Abstract
Gustaf Theodor Fechner's studies, in the latter part of the 1800s, constituted the beginning of empirical psychological perspectives on art and aesthetics. Fechner devoted much of his attention to the controversy concerning the apparent beauty, and hence authenticity, of two very similar Madonna paintings attributed to Holbein the Younger. Fechner's particularly noteworthy study on this topic [1] involved a direct comparison of the two paintings by visitors to an exhibition, but, according to Boring [2], that experiment was a failure. Given the historical importance of Fechner's research overall, and yielding to an urge for resolution of an unanswered question, we report a contemporary comparison of these paintings. Our subjects showed no obvious preference for either of the paintings, but there were differences in terms of emotional and artistic impressions.
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