Discusses the powerful thinking of the psychologist of art, Rudolf Arnheim. This book covers fundamental issues of the importance of psychological discussion of the arts, the status of gestalt psychology, the various sense modalities and media, and developmental issues.

"Arnheim, Gestalt and Art" is the first book-length discussion of the powerful thinking of the psychologist of art, Rudolf Arnheim. Written as a complete overview of Arnheim's thinking, it covers fundamental issues of the importance of psychological discussion of the arts, the status of gestalt psychology, the various sense modalities and media, and developmental issues. By proceeding in a direction from general to specific and then proceeding through dynamic processes as they unfold in time (creativity, development, etc.), the book discovers an unappreciated unity to Arnheim's thinking. Not content to simply summarize Arnheim's theory, however, "Arnheim, Art, and Gestalt" goes on to enrich (and occasionally question) Arnheim's findings with the contemporary results of gestalt-theoretical research from around the world, but especially in Italy and Germany. The result is a workable overview of the psychology of art with bridges built to contemporary research, making Arnheim's approach living and sustainable.

Iintroduction: Why Arnheim? Why Gestalt?.- Arnheim and Different Approaches to the Psychology of Art.- Expression, Symbolism and Visual Thinking.- The Senses, Perceptual Objects and their Dynamics.- The Notorious Gestalt Brain Model.- The Dynamics of Pictorial, Sculptural and Architectural Form.- The Dynamics of Pantomimic Form.- The Dynamics of Musical Form.- The Dynamics of Poetic Form.- Art in Comparative Perspective: Children, Adults, Cultures.- The Dynamics of Microgenetic Artistic Development.- Individual Artistic Development.- The Dynamics of Differential and Psychopathological Artistic Form.- The Dynamics of Cultural-Perceptual Form.- Objective Percepts, Objective Values.- Appendix: The Life of a Psychologist of Art.