Multifractal comparison of the painting techniques of adults and children

Statistical analysis of art, particularly of the abstract genre, is becoming an increasingly important tool for understanding the image creation process. We present a multifractal clustering analysis of non-representational images painted by adults and children using a ‘pouring’ technique. The effective dimensions (D0) are measured for each, as is the associated multifractal depth ΔD = D0 D∞. It is shown that children create paintings whose dimensions D0 are less than those created by adults. The effective dimensions for adult painters tend to cluster around 1.8, while those for children assume typical values of 1.6. In a similar fashion, the multifractal depths for images painted by adults and children show statistically-significant differences in their values. Adult paintings show a relatively shallow depth (ΔD ~ 0.02), while children’s paintings show a much greater depth (ΔD ~ 0.1). Given that the ‘pouring’ technique reflects the body motions of the artist, the results suggest that the differences in the paintings’ fractal characteristics are potential indicators of artist physiology.