horror vacui

noun
/ˈhɒɹ.ə ˈvæ.kjuː.aɪ/UK/ˈhɔɹ.ɚ ˈvæ.kju.aɪ/US

Etymology

From Latin horror vacuī (“fear of empty space”), from horror (“horror, fear”) + vacuum (“vacuum”).

  1. borrowed from horror vacuī

Definitions

  1. The Aristotelian principle that there are no vacuums in nature.

  2. The abhorrence of a vacuum

    The abhorrence of a vacuum; the general tendency to dislike empty space.

    • It is merely the horror vacui of human reason in general which leads it to recoil when it comes across an idea about which no thought is possible, […]
  3. In particular, the tendency of an artist (or of art) to fill an entire surface with…

    In particular, the tendency of an artist (or of art) to fill an entire surface with detail, leaving no blank space.

    • The Where's Wally? series exhibits horror vacui.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for horror vacui. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA