University Federal Savings and Loan

¶ … University Federal Savings and Loan of Seattle launched its "smiley face" advertisement campaign, it generally assumed that the smiley face was a universal sign of happiness. However, when one looks at the use of the smile in art over the course of history, one finds that the smile has not always been associated with happiness. For instance, Da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" has an enigmatic smile that has been interpreted in different ways over the centuries. The smile of the Mona Lisa "enlists the complicity of the beholder and thus has been a sort of Rorschach image onto which succeeding generations have projected their fantasies.[footnoteRef:1] (Lumpkin 1999, 15) However, modern scientists, including Charles Darwin, have begun to recognize the smile as a physiological signal, and have created two categories of smiles: the "true" smile and the "false" smile. But this has not always been the case as demonstrated by the interpretation of smiles on ancient Greek art. Interpretations of the smiles on ancient Greek artwork have generally concentrated on the subject having attained some "transcendent secret knowledge," like the images of smiles on eastern religious figures such as the Buddha.[footnoteRef:2] (Lumpkin 1999, 21) [1: Lumpkin, Libby. Deep Design: Nine Little Art Histories. (Los Angeles: Art Issues, 1999), 15.] [2: Lumpkin, Libby. Deep Design: Nine Little Art Histories. (Los Angeles: Art Issues, 1999), 21.]

The modern artistic interpretation of the smile can be demonstrated by 17th century artist Charles La Brun. He categorized smiles into three categories, smiles generated from: "love, & #8230;joy, [and] & #8230;ecstasy;" but none were directly associated with the expression of the common human emotion of happiness.[footnoteRef:3] (Lumpkin 1999, 23) It was the Dutch painter, Frans Hals, who first transferred the smile in art from an enigmatic display to the reflection of human happiness. Hals painted smiles on the faces of many of his common subjects who were engaged in activities which were generally seen as making people happy. While some reject this interpretation, the idea that happiness generated smiles did seem to be absorbed by many in the Enlightenment, and then associated with the idea that every person was entitled to be "happy." Personal happiness has since become a primary ideal of Western political thought with the idea that the government is there to secure people's freedom and their ability to find happiness. The smiley face image has since been incorporated into modern American society as a symbol of happiness, whatever that happiness may entail, and many project their ideas of happiness onto the symbol. But the symbol is so simple and universal it will continue to exist despite those who attempt to assign a definition to it. [3: Lumpkin, Libby. Deep Design: Nine Little Art Histories. (Los Angeles: Art Issues, 1999), 23.]

While many in the modern world associate artistic smiles with happiness, the article points out that this has not always been the case. In the past, smiles have been associated with many other things like the fulfillment of desire or the attainment of secret knowledge. Smiles were used to give the subject of the artwork something more than the viewer had. However, in nature, smiles have always been the reaction of people who were expressing feelings of happiness. And while this reaction can be simulated with a "false" smile, natural, or "true" smiles have only recently become a symbol of happiness.