Rothko, a Monkey and a Child . . .

walked into a bar . . ..  Just joking.

The next time you hear someone comment about an abstract expressionist painting, "My kid could have done that", you might share with them that research says otherwise.  When compared side by side with abstract paintings made by a child and a monkey, people with an untrained eye significantly preferred those painted by professional artists.

“People untrained in visual art see more than they realize when looking at abstract expressionist paintings,” Boston College psychologists Angelina Hawley-Dolan and Ellen Winner report in the journal Psychological Science.  

There you go.