There will be a seminar tomorrow at 4:00pm in the Seminar Room, 58  
Hillhead Street. All welcome.

SPEAKER: Prof. Patrick Cavanagh, Laboratoire Psychologie de la  
Perception,

Universite Paris Descartes

(invited by Petra Vetter)

TITLE: The Artist as Neuroscientist

ABSTRACT:

A piece of art can trigger many emotions and impressions, many of them  
just as the artist intended. However, the same painting may also  
reveal, unintentionally, much about the workings of the brain: how the  
brain recovers the light and space and surfaces that we see. Painters  
often stray from photorealistic styles, taking liberties with the  
rules of physics to achieve a more effective painting. Critically,  
some of these transgressions of physics such as impossible shadows,  
shapes, or reflections go unnoticed by viewers – these undetected  
errors are the ones that tell us which rules of physics actually count  
for visual perception. As artists find the rules they can break  
without penalty, they act as research neuroscientists and we have only  
to look at their paintings to uncover and appreciate their  
discoveries. Which means that 40,000 years of art also counts as  
40,000 years of documented, neuroscience research, a record unmatched  
in any other discipline. We will survey art from cave paintings to the  
modern era and show how to do “science by looking”, unlocking the  
discoveries in art every time you give a painting a second, knowing  
look.

Dr. David R. Simmons
Lecturer
School of Psychology
University of Glasgow
58 Hillhead Street
Glasgow G12 8QB
Tel: +44 (0)141 330 3612
Fax: +44 (0)141 330 4606
e-mail: [log in to unmask]

The University of Glasgow, charity number SC004401