Investigation on Piero Della Francesca's Frescoes

Abstract

This investigation focuses on the Legend of the True Cross, Piero della Francesca's important series of frescoes (15th century) kept in Arezzo (Italy). We dealt with the expressiveness of the figures according to shapes, colors, and other features. We referred to the phenomenological classification by Arnheim (1949), Metzger (1954, 1966), and Bonaiuto (1965, 1988), who, among expressive qualities and valences, distinguished emotional hues, intentions, functions, causal relations, etc. Ninety adults evaluated affective expressiveness in each of three actual frescoes using an inventory with 46 11-point monopolar scales. Three distinct groups of scales were statistically distinguished: “positive,” “negative,” and “neutral” affects. The peculiarities of each fresco as measured by the scales emerged clearly, underlying the modern legibility of the expressiveness constructed by the artist. Comparisons of the pictorial style of Piero della Francesca with previous and later Renaissance artists and modern artists are described.