Visual illusion in ARTPOP and pop art

(1)

The Japanese Psychonomic Society

NII-Electronic Library Service

The JapanesePsychonomic Society

ThelapaneseJo"rnalofPsrchonomicScience

2014,Vbl.32,No.2,232.234

Mtorial

Visual

illusion

in

ARTPOP

and

_popart

Akiyoshi

KITAoKA

RitsumeikanUhiversity

'

Lady Gaga sfourthCD albumAR711'OP, designedbyAmerican _popartist

Jeff

Koens,adopted one ofmy illu-sion works, namelF licrpinurchin, as themain inside

design,

Thisoccurrence was significant forthestudy ofvisual

illusioninthe

fo11owing

threesenses:

first,

it

drew

_people'sattention tovisual illusion;second, thechosen illusion was novel;and third,

for

thefirsttime initshistorxvisual illusionwas recognized asubiquitous.

Key words: visual illusien.motion, _popart,Ouchi-Spillmannilluslon

Lady

Gaga's

founh

CD

album

ARTPOP

included

artworks of visualillusion

American

pop

artist

Jeff

Koonsdesignedthe cover and

in-side of Lady Gaga'sfourthCD album ARTPOP, which was

re-leased

on November 6.2013.He adopted anovel type ofvisual

illusionthatfeaturesa moving, shaking, or

jerking

optical

ef-fect,

as well as chose one of my

Musion

works,

Hbrpin

urchin

(Figures

1and 2),Thisoccurrence was significant forthe

study ofvisualMusienfor reasons other than theexpected

'

teresttovisual

Musion

from

_peopleinfluenced

by

Lady

Gaga

s superstar status worldwide, Inthis_paper,Iwi11trytocast

light

on unnoticedbut significant influences.

The chosen illusionisnovel inthestudy of

visual Musion

Hbrpinurchin isan artwork ef a novel typeof motion

illu-sion, which Itentatiyely call

"meving

stripes illusion."The

basicimages are

given

a driftingexpressien

(Figures

3a and

3b),a retating

demonstration

(Figure

3c),and aradialIy

mov-ingexpression

(Figure

3d),The illusionof motion isachieved

bymeeting the

"necessary

condition" of arranging stripes of

black

_(dark)

and white

(light)

elements _placedin

frent

ef a

graybackground

(intermediate

luminance)

(Kitaeka,

2012). Stripesofblack and white squares are suracient fbrrendering

theillusion

(Figure

3b),whereas adding oblique components

tothestripes enhances theeffect

(Figures

3a,3c,and 3d).No

models havebeen_proposedtoexplain thesecharacteristics.

Asfaras I

know;

the

first

dernonstration

of thisillusionis

Correspondingaddress.Ritsumeikan UniversitT;56-1 Tkoji-inKitamachi,Kita-ku,KYoto603-8577,

Japan.

E-mail:[email protected]

copY

attributed toAmericanmathematical artist

Jeff

Berkeleyinhis artworks offractalsfractallllusion

(Figure

4a)and FractalZap

(Figure

4b)created in1993 and 1994,respectively Koons did

not cheese theseimages forthe CD design.Instead,he

,

ed TautvydasDavainissillusionartwork 5minutes cij}er the

PhiladeiphiaExperiment_producedin2010,which appears to

'

bea derivativeof Berkeleysartworks. Inmy case, I

-

"

teredBerkeleys artworks before2008,extracted the moving stripes" illusionfromthem, and then created Harpin urchin in

2008.

The

Ouchi-Spillmann

illusion

was

also

included

An irnageof theOuchi-Spillmannillusionwas adopted for

thebackcover of theCD

(Figure

5).

This

imagewas also

'

ducedand _providedbyme. Koonssagent consulted with me

regarding this illusion,and Iinformedherof thestudy of this illusion,This illusionhad beencalled

"Ouchi

illusion"butI asked the agent tolabelit"Ouchi-Spillmann illusion"topay

respect tothe

discoverer

LotharSpillmann,who hadrecently

".

publisheda_paperentitled The Ouchi-Spillmann

illusion

re-yisited" inPerception

(Spillmann,

2013).

Iwas unaware oftheintentionof Koonsforincludingthe

il-lusion,

However,Iirnagine thatheintuitivelythought of the

Ouchi-Spillmann

illusionas

being

closely related to the

"moving

stripes" illusion.Thisideamight be_plausible

be-cause the latterisobtained byreducing theimageof the

for-mer

(Kitaoka,

2012),as shown in

Figure

6,

Significance

ofvisual

illusion

being

chosen

by

the

pop

artist

Pop artisan art movement thatemerged inthe1950sin Britainand theUSA

(LivingstDne,

199e).

Jasper

Johns,

Robert Rau$chenberg,Andy Warhol,and Rey Lichtenstein

gained

right2014.TheJapanesePsychonomic SocietyAllrightsreserved,

(2)

TheJapanesePsychonomic Society

Kitaoka:TutorialVisualiIlusioninAR711'OP and _popart 233

Figure 1. HLtpinurchin

(2008,

http;1/ www.psy.ritsumei.ac.jp/--akitaoka/

opart5e.html). Theradial arms appear

toexpand orcontract abruptlp triggered

by the eye moyement of observers.

Thjswork was adopted forthecover

of

"Special

Issue;169 BestI]lusions

published

byScientijlcAmerican Mind

in2010.

l'

+

Figure 2, Theinsideof LadyGagas

fourth

CD album ARTII'OP

designed

by

Ieff

Koons,The backgroundof the original work was changed from blueto_pink

(reproduced

with _permissionfrornUNIVERSAL MUSIC LI.C).

fame

aspepartistsin_the2ethcentury Popartchallenges tra-ditionsof fineart or highart, as well as includesimagery from

popularculture or industrialmass _products,such as

advertis-ing,news, designs,comic books,commodities, or mundane cultural objects. Inother words, objects or motifs used in_pop

artare _populartothe_general_publicor regarded as ubiquitous, VisualilLusionhadnever met thiscriterion

before

the

infor-mation and communications technology revolution

because

peop]eexperienced visual illusionsor illusionworks in psy-chology textbooks or in science museums. At _present,_people can seethem on theInternet.Thisnbiquitous nature of visual

illusion

has

been

accomplished

by

the_parallel

development

of

telecommunications technology and infrastructure,PCs,cell

phones,as well as avariety of communication networks.

Fur-thermore, rnany contributors in theworld continue tostudy

yisual itlusionor create illusionworks.

Jeff

Koons,one of themost _prominentcontemporary _pop artists,chose visual illusionfortheCD designofthe superstar

t

LadyGagasARTPOP. The ubiquity of yisual illusion was

con-firmedbythisevent, creating ahistoricalmark inthestudy of visual illusion.

Someremarks

Thedesignofthe frentcever ofARTPOP

(Figure

7a) shows anude sculpture ofLady Gagawitha

blue

_glazing

ball,

both

of

Figure3.

`'Moving

stripes" illusion.In

(a)

and

(b),the

inset

appears todrift.

_(c)

Each blockof rings appears torotate

quickly

(d)

Radialarmsappeartoexpandorcontract.

i

Figure4.

JeffBerke]ey

sartworks FractalIllusion

(1993)

and FractatZap

(1994)

(reproduced

with _permission

(3)

TheJapanesePsychonomic Society

234

gmoJcli}g･?filfy

T

Figure5. The

back

cover ofthe CD showing an imageof

theOuchi-Spillmannillusion

(reproduced

with

sion fromUNIVERSAL MUSIC LLC).

x･

ny

Figure6.

Continuation

betweenthe

Ouchi-Spillrnann

illusion

_(the

upper leftimage) andthe "moving stripes'' illusion

_(in

thethreeother images).Each insetappears

tomove.

which were created byKoons,Thiscover designcallstomind

the

_painting

The Birth

of

Vlenus

_produced

byItalianartist

San-droBotticelliin1483

(Figure

7b).

Moreove4 Iwould

like

to_pointout an unnoticed meaning, I

eg

32

tsng

2F,･ Cu)

.L

'/io,

/

./.ttt

cc

Figure _7.

_(a)

The frentcever ofARTPOP

(reproduced

with _permission

frem

UNIVERSAL MUSIC LLC);

(b)

SandroBottjcel]isTheBirth_qt'Vbnus

(around

1483);

t

(c)

RichardHamiltons

Just

what isitthatmakes todays

homesso dttibrent,so ampeating,?

(1956).

think thisimage also _pays hornageto theearl>r _pop artwork

Just

rvhat isitthatmakes today's

homes

so

dtfilerent,

so

appeal-ing?

(Figure

7c)_producedin1956byBritish_painterRichard

Hamilton,which isone of themost famous_piecesin_pop art

history

_{(Livingstone,}

1990).

References

Kitaoka, A.

(2012).

Are shorter sides of the checker _pattern critical in the Ouchi illusion?Talk at the 45th Chikaku

(Perception)

Colloquium,Kiyosato,

Japan,

on March 30

(in

Japanese).

http:ltwww.psy.ritsumeLac.jpl-akitaoka/

chicollo2012.html

Livingstone,M.

C19Ye).

Pop art: a continuing historyNew

Ybrk:HarryN.Abrams.

Spillmann,L.

_(2013).

The Ouchi-Spillmann illusionrevisited. Perception,42,413-429.