Bored Panda spoke to Lisa Yaszek, a Regents Professor of Science Fiction Studies at Georgia Tech who shared some very interesting interpretations of the Accidental Renaissance concept that has gained almost a cult-like following online. Yaszek specializes in researching and teaching science fiction as a global language crossing centuries, continents, and cultures.

We asked Yaszek why is Accidental Renaissance, the idea that photos are just like classical paintings, so appealing? “People are fascinated with photos that look like classic art because they allow us to connect some of the most prosaic moments of everyday modern life with the greater sweep of history. When we think about “Great Art,” we think of it as something removed from us in time and space—a “masterpiece” created long ago and far away that was and still is cherished by entire societies,” the professor explained.

Moreover, “when we think of ‘Great Artists,’ we tend to think of people who differ from ourselves and our friends in terms of talent, training, and time to be creative. By way of contrast, we tend to think of our own photography – especially in the era of smartphones, which can record thousands of images with a simple click of the button – as relatively amateur and disposable,” Yaszek told Bored Panda.

The Accidental Renaissance community on Reddit was born 8 years ago. The subreddit was inspired by an original post shared in August 2014 that showed a photograph of a fight in the Ukrainian Parliament.

According to the professor, “Sometimes we are lucky, or we practice, or we show a flash of skill, and we take photos that look every bit as provocative and beautiful as the images we see in art galleries and museums!” Yaszek argues that “it’s an exciting moment that connects us to history and that reminds us we can be creators as well as consumers of culture.”

“In fact, when people post their photos to the ‘Accidental Renaissance’ subreddit, they allow others to connect to history and to be creative as well! It’s fun to read the various comments for each photo, as different posters show off their knowledge of 14th-19th century European art by analyzing various images in terms of color, composition, theme, and lighting,” Yaszek explained.

The appeal of Accidental Renaissance has to do with the fact that it reminds us that art is not just something made by trained professionals for a few select members of society, but that art is something that can be created, studied, and communally shared by all, the professor argues. And this is the endearing beauty of it.

“It’s interesting to note that the most popular images on the Accidental Renaissance subreddit come in one of two forms: they tend to be either highly saturated, dramatically lit crowds of people, animals, or architecture or highly saturated, dramatically lit scenes of politicians and celebrities. The former are fairly easy to explain: people, animals, and architecture have long been the subject of art!”

Yaszek explained that during the Middle Ages, European artists tended toward flat, symbolic representation. “As artists of the 14th-19th centuries returned to the values of Greek and Roman antiquity — including an emphasis on harmony, symmetry, and proportion — their representations of classic subjects became increasingly realistic and, eventually, even what we call ‘photo-realistic.’”

Therefore, it’s no surprise that sometimes we take photos, either by accident or by design, that look like classic European paintings!

“Photos of famous people are a slightly more complex variation on the same theme,” Yaszek argues. She continued: “On the one hand, part of our fascination with photos of famous people that look like classic art might well come from the seeming incongruity of the scene: it can be shocking to look at what seems to be a very old image and then realize that there is a contemporary politician or celebrity in the middle of it! But on the other hand, we might remember that artists have created representations of famous people for as long as famous people have existed.”

“Painted portraits of Egyptian rulers date back at least 5000 years, and the ancient Romans regularly commissioned public sculptures of politicians and military leaders to celebrate their accomplishments.”

Therefore, according to Yaszek, “in some important ways, artistic photos of contemporary celebrities allow us, as modern people, to participate in yet another very old human tradition that connects us across centuries, continents, and cultures,” she concluded.

In a previous interview, we spoke with the moderator Openminded_skeptic who happily shared some insights into this now iconic corner of Reddit. “Several people in the post expressed interest in a subreddit featuring photos that accidentally resembled Renaissance art (although the actual photo technically is more along the lines of Baroque art in coloring and lighting, the Golden Ratio spiral superimposed on it notwithstanding), and this subreddit was created.”

Readers with attention to detail will notice that the community not only shares photographs that resemble or have elements of Renaissance, but include different art movements and styles too. “The definition of 'Renaissance' has expanded to cover art styles from the 14th-19th centuries as the sub has risen in popularity,” Openminded_skeptic told us previously. Today, the community shares pictures that have a resemblance to anything from Baroque to the Golden Dutch Age.

Meanwhile, the most popular subjects shared on the subreddit seem to depict scenes with crowds of people. They may be “doing things like protesting, marching for a cause, or otherwise expressing themselves; highly saturated photos of people, livestock, or interesting architecture featuring chiaroscuro and, many times, sun or light rays highlighting a portion of the photo,” the mod explained a while back.

He added that photographs that feature politicians and world leaders are also very popular among members of the community.