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Visual Thinking
For thirty-five years Visual Thinking has been the gold standard for art educators, psychologists, and general readers alike. In this seminal work, Arnheim, author of The Dynamics of Architectural Form, Film as Art, Toward a Psychology of Art, and Art and Visual Perception, asserts that all thinking (not just thinking related to art) is basically perceptual in nature, and that the ancient dichotomy between seeing and thinking, between perceiving and reasoning, is false and misleading. An indispensable tool for students and for those interested in the arts.
360 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1969
About the author
Rudolf Arnheim
73 books126 followersRudolf Arnheim (1904–2007) was a German-born author, art and film theorist, and perceptual psychologist. He learned Gestalt psychology from studying under Max Wertheimer and Wolfgang Köhler at the University of Berlin and applied it to art. His magnum opus was his book Art and Visual Perception: A Psychology of the Creative Eye (1954). Other major books by Arnheim have included Visual Thinking (1969), and The Power of the Center: A Study of Composition in the Visual Arts (1982). Art and Visual Perception was revised, enlarged and published as a new version in 1974, and it has been translated into fourteen languages. He lived in Germany, Italy, England, and America. Most notably, Arnheim taught at Sarah Lawrence College, Harvard University, and the University of Michigan. He has greatly influenced art history and psychology in America.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 33 reviews
February 22, 2014
Some 30 years after publishing Visual Thinking, Arnheim described it thus:
“My essential assertion in the book you mentioned [Visual Thinking] is that language is not the formal prototype of knowledge; rather, that sensory knowledge, upon which all our experience is based, creates the possibilities of language.
“Our only access to reality is sensory experience, that is, sight or hearing or touch. And sensory experience is always more than mere seeing or touching. It also includes mental images and knowledge based on experience. All of that makes up our view of the world.
“In my opinion, "visual thinking" means that visual perception consists above all in the development of forms, of "perceptual terms," and thereby fulfills the conditions of the intellectual formation of concepts; it has the ability, by means of these forms, to give a valid interpretation of experience.
“Language, on the other hand, is in itself without form; one cannot think in words, since words cannot contain an object. Language is instructed by sensory perception. It codifies the knowledge [given] through sensory experience. This doesn't mean that language isn't tremendously significant for thought, for all of human development. Human existence is unimaginable without language. I am only stressing that language is an instrument of that which we have gained through perception, in that it confirms and preserves the concepts [formed].”
Rudolf Arnheim, as interviewed by Uta Grundmann in Ann Arbor, Michigan (1998?), corrected translation by Gregory Williams. Arnheim died in 2007 at 102.
“A version of this interview was published as "Rudolf Arnheim: Die Intelligenz des Sehens" in Neue Bildende Kunst (August-September, 1998), pp. 56-62.” Entire interview at: http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues...
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Compare with Mark Johnson’s 1987 The Body in the Mind and Johnson’s work with George Lakoff. Etc.
“My essential assertion in the book you mentioned [Visual Thinking] is that language is not the formal prototype of knowledge; rather, that sensory knowledge, upon which all our experience is based, creates the possibilities of language.
“Our only access to reality is sensory experience, that is, sight or hearing or touch. And sensory experience is always more than mere seeing or touching. It also includes mental images and knowledge based on experience. All of that makes up our view of the world.
“In my opinion, "visual thinking" means that visual perception consists above all in the development of forms, of "perceptual terms," and thereby fulfills the conditions of the intellectual formation of concepts; it has the ability, by means of these forms, to give a valid interpretation of experience.
“Language, on the other hand, is in itself without form; one cannot think in words, since words cannot contain an object. Language is instructed by sensory perception. It codifies the knowledge [given] through sensory experience. This doesn't mean that language isn't tremendously significant for thought, for all of human development. Human existence is unimaginable without language. I am only stressing that language is an instrument of that which we have gained through perception, in that it confirms and preserves the concepts [formed].”
Rudolf Arnheim, as interviewed by Uta Grundmann in Ann Arbor, Michigan (1998?), corrected translation by Gregory Williams. Arnheim died in 2007 at 102.
“A version of this interview was published as "Rudolf Arnheim: Die Intelligenz des Sehens" in Neue Bildende Kunst (August-September, 1998), pp. 56-62.” Entire interview at: http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues...
----------------------------
Compare with Mark Johnson’s 1987 The Body in the Mind and Johnson’s work with George Lakoff. Etc.
March 17, 2007
What if pictures, or hieroglyphics, could be made into a deeper and more complex langauge, that is yet more rapidly understandable and recognizable by the same order? Text takes time to export and to absorb in relation to drawings, stalling the creative brainstorming process. Arnheim shows how this visual langauge has developed. One can easily think of the long dashes and violent scribbles that translate into speed and dust clouds of coups de poing that are depicted in every newspaper's comic section. What if one could take this further and change whole sentences of semantic thought in to a basic shape? One paragraph in to 7 or 8 strokes of the pen?
October 27, 2020
Although I rushed through this book when it was assigned by Robert Neale for my first psychology class at Union Theological Seminary in New York, I suspect that its argument and evidences that all thinking is sensory (Arnheim's emphasis being on the visual sense) has influenced me ever since.
August 12, 2014
One of the must-read classics on visual thinking. You'll need some patience to read it, but take your time and read it all.
According to Arnheim: "cognitive processes indicated as thinking are not mental processes above and beyond perception but essential ingredients of perception itself". This book will help you gain some understanding of cognitive psychology.
According to Arnheim: "cognitive processes indicated as thinking are not mental processes above and beyond perception but essential ingredients of perception itself". This book will help you gain some understanding of cognitive psychology.
February 27, 2019
Görme duyumuzun düşüncede, sanatta, fizik ve matematikteki ilişkisinin önemini sadece aklın merkezde olduğu tezi reddererek gerekçeleriyle birlikte her yönden ele almış Rudolf Arnheim ve görsel anlatımlarıyla da müthiş detaylı bir çalışma sunmuş.
May 26, 2019
Çok zor okunan bir kitaptı benim için. Konular dağınık ve fikirler hava kalmış . Kitabın sonunda her ne kadar toparlamaya çalışılıyor sa gibi maalesef kitaptan yeni bir fikir alamadım belki de doğru zamanda değildi okumam.
April 8, 2021
Bir klasik olan bu eseri farklı kılan, algı psikolojisinin temel bazı bulgularını da kullanarak yerleşik bir dogmaya karşı çıkmış olmasıdır: Bu dogmaya göre gözümüz sadece bir duyu organıdır ve görme duyumuz ile bütün yaptığımız, daha sonra bunları işleyecek, değerlendirecek, bunlar üzerine düşünecek olan beynimiz için görüntü verileri toplamaktır. Hem gündelik yaklaşımlarımıza hem de bütün bir bilim ve felsefe tarihine damgasını vurmuş olan bu mekanik modelde, duyularla düşünce birbirinden ayrılır, hatta karşı karşıya getirilir: Akıl tarafından işlenmedikçe duyular yanıltıcıdır, güvenilmezdir.
Arnheim'ın tezi bu modelin güdüklüğünü sergiliyor; düşünmenin daha ilk anda görme ile birlikte oluştuğunu, düşünmenin yapısal olarak neredeyse resimsel diyebileceğimiz ölçüde görme duyumuza bağlı olduğunu, insanın bütün sanatsal ve bilimsel faaliyetlerinde problem çözme anlamındaki gerçek düşünme'nin her zaman uzamın görsel algılanışı üzerinden yürüdüğünü savunuyor. Çocuk resimlerinden bilim tarihindeki kâinat tasavvurlarına kadar uzanan farklı faaliyet alanlarından taşıdığı örneklerle, nasıl algıladığımızı, düşüncelerimizin duyu ve algılarımıza bağlı olarak nasıl biçimlendiğini anlatan Arnheim, görme duyusu ile düşünme arasında kurulmuş sahte ikilikten kurtulmanın bilim ve sanatlarda verimli açılımlar getireceğine işaret ediyor.
Eğitimde görselliğin önemini anlamaktan hayli uzak görünen bizimkisi gibi bir kültürde bu anlatılanların bir önemi olabilir mi? Cevap, önümüzde. Resim eğitimini bir hobi kertesinde ele almaktan vazgeçmek, görsel eğitimin sadece resim sanatıyla ilgili olmadığını, gözün eğitilmesinin düşüncenin yaratıcılığının geliştirilmesi demek olduğunu, görselliğin yalnızca sanatlarla değil, en az onun kadar fizik ve matematik bilimlerle de ilgili olduğunu kavramak.
May 19, 2021
Leído para tfm // 4,75 ⭐
Bastante filosófico y muy sesentero. Podría pasar perfectamente por un texto de imagología literaria, aunque tiene su vena psicologista.
Plantea aspectos interesantes aunque están algo cargados: presenta el tema de la educación visual y teoriza sobre algunos aspectos de la percepción visual, la semejanza, la abstracción... y procesos de articulación de la imagen representativa. Es interesante el uso que hace de campos transversales, desde el arte hasta las matemáticas o la cartografía, para explicar las relaciones entre imagen, entendimiento, intuición y percepción.
Hay momentos en los que se va por los cerros de úbeda y que para su época podrían haberse resuelto recurriendo a bibliografía bastante básica (por ejemplo los excursos que se marca sobre significación ya los había trabajado Saussure para aquel entonces) pero en general no va errado. Hay otros momentos en los que descubre que el agua moja y otros donde aporta reflexiones interesantes sobre las asociaciones sensitivas y cómo afectan a la articulación del pensamiento.
Me ha gustado que haya trazado un corpus catalogable de conceptos relacionados con la educación visual y aunque hay aspectos que son solucionables desde otras ramas del conocimiento, está bastante bien.
Sobre todo destacar la última parte que es en la que habla del pensamiento visual aplicado al aprendizaje en secundaria y primaria, pues recurre a lo que ya todos los maestros y profesores sabemos: a lo bueno se llega probando en la práctica, no leyendo manuales de instrucciones sobre cómo se hacen las cosas.
Es interesante, además, que no propone el pensamiento visual como algo inherente a la humanidad, por lo que la posibilidad educativa no parte de la referencialidad, sino de la educación de la sensibilidad visual: antes de mostrar hay que enseñar a ver.
Bastante filosófico y muy sesentero. Podría pasar perfectamente por un texto de imagología literaria, aunque tiene su vena psicologista.
Plantea aspectos interesantes aunque están algo cargados: presenta el tema de la educación visual y teoriza sobre algunos aspectos de la percepción visual, la semejanza, la abstracción... y procesos de articulación de la imagen representativa. Es interesante el uso que hace de campos transversales, desde el arte hasta las matemáticas o la cartografía, para explicar las relaciones entre imagen, entendimiento, intuición y percepción.
Hay momentos en los que se va por los cerros de úbeda y que para su época podrían haberse resuelto recurriendo a bibliografía bastante básica (por ejemplo los excursos que se marca sobre significación ya los había trabajado Saussure para aquel entonces) pero en general no va errado. Hay otros momentos en los que descubre que el agua moja y otros donde aporta reflexiones interesantes sobre las asociaciones sensitivas y cómo afectan a la articulación del pensamiento.
Me ha gustado que haya trazado un corpus catalogable de conceptos relacionados con la educación visual y aunque hay aspectos que son solucionables desde otras ramas del conocimiento, está bastante bien.
Sobre todo destacar la última parte que es en la que habla del pensamiento visual aplicado al aprendizaje en secundaria y primaria, pues recurre a lo que ya todos los maestros y profesores sabemos: a lo bueno se llega probando en la práctica, no leyendo manuales de instrucciones sobre cómo se hacen las cosas.
Es interesante, además, que no propone el pensamiento visual como algo inherente a la humanidad, por lo que la posibilidad educativa no parte de la referencialidad, sino de la educación de la sensibilidad visual: antes de mostrar hay que enseñar a ver.
January 20, 2022
3.5
Took me a good 7 months to read, at night, in bed, before going to sleep. Not really worth the effort. Arnheim is I think a Frenchman, possibly some German connection, who moved to California to teach. What drew me was my addiction to Pinterest, and hope this book might provide some clue to visual fixation, that seems to be in the ascendency generally, and a contributor to reduced practices of literacy. What kept me going was that Arnheim was clearly well read in philosophy, art and science. Art education is difficult, and he has some clever ideas about how to do it well. He also has a tendency I’ve noticed in other continental philosophy to be too wordy and waffle on. At times I would groan under the verbiage, then a brilliant passage would keep me going. This book represents a unique and original creative idea, and I think it has aged better than many of the books of the era, some referenced within, but aspects of it have dated. I suspect it never was a truly brilliant book, even for its time, and now aspects of it seem tired and shabby. But there is enough depth in it to provide some real insights into art, visual perception and thinking, that make it a nice little distraction. The classical basis of some of the ideas is solid foundation, and modern thinkers included, (some) share ideas about philosophy and art that intrigue me. Conveyed in an idiom more common in the late 60’s and possibly lacking focus. A synthesis.
Took me a good 7 months to read, at night, in bed, before going to sleep. Not really worth the effort. Arnheim is I think a Frenchman, possibly some German connection, who moved to California to teach. What drew me was my addiction to Pinterest, and hope this book might provide some clue to visual fixation, that seems to be in the ascendency generally, and a contributor to reduced practices of literacy. What kept me going was that Arnheim was clearly well read in philosophy, art and science. Art education is difficult, and he has some clever ideas about how to do it well. He also has a tendency I’ve noticed in other continental philosophy to be too wordy and waffle on. At times I would groan under the verbiage, then a brilliant passage would keep me going. This book represents a unique and original creative idea, and I think it has aged better than many of the books of the era, some referenced within, but aspects of it have dated. I suspect it never was a truly brilliant book, even for its time, and now aspects of it seem tired and shabby. But there is enough depth in it to provide some real insights into art, visual perception and thinking, that make it a nice little distraction. The classical basis of some of the ideas is solid foundation, and modern thinkers included, (some) share ideas about philosophy and art that intrigue me. Conveyed in an idiom more common in the late 60’s and possibly lacking focus. A synthesis.
April 25, 2022
Was an interesting read. I could not penetrate his thesis, which was diffusely pointed to. I think he knows so much more about this topic that I don’t have a firm enough foundation in his field to appreciate him fully. He looks for pointers to the workings of consciousness in art, both fine and brut. I see his point, I already did, but his conclusion escaped me
April 4, 2021
Book makes a case for how perception feeds our thoughts and thoughts guide our perception. It talks about the significance of how engaging with the visual also aids cognition. It gave me a deeper understanding of what abstraction is and what is not.
June 28, 2017
Saggio molto breve, ma denso.
March 5, 2018
A decent read.
March 3, 2021
This book is like enigma , it is perfect but so hard to figure it out. I say this commet by thinking that i have understood maximum %35 of this book.
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July 9, 20221-2-12-13-14. bölümler okundu
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February 28, 2023Il pensiero visivo. La percezione visiva come attività conoscitiva by Rudolf Arnheim (1997)
Currently reading
October 4, 2023Visual Thinking
June 30, 2022
The iconic book on visual thought and perception. Useful figures and quotations.
April 27, 2016
La riflessione sul valore sociale e intellettuale del pensare per immagini è il cuore pulsante di questo saggio, in cui il fondamentale e imprescindibile psicologo dell'arte tedesco Rudolf Arnheim descrive, attraverso delle coordinate teoriche precise ed esaustive, il nostro rapporto col visibile, fin dai primi stadi dell'apprendimento. Una relazione che dalle parole di Arnheim non viene fuori nel migliore dei modi e appare viziata da carenze strutturali dell'immaginario collettivo di noi tutti e da abitudini cognitive a lungo sedimentate e reiterate: se perfino i nostri primi maestri preferiscono insegnarci a pensare sempre e comunque per numeri e per parole piuttosto che per immagini, possiamo forse considerarci, nella stragrande maggioranza dei casi, degli analfabeti del visivo? L'arte e gli interrogativi estetici e teoretici sono dopotutto spesso declassati a mero orpello, a sterili abbellimenti privi di implicazioni reali e metodologie conoscitive degne di questo nome, incapaci di incidere concretamente sulla vita degli individui. Quanto di più impreciso e approssimativo, una falsa credenza che Arnheim contribuisce a demistificare come meglio non si potrebbe attraverso una prosa lucida ed esemplare, che spessissimo si nutre proprio di esempi semplici e illuminanti - anche i disegni dei bambini, nell'ultima parte del volume - per portare avanti le sue argomentazioni e dar loro consistenza. Un testo prezioso, un monito dal forte valore educativo e perfino pedagogico in favore di un ''visuale thinking'' auspicabilmente più attento e consapevole. Da non perdere.
October 17, 2014
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Read this and more reviews of Philosophy books on the History page of www.BestPhilosophyBooks.org (a thinkPhilosophy Production).
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This book is a bit dry, but it is a standard and it lays out the terrain where thinking about vision as formative of thought. The two chapters on "The intelligence of perception" I and II, are a review of the philosophical discussions that frame this otherwise formalistic and psychological treatment.
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Read this and more reviews of Philosophy books on the History page of www.BestPhilosophyBooks.org (a thinkPhilosophy Production).
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Read this and more reviews of Philosophy books on the History page of www.BestPhilosophyBooks.org (a thinkPhilosophy Production).
---
This book is a bit dry, but it is a standard and it lays out the terrain where thinking about vision as formative of thought. The two chapters on "The intelligence of perception" I and II, are a review of the philosophical discussions that frame this otherwise formalistic and psychological treatment.
---
Read this and more reviews of Philosophy books on the History page of www.BestPhilosophyBooks.org (a thinkPhilosophy Production).
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May 31, 2014
Recommended by Bill Marling as a good starting point to think about the intersection of images and thought, Arnheim's classic predates some of my favorite visual rhetoric theory, while still engaging in how we should understand/teach visual analysis.
He ends with a chapter entitled, “Vision in Education,” where he argues that we need “the systematic training of visual sensitivity as an indispensable part of any educator’s preparation for his profession. The difference between a picture that makes its point and one that does not can be discerned by anybody whose natural responses to perceptual form have been cultivated rather than stifled” (315).
While I profited from his analysis of children's art and his definition of different art forms, there are limited applications of this book for my own scholarship.
He ends with a chapter entitled, “Vision in Education,” where he argues that we need “the systematic training of visual sensitivity as an indispensable part of any educator’s preparation for his profession. The difference between a picture that makes its point and one that does not can be discerned by anybody whose natural responses to perceptual form have been cultivated rather than stifled” (315).
While I profited from his analysis of children's art and his definition of different art forms, there are limited applications of this book for my own scholarship.
August 1, 2012
Absolute classic essays about cognitive and gestalt psychology. Terrifically appealing for visual artists that are interested in a scientific underpinning of how human cognitive powers operate. Relatively early work in the field of what eventually became cognitive neuroscience and/or biopsychology, so its threaded throughout with a bit of the Jungian-influenced concepts so prevalent during the late 50's & 60's. But terrific information and a text I return to every few years just to flip through. Absolute MUST for any graphic designer's library–some of the info predates information design and web interface design concepts, but this is the information that forms the core of those disciplines. Arnheim is a bit long-winded as a writer, but its fantastic stuff all the same.
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July 18, 2007I read this as an undergraduate. Arnheim died last year and SLC, where he taught for several decades, is planning an event in Spring of 2008. It's one of those books that used to be absolutely required of anyone involved in the visual arts, though more recently, at least in poststructuralist art history circles, the psychology of art has gotten a bad rap...
October 20, 2011
Read through about two thirds. It was a good primer on cognition as it relates the sense of vision and how we organize that information. I found it a bit dated though in its perspective, and didn't really have the energy to finish.
March 5, 2014
A very thorough book. Takes time to really think how your visual thinking works. If you take out your blank canvas, and take a good look at it, it can help boosts your visual thinking. This is just one way. There are so many ways. I would recommend this book for visual artists.
February 7, 2016
This book gives a deeper understanding on the worth of perception and the intelligence it requires. But, as a designer, I did not find much additional useful information. The density of the writing was not rewarded with better insight into visual thinking - at least for me.
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May 17, 2007i love this book!!
the perfect way to learn how talk and listen without words.
the perfect way to learn how talk and listen without words.
December 8, 2008
I read this book a long time ago. Now I am re-reading portions of it. It makes me feel good.
October 2, 2011
The arguments are often laborious, but overall an excellent caution against reductionism in one's personal epistemology.
July 31, 2012
A lot of reading. Arnheim is more than a little pedantic. Getting through this felt like an accomplishment. Good stuff there to be sure. I just don't remember any of it.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 33 reviews