Gestalt History

Gestalt was first introduced in philosophy and psychology in 1890 by Christian von Ehrenfels and then evolved by Max Wertheimer in the early 20th Century. It was partially a response to structuralism of Wilhem Wundt. While structuralism, on a basic level, analyzes the different parts of a whole and tries to understand the whole by looking for patterns between those parts, Gestalt looks at the whole and attempts to draw an understanding starting from the entirety.

A toy Wertheimer purchased, called a stroboscope, inspired the development of Gestalt psychology. A stroboscope can be equated to a modern day strobe light. When the light flashes, we see what appears to be a “still” image, but of course there is movement between these still images. Where structuralism looked at the relationship between each of these still images to make meaning, Gestalt looks at the whole “motion picture” in its entirety.