LSD and Creativity
Oscar Janiger, Marlene Dobkin De Rios
Journal of Psychoactive Drugs 1989 DOI: 10.1080/02791072.1989.10472150 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Experimental study Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Population | Artists |
| Intervention | Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) |
| Duration | One hour after ingestion |
| Topics | LSD |
| Keywords | Creativity Depiction Aesthetics Style visual arts |
| Citations | 29 |
| Key findings | LSD ingestion shifted artists' styles from representational or abstract toward more expressionistic or nonobjective approaches, with changes in size, color, and composition. |
Abstract
The effects of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) on creativity were examined in a unique experiment in the late 1950's. In this project, artists were asked to draw and paint a Kachina doll both prior to and one hour after the ingestion of LSD. Evaluations of these artistic productions were analyzed by a professor of art history in order to investigate the impact of LSD on artistic creativity. Certain representative changes were found in the artists' predominant style. The most significant change was noted in those artists whose styles were intrinsically representational or abstract to more expressionistic or nonobjective. Other changes noted included the following: relative size expansion; involution; movement; alteration of figure/ground and boundaries; greater intensity of color and light; oversimplification; symbolic and abstract depiction of objects; and fragmentation, disorganization, and distortion. Many artists judged their LSD productions to be more interesting and aesthetically superior to their usual mode of expression. The above-mentioned changes contributed to the artists' convictions that they were fashioning new meanings to an emergent world.