Page 84 - ART FORM AND MENTAL HEALTH - Ingrid Pénzes

color” and presence of “color saturation” enhanced the amount of structure. “Figuration” contributed sometimes to a highly structured product (e.g. art product 3), at other times not (e.g. art product 1).
Low structured art products consisted of the presence of “movement” and “dynamic” in combination with the absence of “contour” and “repetition”. Low structure was further weakened by the presence of “mixture of color” and absence of “figuration”. “Color saturation” contributed sometimes to a low structured art product (e.g. art product 5), at other times not (e.g. art product 1 or 2).
The presence or absence of “movement”, “dynamic”, “contour” and “repetition” determined the structure of the art product. These formal elements were mentioned most frequently. “Mixture of color”, “figuration” and “color saturation” reinforced or weakened this structure. To indicate the conciseness of “movement”, “dynamic”, “contour” and “repetition” in comparison with the other formal elements, the distinction between “primary” and “secondary” formal elements was introduced (see Figure 2).
How formal elements are combined and how strongly they are present appeared to determine the amount of structure art therapists perceived in the art product. The more dominant a formal element was present or absent, the more clear the structure of the art product was high or low.
The art therapists were in agreement about clearly structured art products. The dominant present or absent formal elements were consistently mentioned first. The art therapists were less consistent about art products that were less clearly structured. It seemed as if the art therapists hesitated and needed more time describing the formal elements. This was for example the case with art product 6 (see Table 4) that showed high structure but was far less structured than art product 1:
Therapist 2: “Somehow the others [art products] are more clear to me, here nothing jumps out. It is all the same, just the color is a bit different, and nothing is placed in the foreground. Those flowers feel a bit strange. It is not connected somehow.”
Therapist 5: “It has something threatening, almost as if it comes rolling towards me. It is a mountain, but it rolls in my direction. Probably accidentally painted in this manner...sort of.... I don’t know...there are actually just four shapes with a cloud and some dots. Kind of duality, contradiction within the art product.”
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