What to Bring Home From the Art Fair

It's summer and art fairs are springing up all over North America. What should you bring home to display on your mantel?

Psychologists can predict what will be snapped up the fastest. Worldwide, people's favorite color is blue, so art that's heavy on blue is apt to be on its way to a new home soonest. Colors that are high in saturation and brightness boost your mood - and put you in the zone to buy. More saturated colors are truer representations of a hue - fire engine red is more saturated than maroon.

Depending on your personality, you'll like certain artworks more than others, and the tone that you're trying to set should also influence the art you select.

First the personality part. If you are more open to new experiences than others, or have a higher need for uniqueness, it's much more likely that you'll spring for an unusual piece of art - and be happy with your choice the next day. Sensation seekers, who vigorously search out experiences, will go all the way to abstract art more probably than those who are less attuned to adventure.

There are more extraverts in the population than introverts, so artwork that appeals to them will sell slightly faster. Extraverts are energized by, and focused on, the world around them, while introverts get the same sort of charge from their own inner thought world. The extraverts among you will be drawn to more stimulating images, those with saturated but less bright colors, for example. Introverts will appreciate works with colors that are not as saturated and are brighter, tones that are generally classified as pastel. Anything that animates an object will be a hit with extraverts - from changing lights to whirling parts - and adding another sensory experience, such as scent, to a piece of art makes them even happier. Shiny surfaces are also popular with extraverts, but not so desirable to introverts. Some researchers believe that extraverts are not as good at processing sensory information as introverts and that's why they crave more of it.

More people in the population feel that their life is controlled by fate than by their own actions. People who feel more in control of their destiny generally prefer more rectilinear shapes, while those who feel that their lives are controlled by fate prefer more curvilinear ones. Cubist art given to people in the second group finds a new home pretty quickly.

Next, it matters what you're trying to accomplish with a piece of art. The art related repercussions of personality outlined above will influence exactly how you choose to implement the material that follows. An artwork that relaxes an extravert may energize an introvert, for example.

If you want art you are buying to make a place seem more relaxing, go with the not so saturated and brighter color palettes; if you want the piece to energize a space, go with a more saturated, less bright palette. Colors that are across the color wheel from each other - red and green, orange and blue - when used in combination have a more energizing effect. Colors beside each other on the color wheel - blue and green, yellow and green - are generally more relaxing combinations. Red, at least in North America, has a lot of associations that adversely affect cognitive performance - so it's not a good color for art in a home office or a work cubicle.

People, whatever their thoughts on fate, generally find curved shapes more relaxing to be around than pointy ones, so they are better for art in places you want to relax. "V" shapes, particularly those that are higher from the floor are particularly ominous.

Realistic nature scenes (photographs or paintings), particularly those that show some sort of water, help mentally exhausted people restock their mental energy. The best scenes for mental revitalization have scattered groups of trees and meadow grasses between those trees. Jungle scenes with closely packed foliage won't produce the same sort of mental refreshment. It is even better if the nature scene has the viewer in a slightly elevated position, looking at a scene unfolding beneath him or her.

Using abstract art around people who are really ill can be a problem, particularly if those people may become delirious. It is easy for people in an altered state of consciousness to see danger in those abstract forms.

Art affects how you experience a space and who you are affects how you experience art. Your home is your canvas; fill it with things that make it a masterpiece.