Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

Artistic quality is often thought of in terms of two components: originality and technical skill. To examine the relations between these three constructs, 35 judges rated 72 drawings on 25 survey items related to quality, technical skill, and originality. Rasch statistical analysis revealed an underlying dimension of quality. Items related to both technical skill and originality loaded highly onto this dimension, indicating that both are components of quality. All three measures were strongly inter-correlated. Technical skill and originality jointly accounted for over 90% of the variance in quality. Despite a high correlation (r = .65), technical skill and originality can be distinguished in three ways: originality items fit the underlying quality dimension better than did technical skill items, originality was more difficult to achieve than technical, and the two kinds of items loaded with opposite valences on the first factor of a factor analysis.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Amabile

T. M.

(1982). Children's artistic creativity: Detrimental effects of competition in a field setting. Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin, 8, 573–578.

Berlyne

D. E.

(1971). Aesthetics and psychobiology. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.

Berlyne

D. E.

, & Ogilvie

J. C.

(1974). Dimensions of perceptions of paintings. In Berlyne

D. E.

(Ed.), Studies in the new experimental aesthetics (pp. 181–227). New York: Wiley.

Besemer

, & O'Quin

(1986). Analyzing creative products: Refinement and test of a judging instrument. The Journal of Creative Behavior, 20, 115–126.

Christiaans

H. H. C. M.

(2002). Creativity as a design criterion. Creativity Research Journal, 14, 41–54.

Eisner

E. W.

(1972). Educating artistic vision. New York: Macmillan and Co.

Gardner

(1973). The arts and human development: A psychological study of the artistic process. New York: Wiley.

Getzels

J. W.

, & Csikszentmihalyi

(1976). The creative vision: A longitudinal study of problem finding in art. New York: Wiley.

Gombrich

E. H.

(1991). Topics of our time: Twentieth-century issues in learning and in art. London: Phaidon.

10.

Hayes

J. R.

(1989). Cognitive processes in creativity. In Glover

J. A.

Roning

R. R.

, & Reynolds

C. R.

(Eds.), Handbook of creativity (pp. 202–219). New York: Plenum.

11.

Hekkert

, & van Wieringen

P. C. W.

(1996). Beauty in the eye of expert and nonexpert beholders: A study in the appraisal of art. American Journal of Psychology, 109, 389–407.

12.

Kant

(1790/1929). The critique of judgment. In Greene

T. M.

(Trans.), Kant: Selections. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. (Original work published 1790.)

13.

Linacre

J. M.

, & Wright

B. D.

(1991/2000). A user's guide to WINSTEPS. Chicago: MESA Press.

14.

Martindale

(1990). The clockwork muse: The predictability of artistic change. New York: Basic Books.

15.

Osborne

(1970). Aesthetics and art theory: An historical introduction. New York: Dutton.

16.

Osgood

C. E.

Suci

G. J.

, & Tannenbaum

P. H.

(1957). The measurement of meaning. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.

17.

Rasch

(1960/1980). Probabilistic models for some intelligence and attainment tests. Copenhagen: Danmarks Paedogogiskse Institut (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980).

18.

Rosenberg

(1967). On quality in art: Criteria of excellence, past and present. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

19.

Trowbridge

, & Charles

D. C.

(1966). Creativity in art students. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 109, 281–299.

20.

Tucker

W. T.

(1955). Experiments in aesthetic communications. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Illinois.

21.

Simon

H. A.

(1984). Harold Cohen's computer drawings: Comments on computer art. In Harold Cohen: Computer-as-artist, Buhl Science Center, April 11-May 20, 1984 (pp. 14–16). Pittsburgh: The Buhl Science Center.

22.

Wilson

(1972). The relationship between years of art training and the use of aesthetic judgmental criteria among high school students. Studies in Art Education, 13, 34–43.

23.

Wright

B. D.

, & Masters

G. N.

(1982). Rating scale analysis: Rasch measurement. Chicago: MESA Press.

Originality and Technical Skill as Components of Artistic Quality

Abstract

Get full access to this article

References