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The Quality of Art:

Consonance

by Chris Sunami

Consonance is a measure of how well the elements in an artwork match up with each other. The more those elements work together or harmonize, the more Consonant the artwork. An artwork with a high degree of Consonance is potentially more valuable than one with a low degree of Consonance because it presents as a more complete or effective solution to the problem it solves.

An artwork with a high degree of Consonance is described in ordinary language as “pretty” or “attractive.” The Consonance of an artwork is chiefly a function of the artist’s technical expertise and training, and so we often describe it as “craft” or “craftsmanship”. Typically, craft includes a mastery of styles and conventions, a developed sense of perception, an education in the great works of the field, and an attention to the technical details. For example,although Pablo Picasso is best known for his seemingly free-form cubist pictures, his more realist work reveals him as a master of the technicalities of his craft.

Consonances are relationships or alignments between the elements of an object. The stronger those relationships, the higher the object’s overall Consonance. In general Consonance affects the audiences immediate reaction to an artwork. Artworks with high degrees of Consonance are generally described with terms such as “harmonious”, whereas those with low degrees of Consonance are described as “ugly,” “artless” or “amateurish”. Artworks with high degrees of Consonance are experienced as more positive and inviting, and they inspire more uniform reactions from their audiences. The Consonance of the artwork serves as an advertisement for its success as model for solving problems.

In the above example, if the fish is painted in an ultrarealistic fashion it will create one kind of Consonance --a visual consonance between the painting and its subject. However, the establishment of one consonance can mean the destruction of another. A realistic painting of the fish has no clear consonance between the materials used and the final product, whereas a less realistic version of the same painting (utilizing visible brushstrokes or blobs of paint) might be more consonant with the materials, although at the price of being less visually consonant.
An artwork with a lot of Consonance, but little Tension or other artistic qualities might be described as hyperconsonant. Such artworks are produced by artists with a high degree of craft, but little artistry or creativity. Artworks with this quality are perceived as mechanical, overproduced or uninteresting. The effect they produce on the audience is a period of initial appeal, followed by distaste. A good example is the boy-band hits of the early 2000's, or the work of Thomas Kinkade.

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