The Psychology of Art

Lev Semenovich Vygotsky is a Russian psychologist, the creator of an original scientific direction in psychology, the foundation of which is the teaching about the social-historical nature of human consciousness. Today, L.S. Vygotsky is among the greatest psychologists in the world. His ideas and theories are actively studied, and the psychological principles and laws he developed are widely used both in Russia and abroad. In the work "The Psychology of Art," Lev Vygotsky examines the psychological basis for the emergence of a work of art — its nature and the mechanism of aesthetic reaction, art as cognition. The book analyzes various forms of art, as well as different works of varying form and content: Shakespeare's play "Hamlet," the fables of I. Krylov, and the short story by I. Bunin "A Light Breath." Through the search for the aesthetic grain and its psychological description, the author demonstrates what makes an artistic creation a work of art.