Aversive Aesthetics

Aversion has a paradoxical effect: as much as we want to run away from disgusting things, we feel attracted to them as well. There is something so tantalising in the shock that we watch movies we don't want to see, sniff at things we don't want to smell and listen to stories we don't want to hear. Merel Witteman has studied ways of harnessing the invitation that lies hidden in repulsion to come to a new way of storytelling. Her research is aimed at enriching the aesthetic by triggering an aversive emotion: disgust.