this is a good explanation (from a solid book called understanding comics by scott mccloud) of the power of using simplified imagery, this is a huge part of why i gravitated towards my own style + certain art forms that reach deeper into the mind of the viewer (imo) than realism
its somewhat platonic in that ur brain has an image of a bird in it thats unlike what ur eye sees when it sees a bird. if ur a visual artist u can speak to + manipulate this part of the brain rather than the part hooked up to the eyes that registers photographic style information
this is something some sufic and islamic artists dealt with (as well), flipped to be about theology instead of the individuals mind, but thats not really my area of expertise. sometimes they talk about drawing a horse as god sees a horse, not as an individual man sees one.
in this sense a simplified image of a sword actually looks more like a sword than a photographic style image, to your inner mind. this is part of why imo medieval style non realistic art is actually more advanced and complex than simply recording the visual input ur eyes take in
kind of review but since im always pumping the symbolism thing, there are cave paintings that are so realistic we know exactly what sub species of the animal it was. its intuitive to make things realistic but more advanced to symbolically encode their essence into an image, etc
