Stantne in imaginum classibus animi motus? A study on the ability of Iconclass to decipher the visual language of emotions in classical imagery

This paper explores the intersection of iconography, iconology, and sentic computing to enhance the analysis and understanding of artworks. We focus on the Greek mythology associated with the Trojan War, which lends itself to highly diverse visual interpretations over many centuries, and exploit the availability of imagery annotated with Iconclass, a widely used taxonomy of visual art themes, figures, and concepts. Our study consists of a quantitative analysis with non-expert annotators and a qualitative study with art historians. The results show that laypersons agree on emotions derived from the iconography in universally tragic events, while expert knowledge boosts consensus in cases where emotional resonance depends on context. Both studies converge on a need to integrate an iconological layer with the one for which Iconclass is usually employed, in order to enrich the cataloging, analysis, and understanding of artworks. Our work contributes to broader discussions about innovative and inclusive practices in art classification, highlighting the need for a holistic approach that accommodates both intellectual and affective dimensions in visual art as in text.