Embodied Aesthetics: Insight from Cognitive Neuroscience of Performing Arts

Abstract

Echoing the phenomenological tradition in philosophy, recent hypotheses have proposed that aesthetic experiences are grounded in the embodied simulation of the actions, emotions, and corporeal sensations represented in artworks. We refer to these simulative processes as “embodied aesthetics”. Recent investigations in cognitive neuroscience have helped us to explore the mechanisms of complex human experiences and some of them have been specifically dedicated to the study of the neural underpinning of aesthetic experience. Their results have repeatedly suggested that the creation and the perception of artworks activate a set of shared brain mechanisms, especially as far as performing arts (such as music and dance) are concerned. For instance, pleasurable dance may resonate in the spectators’ brain by enhancing the activity in motor-related areas. This evidence points to the universal involvement of a motor resonance mechanism in aesthetic experience. The present chapter will initially explore the general idea of embodiment. We will then describe some studies in the field of performing arts, where the human body is the object of aesthetic stimulation and the subject of the aesthetic experience. We will also describe how embodiment is modulated by different properties of the stimuli, by the performers’ body or by the preference of the observer. Overall, we expect to provide a framework to better understand aesthetic experience from an embodiment perspective, taking into consideration the different factors that interact with these processes, especially as far as the performing arts are concerned.