in the development of
algorithms and thus code. I understand that scientists study breathing to understand life. I
understand that which is self-evident in my practice of the fine arts is as mysterious and
magical to some as alchemy.
A few conventions
If this is the case, then let us explore techniques used in the arts to manipulate the
perception of the user. This is not magic and understanding the visual techniques artists
bandy about is worthwhile, especially if we wish to use these techniques effectively and
with purpose in other arenas – specifically human computer interaction.
I would argue that the artists’ purpose in creating their works is to manipulate the viewer
with specific intent. The intent may be a narrative, it may be to evoke a sense of the
sublime, it may be to create a particular mood or feeling.
Scale
Elouise R. Oyzon
Position Paper, “Understanding & Designing for Aesthetic Experience”
3louis3@gmail.com
1
Fitt’s Law states “The time to acquire a target is a function of the distance to and size of
the target.”
Let’s break that down.
It is possible to guide the eye about by using different techniques. Fitt’s Law addresses
the notion of varied scale.
In early artwork the paradigm was this: that which is
important is larger. That which is less important is smaller. A
look at this Egyptian painting indicates a clear structural
hierarchy. This is not and indication of space, but a chain of
command.
Fig. 1. Egyptian tomb painting featuring a banquet scene, from
the tomb of Nakht ca. 1420 B.C., Thebes. 18th dynasty.
We could infer that the larger “target” has a greater
hierarchical status. The resulting response in the reader is to
draw the eye to it first.
Graphically, the implications are the same. A larger element
on the painting, the page or the screen would be likely to draw
one’s eye first. Clearly, that which is larger is more important.
There is a visual hierarchy informed by scale.
Perspective
It would be several hundred years before artists made the great leap to the notion that
things that are closer are larger, while things that are farther away are smaller.
Fig. 2. ‘The Healing of the
Cripple and the Raising of
Tabitha’, by Masolino (1425).
A look at the pre Greco-Roman
art world is essentially flatland.
There were no indications of any
depth of space in two dimensions.
Spatial depth would be a later
addition to our visual language.
This added dimensionality starts to locate the reader in a virtual world. That which is
closer is more immediate and important than that which is farther away. As elements
retreat in space, they are relegated to the role of environment and provide support to the
primary players in the scene.
Elouise R. Oyzon
Position Paper, “Understanding & Designing for Aesthetic Experience”
3louis3@gmail.com
2
This is something only recently utilized in G.U.I.s. With the advent of Mac’s OS X’s
expose, it is possible with a click to see all the windows in relative scale at once. An
additional nod to a depth of space is the introduction of drop shadows to the windows so
the screen looks like an extremely shallow shadowbox. Not much depth, but it is there
nonetheless.
We are beginning to leave flatland.
Elouise R. Oyzon
Position Paper, “Understanding & Designing for Aesthetic Experience”
3louis3@gmail.com
3
Depth of Field
It is not possible for the artist to render
everything in exacting detail, so the artist
edits. In doing so, the artist determines that
which is most important.
In this study for the head of Leda, DaVinci
concentrates upon certain facial features
and the arrangement of hair around Leda’s
face. Note the greater contrast and detail in
the intersection of the top thirds of the
drawing. Movement out from this point has
a decreased level of detail and contrast (the
lighter pencil strokes are closer in value to
the parchment).
Fig. 3. Leonardo DaVinci's study for the
head of Leda (c 1505-07)
Even in the realm of photography where
exacting detail is possible, the photographer
still edits what should be included within the
frame. Using a varied depth of field, it is
possible for the photographer to determine the
range of sharp detail, and areas of blurred
focus.
Fig. 4. Kyle Lake (2004)
http://lakewood.bottlabs.com/BOTT_Juice/Photogra
phy/photo_default.htm
This is addressed in a technical paper entitled “Semantic Depth of Field'' authored by
Robert Kosara, Silvia Miksch, and Helwig Hauser from Institute of Software Technology
at Vienna University of Technology, Austria. (http://www.vrvis.at/vis/research/sdof/)
Still More
There are many other devices used by artists to indicate relative importance and spatial
depth. I have not spoken of overlapping or transparency. I have not addressed the use of
contrast of value or hue or saturation. I have not spoken of playing with juxtaspositioning
and the current inclinations of artists to appropriate work.
Interface design is following a similar progression to that of the art world, albeit an
accelerated one. It is possible to use these many artistic devices in the medium of
computer interaction.
Elouise R. Oyzon
Position Paper, “Understanding & Designing for Aesthetic Experience”
3louis3@gmail.com
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Given this wealth of aesthetic convention, why are we not implementing them to a
greater degree in all interaction design? The notion of the painting as a window into the
world is not even a hop, much less a leap from the window metaphor of the personal
computer monitor.
That was then. This is now.
We see artists playing with interaction. There is experimental performance art and
interactive sculpture. There is a play between the user of the piece and the piece itself…in
some cases the audience creates the work. HCI’s bleeding edge can be found there.
Current artwork has implications for HCI and pushing the envelope of immersive and
aesthetic experience.
Artists are pushing technological boundaries. I would argue HCI should push its aesthetic
ones.
There is no need to reinvent a means of interacting with the user. The aesthetic
experience is the visual experience. The aesthetic experience is also the aural experience.
Ultimately, aesthetics is the culmination of the senses. The audience is purposely guided
to look at specific things, to see what the artist wants them to within the context of an
environment that has been designed.
The function of art is to communicate something. Perhaps it may not even be so much to
communicate a statement as it is a question. But ultimately that which conforms to a
notion of beauty has the same qualities as any good interface; a clarity of purpose, an
economy of information, and an arrangement of elements that seems to have a sense of
belonging and order. The aesthetic experience is not so much a matter of beauty as it is of
integrity and clarity.
Elouise R. Oyzon
Position Paper, “Understanding & Designing for Aesthetic Experience”
3louis3@gmail.com
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