DOCUMENTATION
CONTEXTUALISATION POSTS
A window into the soul.
This is a theme that has been continuously developed by many different artist and theorists. Most commonly through the quote, “eyes are the windows to the soul”. (A quote I completely agree with.)
There is a lot of debate over who was the first to say it..
It’s been attributed to Shakespeare, Leonardo DaVinci and others. A few of those I could find are listed here:
“The eye is the window of the soul, the mouth the door. The intellect, the will, are seen in the eye; the emotions, sensibilities, and affections, in the mouth. The animals look for man’s intentions right into his eyes. Even a rat, when you hunt him and bring him to bay, looks you in the eye.” Hiram Powers, American sculptor (1805 – 1873)
“I need no dictionary of quotations to remind me that the eyes are the windows of the soul.” Max Beerbohm
“Perhaps in all too many cases they are full of ancient traditional hokum from the culture about the eyes being the windows of the soul, and things being seen in them that might not otherwise be revealed — which seems to be one of the most misguided ideas I’ve ever known.” Sullivan, H. S. (1954). The Psychiatric Interview. New York: Norton. p. 5-6.
“The eyes of our souls only then begin to see, when our bodily eyes are closing.” Law.
“Thou sun, of this great world both eye and soul.” Milton.
“They say that the eye is the window to the soul. But it is the soul that is the window.” Andrew Hamilton
“The eyes indicate the antiquity of the soul.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
http://www.bored.com/findquotes/cate_728…
http://answers.google.com/answers/thread…
http://www.giga-usa.com/quotes/authors/h…
http://wiki.answers.com/
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/soul?jss=0
http://quote.robertgenn.com/getquotes.php?catid=329
http://www.inspirationfalls.com/eyes-quotes/
This is a topic I wish to explore within my art as I feel it embodies all of my desired themes.
Psychological Properties Of Colours
Through my research into the colours ‘energy’ that is used in chakra healing, I have begun to investigate the psychological properties colours have in western society. Through my findings (asking friends/family, online research) this is what the most common themes are for each colour:
RED. Physical
Positive: Physical courage, strength, warmth, energy, basic survival, ‘fight or flight’, stimulation, masculinity, excitement.
Negative: Defiance, aggression, visual impact, strain.
Being the longest wavelength, red is a powerful colour. Although not technically the most visible, it has the property of appearing to be nearer than it is and therefore it grabs our attention first. Hence, its effectiveness in traffic lights the world over. Its effect is physical; it stimulates us and raises the pulse rate. It relates to the masculine principle and can activate the “fight or flight” instinct. Red is strong, and very basic. Pure red is the simplest colour, with no subtlety. It is stimulating and lively, very friendly. At the same time, it can be perceived as demanding and aggressive.
BLUE. Intellectual.
Positive: Intelligence, communication, trust, efficiency, serenity, duty, logic, coolness, reflection, calm.
Negative: Coldness, aloofness, lack of emotion, unfriendliness.
Blue is the colour of the mind and is essentially soothing; it affects us mentally, rather than the physical reaction we have to red. Strong blues will stimulate clear thought and lighter, soft blues will calm the mind and aid concentration. Consequently, it is serene and mentally calming. It is the colour of clear communication. Blue objects do not appear to be as close to us as red ones. Time and again in research, blue is the world’s favourite colour. However, it can be perceived as cold, unemotional and unfriendly.
YELLOW. Emotional
Positive: Optimism, confidence, self-esteem, extraversion, emotional strength, friendliness, creativity.
Negative: Irrationality, fear, emotional fragility, depression, anxiety, suicide.
The yellow wavelength is relatively long and essentially stimulating. In this case, the stimulus is emotional, therefore, yellow is the strongest colour, psychologically. The right yellow will lift our spirits and our self-esteem; it is the colour of confidence and optimism.
GREEN. Balance
Positive: Harmony, balance, refreshment, universal love, rest, restoration, reassurance, environmental awareness, equilibrium, peace.
Negative: Boredom, stagnation, blandness, enervation.
Green strikes the eye in such a way as to require no adjustment whatever and is, therefore, restful. Being in the centre of the spectrum, it is the colour of balance – a more important concept than many people realise. When the world about us contains plenty of green, this indicates the presence of water, and little danger of famine, so we are reassured by green, on a primitive level.
VIOLET. Spiritual
Positive: Spiritual awareness, containment, vision, luxury, authenticity, truth, quality.
Negative: Introversion, decadence, suppression, inferiority.
The shortest wavelength is violet, often described as purple. It takes awareness to a higher level of thought, even into the realms of spiritual values. It is highly introvertive and encourages deep contemplation, or meditation. It has associations with royalty and usually communicates the finest possible quality. Being the last visible wavelength before the ultra-violet ray, it has associations with time and space and the cosmos.
ORANGE.
Positive: Physical comfort, food, warmth, security, sensuality, passion, abundance, fun.
Negative: Deprivation, frustration, frivolity, immaturity.
Since it is a combination of red and yellow, orange is stimulating and reaction to it is a combination of the physical and the emotional. It focuses our minds on issues of physical comfort – food, warmth, shelter etc. – and sensuality. It is a ‘fun’ colour. Equally, too much orange suggests frivolity and a lack of serious intellectual values.
PINK.
Positive: Physical tranquillity, nurture, warmth, femininity, love, sexuality, survival of the species.
Negative: Inhibition, emotional claustrophobia, emasculation, physical weakness.
Being a tint of red, pink also affects us physically, but it soothes, rather than stimulates. (Interestingly, red is the only colour that has an entirely separate name for its tints. Tints of blue, green, yellow, etc. are simply called light blue, light greenetc.) Pink is a powerful colour, psychologically. It represents the feminine principle, and survival of the species; it is nurturing and physically soothing.
BLACK.
Positive: Sophistication, glamour, security, emotional safety, efficiency, substance.
Negative: Oppression, coldness, menace, heaviness.
Black is all colours, totally absorbed. The psychological implications of that are considerable. It creates protective barriers, as it absorbs all the energy coming towards you, and it enshrouds the personality. Black is essentially an absence of light, since no wavelengths are reflected and it can, therefore, be menacing; many people are afraid of the dark. Positively, it communicates absolute clarity, with no fine nuances. It communicates sophistication and uncompromising excellence and it works particularly well with white. Black creates a perception of weight and seriousness.
WHITE.
Positive: Hygiene, sterility, clarity, purity, cleanness, simplicity, sophistication, efficiency.
Negative: Sterility, coldness, barriers, unfriendliness, elitism.
Just as black is total absorption, so white is total reflection. In effect, it reflects the full force of the spectrum into our eyes. Thus, it also creates barriers, but differently from black, and it is often a strain to look at. It communicates, “Do not touch!” White is purity and, like black, uncompromising; it is clean, hygienic, and sterile. The concept of sterility can also be negative. Visually, white gives a heightened perception of space.
BROWN.
Positive: Seriousness, warmth, Nature, earthiness, reliability, support.
Negative: Lack of humour, heaviness, lack of sophistication.
Brown usually consists of red and yellow, with a large percentage of black. Consequently, it has much of the same seriousness as black, but is warmer and softer. It has elements of the red and yellow properties. Brown has associations with the earth and the natural world. It is a solid, reliable colour and most people find it quietly supportive – more positively than the ever-popular black, which is suppressive, rather than supportive.
Responding To Colour
Colour and Emotions People attach different meanings to colours. The psychological basis for understanding colour and its influence on emotions is not well understood. There is no simple explanation for the interaction of colour and emotional response. Some evidence suggests that the light of different colours enters the eye and indirectly affects the hypothalamus, which in turn affects the pituitary gland. The pituitary gland controls the hormone Educational programmes of the Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service serve all people regardless of race, colour, age, sex, religion, disability, or national origin. 2 levels and perhaps thus our moods. Some experiments have suggested that colour may influence our emotions. One experiment showed that in a room coloured in red light, time was overestimated while in green or blue light, time was underestimated. In another study, workers lifting black boxes complained they were too heavy; but when the boxes were painted green they felt lighter. During the Middle Ages, Blackfriars Bridge in London, a gloomy black structure, was noted for its record number of suicides until the bridge was painted bright green. However, attempts to establish scientifically the effects of colour on the mind have not been conclusive. Reactions to colour may be very individual and due to associations. Red walls may reassure some while causing discomfort for others.
Colour Therapy
Colour therapy is based on the belief of chakras, predominantly found in Hinduism and Tantric Buddhism. It is a complementary therapy for which there is evidence dating back thousands of years to the ancient cultures of Egypt, China and India.
As I have been exploring the use of colour in our dreams and through brain scans and micro images of our neuro cells, it seemed only right that I should explore the chakras as they are based on the power and effects that colour has on and within our bodies.
Colour is simply light of varying wavelengths, and so each colour has its own particular wavelength and energy.
“The energy relating to each of the seven spectrum colours of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet, resonates with the energy of each of the seven main chakras/energy centres of the body. If you can imagine the chakras as a set of cogs/wheels, they are rather like the workings of a clock or an engine; each cog/wheel needs to move smoothly for the clock/engine to work properly. Thus, good health and wellbeing is achieved by a balance of all these energies.” colour therapy healing
According to this belief, the balance of the energy in each of the body’s chakras is very important for health and wellbeing. Colour therapy can help to re-balance and/or stimulate these energies by applying the appropriate colour to the body and therefore re-balance our chakras.
As I am looking into making a body of work that can evoke an emotional response from the viewer, I will create a layout within my art, based on each of the relative colour meanings.
Consciousness and Cognition – Do we dream in colour?
Having looked at the physical colours within our bodies (through the ‘Bodies’ exhibition) and those expressed through artists, like Elizabeth Jameson and Jason Snyder. I wanted to explore how/ if/ why we dream in colour.
Having read two recent studies (Schredl et al. 2008; Murzyn 2008) which simplified to a short summary amounted to, both researchers asked general questions about people’s dreams and also had people answer questions about their dreams in “dream diaries” immediately upon waking in the morning.
First, both studies confirm that college-age respondents these days rarely report black-and-white dreams, either when asked about their dreams in general or when completing dream diaries. Murzyn finds that older respondents (aged about 55-75 years) more commonly report black and white dreams, but even in this group, the rates of reported black and white dreams (22%) don’t approach the levels of 50 or 60 years ago.
Both Schredl and Murzyn find that people with better overall dream recall report more coloured and less black and white dreaming. Schredl also finds that people with better recall of colour in (waking) visual displays report more colour in dreams. On the face of it, this might suggest that reports of black and white dreams come from less credible reporters; but it could just be that the kind of people who dream in black and white are the kind of people who dream less often and less vividly and are less interested in color memory tasks; or black and white dreams may generally be less detailed.
From this research, I have concluded that the vast majority of people who report dreams report them in colour, I myself have always dreamt in colour (from what I can remember anyway!). So I would like to include the most vivid colours in my body of work based on the consciousness to reflect this.
Nobuhiro Nakanishi
Having wanted to add another dimension to my art, I looked into carving into form boards and painting the negative space. However this created a number of issues as the board wasn’t absorbent enough to use as a canvas and the uneven texture of the carved board was lost when it was covered in a material that could be used as a canvas, even with these issues solved the negative space was still too dark to properly portray the detail of the painting without installing some form of lighting.
From this failed experiment I began looking for another mean of representing a 3D object, that would still give the viewer a sense of curiosity. Which lead to the exploration of layered glass and artwork like, Nobuhiro Nakanishi’s ‘Layered Drawings’.
Nakanishi uses a laser print to mount his photos onto plexiglass acrylic. Creating a sense of fluidity that I work like to create in my own work.
“The theme of my work is: the physical that permeates into the art piece,” he says. “In a foggy landscape, we no longer see what we are usually able to see – the distance to the traffic light, the silhouette of the trees, the slope of the ground. Silhouettes, distance and horizontal sense all become vague. When we perceive this vagueness, the water inside the retina and skin dissolve outwardly toward the infinite space of the body surface. The landscape continues to flow, withholding us from grasping anything solid. By capturing spatial change and the infinite flow of time, I strive to produce art that creates movement between the artwork itself and the viewer’s experience of the artwork.”
Jason Snyder
Neurogenesis– the creation of new neurons in the brain– was conventionally believed to only occur in the growing brains of infants and children. In the 1960s, data started appearing that showed the birth of new neurons in adult, fully formed brains. Now, 40 years later, adult neurogenesis is one of the more robust fields of study in the neurosciences.
Jason Snyder studies adult neurogenesis in Heather Cameron’s lab at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, MD. Snyder’s research focuses on neurogenesis in the hippocampus, highlighting the role of these new neurons in such fundamental behaviors as memory formation and learning.
In his earlier days, Snyder was a student of electrophysiological techniques for studying the brain, and admired the simple, elegant aesthetic of the technology: “I remember pasting a voltage waveform on my bedroom wall because…those curves were beautiful!”
He has a sharp eye for the compelling, unusual forms of brain tissue and uses a beautiful array of staining techniques to highlight young neurons and answer questions relating to neurophysiological results of neurogenesis.
In deciding how to crop these images and which colors to use to visually distinguish certain cells from the surrounding chaos of brain tissue, Snyder’s work toes the line between a hard science goal with great explanatory value and a more artistic mentality in the science’s visual presentation. The art and science go together: a stunning visual can make for a stunning revelation about the structure and function of cells and regions of the brain, and can emotionally move us with its sheer beauty, perhaps steering us towards a lifetime of studying the brain.
http://thebeautifulbrain.com/2010/11/gallery-the-art-of-neuroscience-vol-iii/
Elizabeth Jameson
Having seen Elizabeth’s work in Edinburgh’s centre for regenerative medicine, I thought it would be very relevant to my practice so I started to explore her other works.
A bit about her…
Elizabeth Jameson found her art when her own brain lost one of its most basic functions. After suddenly finding herself unable to speak, Jameson was diagnosed with MS in 1991. She soon came to know the geography of her own mind through countless MRI sessions. Jameson felt a hunger to step beyond her career as a lawyer and reinterpret this medical imagery, adding an artistic treatment to her brain scans in what has become a unique form of portraiture. Jameson writes that her MS inspires her “to create images that provide new insights into the brain and, at the same time, makes medical imaging and its representative humanity more accessible to both medical professionals and others who view these revealing pictures.” Most recently, the Harvard Center for Brain Science commissioned the installation of four of Jameson’s paintings.
Her art is focused on her own brain scans, from her MS diagnoses. What made them stand out to me was her use of vivid colours to explore such a dark disease. It has made me question the difference of how our bodies look so visually different from both the physical inside and outside, but also through the physical and mental states. I would like to explore this further in my own art, possibly investigating how are mental ‘inside’ can be represented through our physical ‘outside’. Possibly exploring how our backgrounds with society and culture affect how we present this ‘outside’.
Greg A. Dunn
An artist who has greatly inspired my work this year is Greg Dunn he is a visual artist and has a Ph.D in neuroscience. He work is very natural and looks both like a branching pattern of a plant and a neuron. His work looks at “the cellular architecture of each square millimeter of our nervous system, architecture that repeats itself all around us” (taken from his website).
I will be working his influence into my own work.
Catherine Wilson 