An album of SNOW PAINTINGS and PRINTS

 

Stanley BADMIN

Stanley SPENCER

Pieter BRUEGEL

Eyvind EARLE

V&A

peter brook

maxfield parrish

... to be continued, as & when ...

A SCRAPBOOK OF THE HUMAN BRAIN ... I read THE PURPOSIVE BRAIN by RAGNAR GRANIT back in the 1970s ... the brain seems to run multiple functions simultaneously of which we aren't properly conscious, until things go wrong ... and I've read other bits and pieces over the years, but I've never consolidated all the stuff I barely understood ... so I'm starting a scrapbook instead of making a scholarly inquiry ...

Wikipedia provides a well structured introduction ... this in itself, if all the useful links were followed, would keep a serious student busy for months

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_brain

What has intrigued me most is the ability of the brain, when temporarily freed from normal constraints, to generate dreams and visual illusions of great beauty.

Over the years, i've valued those experiences just as much as any of the tangible moments that real life has provided.

So, I'll be adding scraps day-by-day ... onwards & upwards boys & girls !

JAMES TURRELL'S TRICK

an experience akin to a fast hallucination is provoked in this apparatus ...

laying flat on your back, you are confined within a white sphere and your entire visual field is exposed to a slow succession of saturated colours, graduating imperceptibly from one colour to another for several minutes

the mind is lulled in your physical isolation

then there is a rapid firing of ( maybe ) ten white strobes in ( maybe ) two seconds

this induces a false perception ... a cascade of fractured shards of prismatic colours that seem to form symmetrical structures within a larger illusory space that throb with energy for a few moments until the mind regains it grasp of reality and you are released from your period of confinement

those shards of colour were entirely illusory, created within your head by a kind of visual shock

https://www.lacma.org/art/exhibition/james-turrell-light-reignfall

ELECTROENCEPHALOGRAPHY ... BRAINWAVE STUDY

electroencephalography is used to search for abnormal electrical activity, and also reveals underlying rhythms in the brain's normal and resting states

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electroencephalography

BRAIN MAPPING

OLIVER SACKS

wrote THE MAN WHO MISTOOK HIS WIFE FOR A HAT

demonstrating the flimsiness of the mental fabrics we call reason and sanity

whilst emphasising the need for humour and compassion and an open mind

DANIEL KAHNEMAN

wrote THINKING FAST AND SLOW a very long examination of what he'd learned about the pitfulls of INSTINCT & INTUITION when they conflict with reason, and with reasonable caution

COGNITIVE DISSONANCE

I picked up this concept from an old Leon Festinger article in Scientific American

My take is ... it is about how we often carry on when things are not right, and about the damage that we then inflict on ourselves

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance

... to be continued, as & when ...

THE SCROLL OF EIGHTY SEVEN IMMORTALS

 The “Scroll of Eighty-Seven Immortals” is believed to be a silk line drawing created by Tang-Dynasty artist Wu Daozi (c. AD 680–759). It’s currently housed at the Xu Beihong Memorial Museum in #Beijing. This artwork vanished from history for several centuries before being rediscovered by Xu Beihong (1895–1953) in a foreigner’s home.

Xu Beihong treasured the piece deeply; he carried it with him everywhere. He even stamped it with his personal seal, “Beihong’s Life,” symbolising his strong connection with the painting. Thanks to him, the artwork has been preserved and passed down to future generations.